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Copyright laws began with the development and widespread use of the Gutenberg printing press that facilitated comparatively fast and easy copying of books. The law was first enacted to allow authors and their printers to make a living from sales of copies of their books, and to stop pirate copying. As copying technology developed copyright laws expanded to incorporate sheet music, artwork, photographs, recorded music, film and software.
Copyright law aims to balance the interests of those who create content, with the public interest in having the widest possible access to that content. However, in the scholarly publishing industry large corporations often hold and exploit copyright to the detriment of both the creators and end users.
This short course on How copyright impacts human rights by UTS Open illustrates the problem.
UTS Open – Copyright and Human Rights (YouTube 0:42 min)
The rapid pace of technological advancements outstrips the slower process of legislative updates. The development of photography, mechanical music players and computer software have all challenged concepts around copyright. The internet is designed for sharing and distributing material; however, it comes with significant challenges in finding the balance between protecting the rights of creators and users access to information and innovation.
Issues include:
The challenges over copyright of content on the internet in the 1990’s resulted in the establishment of various open licencing initiatives based on earlier open content licences that were developed for software.
Generative AI is the latest challenge to copyright law.
Copyright legislation varies from country to country, but there is an international agreement, the Berne Convention to apply the copyright law of the country where a work is used regardless of where it was published. The Berne convention also sets minimum standards for copyright laws.
All countries recognise the need to balance the rights of both owners and users of information and culture, therefore copyright legislation includes clauses to limit copyright owners’ rights and allow exemptions for users. Different countries adopt different approaches leading to situations where copying a work from the internet may infringe copyright in one country but be legal elsewhere.
Fair dealing: In Australia, the Copyright Act lists the purposes and conditions for using copyright material without infringing the copyright owners rights. The UK, Canada and India all allow exceptions based on variations of ‘fair dealing’.
Fair use: In the US, use of copyright material is based on principles of ‘fairness’ rather than itemising specific purposes and conditions in the legislation. Precedent is set through case law.
Fair dealing provides greater clarity than ‘fair use’, however it is less adaptable and can limit development of new technologies. For example, the use of ‘free to read’ material on the internet for training large language models (LLM’s) may be considered ‘fair use’ in the US but is not permitted under ‘fair dealing’ in Australia.
World Map of copyright lawsuits v. AI (Mar. 29, 2025) by ChatGPTiseatingtheworld.com used under CC BY-NC-ND 4.0
Copyright protection lasts for a long time. In some cases, the copyright owner cannot be contacted or identified, however the work is still protected and cannot be re-used without permission. This creates a significant barrier for researchers, artists, and cultural institutions wishing to access and use these works.
The Attorney Generals Department manages copyright legislative reform and consultations in Australia. There are 5 main reform issues currently under consideration, all of which have implications for higher education and research:
Some advocates for copyright reform and open scholarship in Australia are: