Parody, Pastiche, Private copying: UKIPO's "three-P suite"

Never willing to let this blogger catch up with his perennial backlog of unanswered emails, the UK Intellectual Property Office has just sent him a really interesting one, since it deals with two of his favourite creative phenomena - pastiche and parody.  The email was a media release -- and it runs like this:

The Intellectual Property Office (IPO) has today published reports entitled "Parody and Pastiche" and "Private Copying". 

 "Parody and Pastiche" focuses on the economic, cultural and legal effects of parody and helped inform the development of impact assessments on copyright exceptions and the introduction of the ERR bill [that's the Enterprise and Regulatory Reform Bill, here.  Can you imagine any bill in the acronym-conscious United States being allowed to go through both Houses with the word "err" at its helm?]. 

 "Private Copying" was commissioned to collect data on how four copyright industries have adopted private copying measures and whether the cost of the product reflects a right to copy privately. 

 Link to the IPO research page/latest publications: http://www.ipo.gov.uk/pro-ipresearch.htm?debugdate=15.03.13&debugtime=9:30   

1. Evaluating the impact of parody on the exploitation of copyright works: Report 1 (1.06Mb)
http://www.ipo.gov.uk/ipresearch-parody-report1-150313.pdf?debugdate=15.03.13&debugtime=9:30   

2. The Treatment of Parodies Under Copyright Law in Seven Jurisdictions: Report 2 (2.52Mb)
http://www.ipo.gov.uk/ipresearch-parody-report2-150313.pdf?debugdate=15.03.13&debugtime=9:30   

3. Copyright and the Economic Effects of Parody: Report 3 (638Kb)
http://www.ipo.gov.uk/ipresearch-parody-report3-150313.pdf?debugdate=15.03.13&debugtime=9:30   

4. Private copying (420Kb)
http://www.ipo.gov.uk/ipresearch-private-150313.pdf?debugdate=15.03.13&debugtime=9:30

 This blogger has not yet had time to open any of these documents and taste their contents, but it seemed a good idea to spread the word to 1709 Blog readers that they are available. It looks as though, prima facie, empirical and evidence-based research is here to stay.