CREATIVE LICENCE 2014 Annual review of the WRITING PAYS OUR BILLS “Copyright codifies respect for creators.” Author John Birmingham. Copyright Agency member since 2011. Respect Creators. Respect Copyright. CopyrightCopyright Agency,Agency, LevelLevel 15,15, 233233 CastlereaghCastlereagh SStreet,treet, SydneySydney NSW 20020000 II t 0022 99394394 77600600 | e [email protected]@copyright.com.au | w wwwwww..copyright.com.aucopyright.com.au CONTENTS ANNUAL REVIEW 2013-14 1 CREATIVE LICENCE 2014 WRITING Annual review of the Copyright Agency 2 About Us PAYS 3 Chair’s Report OUR 4 2013-14 at a glance 5 CEO’s Report BILLS 6 Our Heritage “Copyright codifies respect for creators.” 6 8 Our Environment 10 International 13 Our Members 14 Business Partnerships 16 Education 18 Reading Australia 16 20 Cultural and Career Funds 22 Visual Arts 24 John Fries Award Author John Birmingham. Copyright Agency member since 2011. Respect Creators. Respect Copyright. Cover and select illustrations: Lew Keilar | www.lewkeilar.com Design: Fresco Creative | www.frescocreative.com.au © Copyright Agency and contributors. Members and licensees may use text. Permission should be sought from the Copyright Agency for use of images. ABN 53 001 228 799 CopyrightCopyright Agency,Agency, LLevelevel 115,5, 223333 CastlereaghCastlereagh Street,Street, SSydneyydney NSW 20020000 24 Level 15, 233 Castlereagh St, Sydney NSW 2000 t 0022 99394394 77600600 | e [email protected]@copyright.com.au | w wwwwww..copyright.com.aucopyright.com.au T: +61 2 9394 7600 | www.copyright.com.au ABOUT US Respecting and supporting creators Teachers e pay W copy andages share with creators 1.5b p studentsyear every How the copying scheme for schools and universities We We survey works: schools, unis receive licence fees from about usage education We use data to identify the creators of the material he Copyright Agency has been standing up for the resale royalty scheme for artists which provides Australian creators for 40 years. a 5 per cent royalty on an artwork when it is resold, T We are a not-for-profit and with our sister if valued at more than $1000. organisation, Viscopy, provide licences to use copyright Our Cultural Fund supports the rich creativity of material such as newspaper articles, books, images, art and Australian writers, artists, publishers and arts organisations. survey plans – particularly for the education sector, but also The fund grants about $2m each year (1.5 per cent of for governments and businesses. licensing revenue) to the Australian cultural community. Fees are distributed to our member creators: publishers, This includes skills development through mentoring and authors, journalists, poets, educators, photographers, training programs, digital initiatives and projects aimed illustrators, visual artists and surveyors. Membership is free. at developing new markets for our members’ works. 2 Since 2010, the Copyright Agency has also managed www.copyright.com.au CHAIR’S REPORT ANNUAL REVIEW 2013-14 3 A worthy celebration feel like I often have loaded my Chair’s Report to contributes to the Australian community by ensuring fair Alexander members with the anxieties and pressures that have payment for people willing to create and disseminate (Sandy) Grant. I become part and parcel of managing the Copyright books, journals and artworks. Photo: Richard Agency in a transformational era, but this year I have an Education remains central to our activity and it is no Birch. excuse to be more expansive and optimistic as I recognise coincidence that Australia has a robust and innovative and celebrate our 40th birthday. educational publishing and writing community. Our role It must have been over 35 years ago when I was taken in the visual arts has grown over the last few years too, to a rowdy, stimulating meeting of the APA by my then with the Viscopy alliance and the resale royalty program Managing Director, Philip Harris of Pitman Publishing, where complementing our significant statutory payments to some of the great Australian publishers stood and argued artists, illustrators and photographers. Seeing Aboriginal loudly about whether or not the APA should put up money artists being well-rewarded in the first years under this new – I think $10,000 – to ensure the future of the Copyright scheme promises much for the future. Agency (then CAL). Our partnership with the newspapers and other media The argument was won dramatically and, as a result, ensures they too get fair reward for re-use in a climate writers and publishers have been fairly rewarded, earning where every dollar counts, and this year we welcome around a billion dollars as a result of that heroic start. The surveyors to our family after a more than ten-year battle business was launched to ensure the photocopier wouldn’t through the courts. We will be delighted to send them kill investment of time and money in their craft – well, the their first cheques in the coming months. technology of unfair re-use has changed but