Fair Use Week has been celebrated this week in the United States, with great gusto and enthusiasm. At Harvard Library, Kyle Courtney commented: ‘Fair use is critical and important to innovation, scholarship and research in the United States.’ Kenneth Crews emphasized that ‘the new technological ventures, like other creative pursuits, require fair use and other copyright limitations for experimentation and success.’ Legal director Corynne McSherry of the Electronic Frontier Foundation has highlighted the significance and the importance of the defence of fair use: ‘Fair use provides breathing space in copyright law, making sure that control of the right to copy and distribute doesn’t become control of the right to create and innovate.’ For Techdirt, Mike Masnick has emphasized that fair use is a right – and not an exception or a mere defence. Peter Jaszi and Pat Aufderheide have highlighted the contextual operation of fair use in particular artistic communities. Molly Van Houweling of the Authors Alliance has written about the ecstasy of influence – the role of inspiration and appropriation in all acts of artistic creation. Fair use has been celebrated as a many-splendored legal creation. While fair use has been feted and celebrated in the United States, fair use has been under attack, both in the United States, and in other jurisdictions. Fair use is in peril. Copyright owners have sought to confine the operation of fair use in litigation in the United States, and in policy debates. Political lobbyists have sought to prevent the adoption of fair use in Australia, and other countries elsewhere in the Pacific Rim. Fair use has been undermined and undercut by intermediary liability schemes, technological protection measures, and contract law. Moreover, fair use has been threatened by international trade agreements – such as the Trans-Pacific Partnership.