Board of Directors and Staff

Derek Whitehead, OAM, has been Chair of the Australian Digital Alliance since January 2008. He has also been Vice President and President of the Australian Library and Information Association (2007-2009) and chaired a review of Australian domain name policy in 2010-2011.

Derek is the former Director of Information Resources and University Copyright Officer at Swinburne University of Technology, where he was responsible for management of the university library,  university information (website, records, and other content), and the Copyright Office.

From 1996 to 1999 Derek was Deputy State Librarian at the State Library of Victoria. In 2002 he was awarded the Medal of the Order of Australia in the Australia Day honours for his contribution to libraries and the internet.

Delia Browne is a Sydney based policy lawyer specialising in Copyright issues. She is the National Copyright Director of the National Copyright Unit for the Copyright Advisory Group to COAG Education Council. The NCU provides copyright advice to the School and TAFE sector. See www.smartcopying.edu.au for information sheets and online educational resources on copyright. The NCU also advocates for copyright law reform on behalf of the School and TAFE sector.

She is a co founder and President of Peer 2 Peer University (P2PU) a free online disruptive education initiative, the deputy chair of the Australian Centre of Photography and an iCommons Board Director. She is a passionate advocate of Creative Commons and Open Education and was one the drafters of the Cape Town Declaration on Open Education. She is on the editorial boards of the Media and Arts Law Review and the NZ Intellectual Property Review and is a sought after conference presenter.

Emeritus Professor Tom Cochrane is currently Adjunct Professor in the Faculty of Law at the Queensland University of Technology (QUT) in Brisbane, Australia. He was formerly, (until retiring from the position in December 2013), Deputy Vice-Chancellor (Vice-President) at QUT. In his current role, Professor Cochrane’s external duties include: Director, Australian Digital Alliance; Member, Library Board of Queensland; Director, Board of Knowledge Unlatched (UK); Member, Board of Enabling Open Scholarship (Europe). He has also been co-leader of the Creative Commons project for which QUT is the institutional partner for Australia. This project, together with other open access initiatives locally based at QUT, signals a long standing commitment to improving access to research outputs and the supporting infrastructure worldwide. This is part of a wider general commitment to promoting access to knowledge and a fair go for every person in the copyright ecosystem.

Justine Heazlewood is the Director and Keeper of Public Records at the Public Record Office Victoria. She has been Victoria’s Keeper of Public Records since 2003. She has degrees in both history and information technology. In her archives career she has focused particularly on digital preservation, digital archiving and ways to use technology to unveil the rich data in historical records. She has also been involved in initiatives to improve access to records for the Stolen Generations, care-leavers and others whose access to information about themselves has been impacted by government policies.

Justine is the Convener of the Australasian Digital Recordkeeping Initiative (a body set up by the Council of Australasian Archives and Records Authorities (CAARA) to collaborate and establish standards for digital recordkeeping). Justine is chair of the Australian Archives and Libraries Copyright Coalition.

Professor Emily Hudson is Professor of Law at the Dickson Poon School of Law, King’s College London. Emily joined King’s in January 2015, having previously held academic posts at the University of Melbourne, University of Queensland and University of Oxford. Emily has a particular research interest in copyright law, and for many years has undertaken work on the copyright experiences of cultural and educational institutions, this work being showcased in her book, Drafting Copyright Exceptions: From the Law in Books to the Law in Action (CUP, 2020). Some of Emily’s recent research projects have related to fair dealing and online teaching, quotation norms in the publishing industry, copyright and open access, and controlled digital lending (CDL).

Lucinda joined Google in November 2019 as Director of Government Affairs and Public Policy for Australia and New Zealand, and brings over 25 years of public and private sector experience at national and international levels.

She is a senior international lawyer and manager with a track record of leadership, strategic planning and advice, providing sound policy analysis and guidance, and conducting negotiations in complex and sensitive fields of law and policy. Her areas of legal expertise include intellectual property, innovation, copyright and creative industries, media and the digital environment, emerging technologies, international law and normative/regulatory development at national and international levels.

Lucinda holds a Bachelor of Law degree and a Bachelor of Arts degree from the University of Sydney, Australia, and a Masters in International Law from the University of Cambridge, England, and is a qualified attorney in Australia and New York.

Ben Rice is the Director of Government Relations and Partnerships at Universities Australia. Prior to UA he was the Executive Officer of the Australian Digital Alliance and the Australian Libraries and Archives Copyright Committee. Ben has worked as a copyright lawyer and a policy advisor specialising in digital technologies, media regulation and intellectual property law.

