Today, April 28, 2015, ARL joined US technology companies, trade associations, and civil society organizations in the launch of Re:Create, a coalition that promotes balanced copyright policy. A balanced copyright system depends on limitations and exceptions, such as fair use. As technology advances, it is imperative that the copyright law is responsive to these changes, balancing the interests of creators of copyrighted information and products with the interests of users of those products.
Re:Create promotes and defends the important balance of copyright. ARL’s member institutions, as well as the general public, depend on balanced copyright that includes robust limitations and exceptions. A balanced system ensures that copyright does not limit or impede new and valuable technologies and uses.
Fair use is responsive to the quickly evolving technology and has been called the “safety valve” of US copyright law. Fair use also accommodates the First Amendment right to freedom of expression, ensuring that copyright does not prevent freedom of speech. As ARL has shown in an infographic (PDF), fair use is a right, vitally important, for everyone and everywhere. This important doctrine is vital to the economy, innovation, new creativity, learning and education.
Deborah Jakubs, president of ARL said, “The mission of Re:Create squarely comports with the Constitutional rationale for copyright: ‘to promote the progress of science and useful arts.’ ARL is proud to be a member of this coalition, which will work to ensure that copyright law supports this rationale and ensure that the copyright system provides an appropriate balance.”
The Re:Create Coalition launched with the following members: American Library Association, Association of Research Libraries, Center for Democracy & Technology, Computer & Communications Industry Association, Consumer Electronics Association, Electronic Frontier Foundation, Media Democracy Fund, New America’s Open Technology Institute, Public Knowledge, and R Street Institute.
For more information, visit http://www.recreatecoalition.com/.
The Association of Research Libraries (ARL) is a nonprofit organization of 124 research libraries in the US and Canada. ARL’s mission is to influence the changing environment of scholarly communication and the public policies that affect research libraries and the diverse communities they serve. ARL pursues this mission by advancing the goals of its member research libraries, providing leadership in public and information policy to the scholarly and higher education communities, fostering the exchange of ideas and expertise, facilitating the emergence of new roles for research libraries, and shaping a future environment that leverages its interests with those of allied organizations. ARL is on the web at https://www.arl.org/.
