[Submitted by Tobias Schonwetter] Excerpt: We note that the 2017 Bill is, as far as the drafting is concerned — and subject to our specific comments below — a marked improvement to the 2015 Copyright Amendment Bill. Some technical drafting errors do, however, remain. In particular, in many sections of the Bill, the word “author” is used, sometimes with a list of others, instead of the term “rights owner” being used.
In our comments concerning the 2015 Bill, we expressly welcomed the proposed introduction of a more flexible and open fair use provision. We note with concern that the lawmaker has since decided to significantly reduce the provision’s utility by limiting its applicability to a closed list of permitted purposes. We strongly urge the lawmaker to reconsider this decision and amend S12 of the 2017 Bill in line with our suggestions in this submission.