Robyn van Dyk is Head of the Australian War Memorial’s Research Centre. Her work involves leading the development, management and preservation of the Memorial’s archival and published collections. Robyn is a strong advocate for copyright reform in the cultural sector delivering submissions to government, conference papers and published articles on the issues. Robyn has worked in collaboration with members of cultural institutions to achieve broader public access to national collections through finding solutions for orphan works and defining and explaining the use of the exception S200AB. This work has played a significant role in delivering mass digitisation, crowd source projects, social media, exhibition, data creation, visualisation and linking. Robyn has played a role in lobbying for some of the recent hard won changes in the Act with the Copyright (Disabilities and Other Measures) Act passed 15 June 2017

Dr Kylie Pappalardo studies how automation, digital distribution, and intellectual property laws shape the reach and diversity of our culture. Her work seeks to develop and inform law, public policy and industry norms that prioritise marginalised voices and diverse perspectives in the production and distribution of screen content. 

Kylie is a Senior Lecturer in the Law School at the Queensland University of Technology (QUT), Associate Investigator with the ARC Centre of Excellence for Automated Decision Making and Society (ADM+S), a Chief Investigator with the Digital Media Research Centre (DMRC), and an Australian Research Council (ARC) Discovery Early Career Research (DECRA) Fellow (2021-2024) (DE210100525). Her DECRA project examines the impact of copyright law in Australia’s screen industries, focusing on distribution and access to audiovisual material. It considers how the high costs and complex logistics of screen production and distribution can be reconciled with the public goal of broad, affordable and sustained availability of audiovisual content that represents the full diversity of Australia’s people and cultures. 

Kylie holds degrees in Law and Creative Writing from QUT, a Master of Law from Georgetown University in Washington D.C., and a PhD from the Australian Catholic University.  

Robin Wright is the Manager, Licensing, Acquisitions and Copyright at Swinburne University of Technology. She has worked at the intersection of copyright law and digital technologies in cultural and education policy and practice for over twenty years. She previously worked as a Research Fellow at the Centre for Media & Communications Law at Melbourne Law School. She has provided submissions on copyright law reform, spoken at national and international conferences on copyright and digital libraries and published on copyright exceptions and digitisation in the cultural sector. Robin has worked in cultural organisations in Australia and the UK and practiced as a solicitor in Victoria. She holds a BMus, MA and LLB(Hons).

Nicholas Gruen is a widely published policy economist, entrepreneur and commentator on our economy and society and innovation. He is currently Patron of the Australian Digital Alliance, CEO of Lateral Economics, Chair of: the Innovation Australia Board; the Australian Centre for Social Innovation; Deakin University’s Arts Participation Incubator and the Open Knowledge Foundation (Australia), and is also a member of the Council of the National Library of Australia.

He was a founding shareholder and Chairman of successful San Francisco based startup, data analytics crowdsourcing platform Kaggle.com. He is an investor in numerous other startups in Australia and the US.  He has advised Cabinet Ministers, sat on Australia’s Productivity Commission and founded Lateral Economics and Peach Financial. He has had regular columns in the Courier Mail, the Australian Financial Review, the Age and the Sydney Morning Herald and has published numerous essays on political, economic and cultural matters several of which have been published in annual “Best Essays” anthologies.

He was a member of a major review into Australia’s Innovation System in 2008, a review of Pharmaceutical patent extensions in 2013. In 2009 he chaired Australia’s internationally acclaimed Government 2.0 Taskforce.  He has a BA (Hons – First Class) in History (1981) a Graduate Diploma in economics and a PhD from the ANU (1998), and an LLB (Hons) from the University of Melbourne (1982). 

Sarah Powell is the ADA’s Executive Officer. Sarah is an established copyright specialist with a wealth of experience in copyright related roles in both cultural heritage and educational institutions. Her key areas of interest include copyright reform, the Marrakesh Treaty, remedies for orphan works and protection of traditional knowledge. Sarah’s contributions to the wider cultural heritage and education sectors include chairing the Library and Information Association of New Zealand Aotearoa (LIANZA) Standing Committee on Copyright and as an active member of the Universities New Zealand Copyright Expert Working group. In these roles she advocated for flexible copyright legislation in New Zealand and contributed to submissions on the government’s Copyright Act Review.

Sarah holds a Bachelor of Creative Industries and a Masters in Museum and Heritage Studies. She is a staunch advocate for Open GLAM initiatives and Creative Commons licensing. She is currently studying towards a law degree part time through Victoria University of Wellington.

Elliott Bledsoe is the ADA’s Copyright Officer. Elliott has extensive experience in copyright, with a focus on the interplay between rights and creative practice. In addition to working at the ADA and the Australian Libraries and Archives Copyright Coalition (ALACC) he is also the  Co-lead of Creative Commons Australian. Outside of copyright he also runs Agentry, an arts marketing micro-consultancy delivering tailored solutions for artists, arts organisations and arts groups. He has held marketing and content positions with the Queensland Writers Centre, ABC Radio National, the Australia Council for the Arts, Regional Arts Australia and others.