Did ya know? It's Fair Use Day: July 11, 2007

By Ken Fisher

Get out your party hats and DeCSS coasters and t-shirts!

July 11, 2007, will mark the third-annual global "Fair Use Day," but chances are this is the first you've heard of it. Started back in 2005, "Fair Use Day" (project website) was created by Eric Clifford to raise awareness of the shifting balance in copyright laws around the world. Clifford acknowledges that Fair Use Day hasn't become the biggest advocacy day in existence, but perhaps the third time is the charm, as the Pirate Party of the United States has announced its support of the effort to raise awareness about copyright issues. As Clifford says, "Garbage had a day, taxes have a day, why not fair use?"

As we have chronicled here on Ars for years, copyright laws are increasingly being rewritten, modified, or tossed out in favor of new laws which grant copyright holders extremely broad powers over how you use content you pay for. Both Clifford and the Pirate Party hope that July 11 will serve as a day to remind users across the globe that fair copyright laws are essential to culture.

"It is important the people are aware of what they can legally do with regards to copyrighted material," said Pirate Party US spokesman Andrew Norton. "Very often people believe that a use of copyrighted material that would normally fall into fair use is an infringement of copyright. It is a belief that copyright holders seek to enforce, either through frivolous litigation, intimidation, or legal and political maneuvering to legally restrict what can be considered fair use. This is especially true when it comes to critical reviews, or parodies."

The Pirate Party calls on citizens to exercise their fair use rights tomorrow, and to contact their representatives to voice support for the Freedom and Innovation Revitalizing U.S. Entrepreneurship Act of 2007 (FAIR USE Act of 2007).

Our own examination of the FAIR USE Act of 2007 raised serious doubts about the Act's power to accomplish any true revamp of fair use in the United States, or any of the other major issues brought about by the DMCA. In our view, the proposed legislation is oriented towards making the lives of consumer electronics manufacturers easier, but without any payoff for end users.

When asked about their support of the FAIR USE Act, Andrew Norton told Ars that "any step in the right direction is better than what we have now. A bigger step would be better, but any movement in the right direction is a movement that should be supported," he said.

As for how to make the best of Fair Use Day, founder Eric Clifford told Ars that users should "enjoy fair use in any way that you can," but he added that "the problem is that the legal ways to exercise fair use is diminishing."