the need for Over the life of the organisation, the Cultural Fund equity has not. – another amazing piece of foresight by the founding Pitman Publishing has disappeared and many of the Directors – has grown in sophistication and confidence protagonists, whose foresight about the value of secondary and, under Brian Johns’ leadership, has mapped out usage was prescient, have retired or passed away, but the a visionary approach. Copyright Agency has established itself as a critical and There is much to celebrate and much to be proud of in highly trustworthy part of the landscape. the pages of this report. Happy Birthday to the members – In the year just completed we can say without fear of it is your organisation – and congratulations and thanks contradiction that our members are highly satisfied with the to the staff from the Board. in excess of $100m distributed and the fact the Copyright Agency continues to increase the speed with which we manage to get our surveys completed and the money distributed. It is a great success story and one where the credit goes to the effort and ingenuity of the key staff, past and present. Alexander (Sandy) Grant Of course, there are tensions, setbacks and threats, but Chair we need to remind ourselves how much the organisation 2013-14 AT A GLANCE $103m+ in copyright fees paid to content creator $2.4m in resale royalties members in 2013-14 generated for Australian artists Of the top 20 Australian artists earning royalties (to June 2014), seven (35 per cent) are Aboriginal and six of those are women. $129.3m revenue and investment income Operating costs as a proportion of revenue: 14.3% 10 publishers provide amalgamated textbook content The Copyright Agency has been on digital standing up for Australian creators platform since LearningField 1974 Our customers (licensees) are from the education, Total Copyright Agency business and members 28,375, up 1,643 government Authors, visual artists, journalists, photographers, sectors illustrators, cartoonists, publishers and surveyors $2.75m+ approved $2.25m by the Cultural Fund back payment negotiated to support arts and for NSW surveyors literary organisations 4 and creators CEO’S REPORT ANNUAL REVIEW 2013-14 5 Delight, surprise, inform, inspire s author John Birmingham says: copyright is reward creators and deliver benefits to the Australian Murray St a codification of respect for creators. education community. Leger. Photo: A Our authors spend hundreds, sometimes Copyright is front and centre in one of the major issues Richard Birch. thousands of hours creating their work. of our time – how do we relate to each other as digital Talk to an author and you will discover some of those citizens? In other words, what do we expect in the way hours are spent in the zone, a time of buzz and flow. Many of digital etiquette? more hours are spent however in the grind. Revision after Do we expect conversations or shouting matches? revision, restructuring the work, responding to editorial Are cyber trolls now part of life? Do we expect queries, changing points of view, honing and curating. acknowledgment, permissions and respect for other The same applies to the hours spent in the classroom by people’s work or do we just consume it because we can? so many of our educational authors – honing what works Perhaps one of the most telling characteristics of our for Aussie kids. Our Australian education copying licence online community is how we demonstrate respect for ensures teachers have access to near limitless sources of those that delight, surprise, inform and inspire us. inspiration, while creators, so often teachers, receive their fair due for copying and sharing. It is this revenue, distributed by the Copyright Agency, that helps our publisher, author, artist, journalist, photographer and surveyor members continue the great cycle of creation. To continue to tap deep into the well of creativity … to delight, surprise, inform and inspire us. Murray St Leger One digital innovation of 2013-14 is the Copyright Chief Executive Agency’s ‘LearningField’. This digital textbook resource is an industry solution developed with Australia’s leading education publishers. The feedback from schools has been genuinely positive – and the developments to come in 2015 will cement LearningField’s utility in helping teachers drive learning outcomes. Equally, our Reading Australia website is delivering compelling teacher resources to educators – but specifically for Australian works – modern and classic. The Copyright Agency’s Cultural Fund has made it happen and the platform is evolving in response to feedback from the very teachers it was created for. These two resources are good examples of how innovative approaches to copyright can respect and OUR HERITAGE Fight for creators’ rights still burns bright The Australian creative arts industry was blossoming in 1974, yet authors’ and artists’ rights weren’t being protected and their work was being copied frequently without their permission.