Don’t cut the signal: Protect fair access to broadcast content
The SCCR (Standing Committee on Copyright and Related Rights) is a body of the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO). It helps member countries develop international copyright laws, addressing legal issues related to copyright and related rights. Education International attends the SCCR to advocate for balanced copyright exceptions and limitations for education, research, libraries, archives and museums. This is to ensure that teachers can exercise their academic freedom to choose and adopt teaching materials to provide quality and inclusive education and researchers can make fair use of copyright protected materials for their research.
Currently, the Committee is debating the adoption of a Broadcast Treaty. Originally focused on the protection of broadcast signals that transmit, for instance, analogue TV programmes, the draft WIPO Broadcast Treaty has since been significantly expanded in scope, leading to confusion and extensive debate.
EI is concerned that the draft Broadcast Treaty is increasingly dominating the SCCR agenda, thereby reducing the available time and focus for advancing discussions on a potential international treaty on exceptions and limitations for education and research.
EI is also concerned that the current draft of the Broadcast Treaty does not include adequate exceptions and limitations that would protect the fair use of broadcast materials for teaching and research purposes. Hence if adopted, the education sector might have to face barriers in the use of analogue broadcasted materials (e.g. working with live or recorded TV materials) and digitally broadcasted materials (e.g. showing a YouTube video in class or showing digitally recorded or live TV shows).
This flyer was prepared by the Access to Knowledge Coalition of which EI is a member, to showcase examples of how teachers, librarians, researchers, archivists and others are working with broadcast materials.
