Making Copies: The Impact of Photocopying on Copyright Law in Australia In recent years, there has been a growing interest in looking at the history of copyright law through the lens of different technologies. Rather than looking at the historical development of, for example, copyright defences, the development of a specific piece of legislation or the way in which copyright law as distinct body of law took shape, there is a growing interest in looking at the way in which copyright law was shaped and influenced by specific types of technology. This literature is based on the idea that by focusing on the way that the law responded to a particular technology, that this enables us to get a better sense of the way in which the different legal rules and procedures operate and intersect: something that tends to be lost in more focused doctrinal or policy accounts. While there have been a number of important studies that focus on the impact of specific technologies, notably the printing press, on the development of copyright law, there are many other technologies that have not been given the attention they deserve. The thesis aims to contribute to the growing body of copyright scholarship that looks at the impact that specific technologies have had on copyright law. More specifically, it aims to look at the impact that the photocopier had on the development of copyright law across the second half of twentieth century. In effect, the question that the thesis asks is: what impact did photocopying have on the development of copyright law in Australia? The thesis shows that in responding to the problems created photocopier, a number of important changes were made to copyright law. In addition to contributing to the introduction of published edition copyright, it will be argued that the photocopier not only led to the introduction of library copying provisions which have played and continue to play an important role in ensuring access to information, but also helped to clarify that the fair dealing defence extended beyond hand copying to include machine copies. As well as highlighting the impact that the photocopying licences, which were introduced to deal with multiple copies, had on copyright law, it will be also be argued that the photocopier led to other changes, such as the politicisation of literary copyright. In highlighting the various changes brought about as a result of the attempt to respond to the problems created by the photocopier, the thesis will highlight the important role that technological change has had on the development of copyright law.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:ADTP/279176 |
| Creators | Leanne Wiseman |
| Source Sets | Australiasian Digital Theses Program |
| Detected Language | English |
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