IP Experts Sign Declaration Seeking Balanced Copyright Three-Step Test

"Harmonisation of copyright regulation in recent years has overly 'focussed on securing rightsholders’ ability to benefit from new modes of exploitation and business models' and has primarily served 'the interests of copyright exporting countries.' This statement does not come from copyright critics, but from a group of well-known experts in copyright law mostly from Europe and one from the United States gathered at the annual conference of the International Association for the Advancement of Teaching and Research in Intellectual Property (ATRIP) held 21-23 July in Munich. The academics signed a declaration – initiated by this year’s ATRIP host, the Max Planck Institute of Intellectual Property, Competition and Tax Law – asking for 'a balanced interpretation of the ‘three-step test’ in copyright law.' In the declaration, the academics argue that three-step test has in fact established 'an effective means of preventing the excessive application of limitations and exceptions' to copyright. However, it adds, 'there is not [a] complementary mechanism prohibiting an unduly narrow or restrictive approach' ..."