Researchers

From Copyright Act

Andrew Rens Andrew Rens is the Intellectual Property Fellow at the Shuttleworth Foundation, Cape Town, South Africa, where he researches Intellectual Property and Access to Knowledge Issues. After qualifying as an attorney Andrew Rens taught law and practiced human rights litigation at the Wits Law Clinic. He subsequently taught Intellectual Property, Telecommunications, Broadcasting, Space and Satellite, and Media Law and pioneered a course in Information Technology Law at Wits Law School. Andrew is the Legal Lead for Creative Commons South Africa, a co-founder and director of The African Commons Project,a fellow at the Stanford Center for Internet and Society, and a research associate at the LINK Center at the School of Public and Development Management, University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg,

Pria Chetty Pria is the founder of Technology and Innovation law firm, Chetty Law. She completed her law degree in 2000 and went on to specialise in Electronic Law and Intellectual Property Law. Shortly after completing her admission exams Pria was asked to compile a national curriculum for Attorneys in South Africa on Computers in Legal Practice. As a part time lecturer, she also lectured Business Law, Labour Law and Commercial Law. An active commentator on the ICT industry, Pria has been approached for numerous speaking engagements at international and local events including the African ICT Summit and written articles that have appeared in amongst other publications: Leadership, Computing SA, I-Week, Tectonic, Music Industry Online and Engineering News. She has also been interviewed by SABC TV and radio channels regarding legal developments in the ICT industry. She is passionate about the impact that technology can have on development and hopes to play a strong role in shaping South Africa’s innovation and development cultures.

Tobias Schonwetter is a qualified lawyer in Germany since 2002 and a PhD candidate at the Department of Commercial Law at the University of Cape Town (UCT), South Africa. His doctoral thesis is concerned with copyright exceptions and limitations. In 2005, Tobias received his LL.M. degree at UCT and started coordinating the UCT Copyright Workgroup. In the same year, he helped to set up the law faculty’s digital repository 'lawspace', which he has managed ever since. He is also a member of the Commonwealth of Learning’s (COL) copyright expert group and an iCommons resident copyright expert. Tobias has spoken on copyright-related matters at various conferences and has been awarded with the prestigious UCT Research Fellowship Award for his doctoral studies in 2005 and 2006.

Roux de Villiers is a senior lecturer in Intellectual Property Law and Information Technology Law at the University of Stellenbosch and Head of the Information Technology Law Unit of Jan S de Villiers Attorneys, Cape Town. Roux is also a solicitor of the High Court of England and Wales and Member of the Law Society of England and Wales and practiced in information technology law with the London office of Shaw Pittman LLC (now Pillsbury Winthrop Shaw Pittman LLC). Roux is an electronic engineer with a Master’s degree in Computer and Communications Law from the University of London. He is also a member of the Internet Society of South Africa and of the legal team of Creative Commons South Africa.