ABC Copyright Conference

Educators, researchers, artist-scholars, and librarians face a pressing need to be able to continue to access, preserve, and reuse media content. Barriers to access, preservation, and reuse are increasing as copyright owners continue to use technology to lock-down access and move the industry away from physical formats towards streaming media and licensing, and the resultant overriding of copyright exceptions.

This session highlights a pan-Canadian multi-institutional initiative to develop two best practices codes in applying fair dealing and other exceptions (user rights) in scholarly and professional practices involving copyright-protected media. The Media Access and Copyright Group (MAC) was created under the sponsorship of the Film and Media Studies Association of Canada. Comprising about 40 communication and media studies scholars, academic librarians, copyright advisors, filmmakers, and legal experts, MAC is developing two codes to help media and communication scholars and academic librarians understand when unauthorized uses of media content may be permissible for educational, research-creation, or preservation purposes.

The session will briefly outline the structure of MAC and its best practices research project, including an overview of its application for a Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC) grant. This session also touches on the importance of best practices codes for fair dealing. In the Q&A, presenters will invite attendees to share their experiences in using, or advising on the use, of media content in the teaching and research environment and on the uncertainties they face in discerning copyright issues in this area.