Sean Flynn and Peter Jaszi
Global Expert Network on Copyright User Rights

We write on behalf of the Global Expert Network on Copyright User Rights, which is a coalition of copyright academics and researchers who offer technical assistance to governments and stakeholders on the reform of copyright limitations and exceptions to promote the public interest.[1]

Separate submissions on specific issues will be submitted by User Rights Network members from South Africa Andrew Rens and the University of Cape Town’s IP Unit.

By way of background, Sean Flynn, Counsel of Record, has been working in South Africa for 20 years, including as a Clerk for the late Chief Justice Arthur Chaskalson and a lecturer and researcher at the University of Witwatersrand. Professor Peter Jaszi, who joins this submission, and Professor Flynn have been working with filmmakers in South Africa for over a decade.

We commend the Copyright Amendment Bill’s proposed introduction of an innovative, forward-thinking and South Africa-specific open general exception for “fair use.”

The enclosed comments make the following main points:

  • Fair use promotes innovation and free expression — as shown in the experience of other countries who have adopted it.
  • The fair use provision, and the other limitations and exceptions in the bill, are fully compliant with the international “three step test.”
  • The fair use clause will increase predictability under the law by adding an explicit fairness test.
  • Experience in other countries does not support allegations that adopting fair use will increase litigation, shift burdens of proof onto copyright holders, decimate the publishing industry or authorize widespread piracy.

Included below are further explanations of each of these points. I request to give oral testimony if a hearing is scheduled a time I can be present.

Click here for the full comment (PDF).

[1] Global Network on Copyright User Rights, http://infojustice.org/flexible-use.