The Chinese Sharing Economy PDF Download

Copyright works are greatly entwined with the concept of sharing economy due to their public good nature. Unlike the sharing commercial models based on tangible goods such as bikes and houses that are limited to their physical nature, sharing models of copyright works, such as Google Books and live game webcasting are comparatively unfettered hence more focused on the exploitation of works to their full commercial potentials. However, considering the fact that these sharing models are based on unauthorized exploitation of copyright works, they will be unsustainable if the related copyright issues cannot be solved. The boundary of copyright owners' exclusivity will then have to be balanced with the public interests in exploiting their works. The Article 22 of Copyright Law of China provides an enumerative and exhaustive list of fair use exceptions, which is considered incompatible with the concept of sharing economy. The Chinese courts have already realized this problem and extended the range of fair use by learning from their U.S. counterparts, but there exists the serious inconsistency in the fair use decisions made in China.To address the abovementioned problems, this paper examines the latest amendment proposal of Copyright Law of China and raises several propositions at both legislative and judicial levels. It suggests that at the legislative level, an open-ended fair use clause is needed to further promote the development of sharing economy. At the judicial level, the Chinese courts should correctly employ transformative use to interpret the proposed open-ended clause. By bringing in the assessment of transformative use, the public has more freedom to share other's works and participate in the innovation process and create new values. Further, the authors' incentive to create works is well preserved, because it will not result in market substitution if using a work for the different expressive purpose than that for which the work was created. In the end, a proper balance between promoting the sharing economy and protecting the exclusivity of copyright in China can then be struck.