EXCEPTIONS AND LIMITATIONS ON EXCLUSIVE COPYRIGHT: US DOCTRINEOF FAIR USE

In order to encourage and reward creative works, there is the existence of copyright and related rights. Copyright is a set of rights granted to authors, artists and other creators to protect their literary and artistic creations, usually called works. Copyright owners are granted with certain economic and moral rights. The copyright owner is the person who has the exclusive rights to exploit the work and generally, it is illegal for anyone to use the copyrighted work without seeking permission from the copyright owner. However, in order to maintain the balance between the legitimate interests of the right holders and the general public, there must be a number of limitations and exceptions to the exclusive rights of the copyright owner. In the USA, or specifically in the US Copyright Act of 1976, such exceptions and limitations are provided within the Fair Use Doctrine that is incorporated in the Section 107. Hence, in this paper will be analyzed this Fair Use doctrine, which is some kind of open system for finding limitations and exceptions to the exclusive rights that the law grants to the authors of creative works. Guided by this doctrine, the judiciary is determining whether the use of a copyrighted work is fair or not, in each particular case. Thus, in this paper will also be described how the fair use is measured in respect of the four statutory fair use factors under the US Copyright Law with special emphasis to the first factor (The Purpose and Character of the Use – The Transformative Factor) and how this reflects to the goal of achieving the abovementioned balance.