We are happy to announce that going forward we will be publishing an annual review of the case law of the German Bundesgerichtshof, authored by Jan Bernd Nordemnann (NORDEMANN law firm). In order to bring readers up to date on earlier developments, over the next few days we will be republishing in four parts an…
According to a recent Oberlandesgericht (Court of Appeal – CoA) Cologne ruling, providers of DNS resolvers may be held accountable to DNS block domain names used by websites which run an illegal business model dedicated to copyright infringements. Additionally, providers of content delivery networks (CDNs) have a duty to stop their services for such rogue…
Article 17 Directive (EU) 2019/790 on copyright and related rights in the Digital Single Market (“DSM Directive”) is currently being implemented into national law in the EU Member States. This has caused extensive debates on the national level comparable to the debate that took place when Art. 17 DSM Directive was introduced in 2019. But…
Everybody on the internet needs domain names. This also true for websites which run an illegal business model dedicated to copyright infringements. Such rogue websites are also called structurally copyright infringing websites. The German highest civil court Bundesgerichtshof (“BGH”) [German Federal Supreme Court] has now held that domain registrars have duties of care to disconnect…
Part 1 of this post illustrated the criteria differentiating Article 17 of the EU Directive on copyright and related rights in the Digital Single Market (“DSMCD”) from Article 3 InfoSoc Directive and came to the conclusion that the relationship between the two provisions cannot be explained by a sui generis right, which follows its own…
Part 2 of this publication will be published on the Kluwer Copyright Blog shortly. “… [T]his Directive shall leave intact and shall in no way affect existing rules laid down in the directives currently in force in this area, in particular Directives … 2001/29/EC.”. Art. 1(2) of the EU Directive on copyright and related rights…
Rembrandt has been dead for 350 years. He is still admired as one of the greatest painters of all time. No wonder then, that it would be a charming idea to revive Rembrandt. “Can the great Master be brought back to create one more painting?” The answer is yes, at least for a team of…
Following the CJEU’s judgment of 12 September 2019, the German national related right in favour of press publishers established in 2013 is unenforceable for formal reasons. But a new related right will be introduced shortly with the implementation of the DSM Directive. The competition law issues brought up in Germany will remain for the EU…
German Federal Supreme Court’s decisions of 21 February 2019 (ref.: I ZR 98/17, I ZR 99/17 and I ZR 15/18) Protection of moral rights in Germany, in particular the right to prohibit distortion of the work Moral rights derived from copyright are not harmonized within the European Union. Rather, every EU member state has developed…
Just a few days before Christmas, Advocate General Hogan published his opinion that the German related right (neighbouring right) in favour of press publishers is unenforceable for formal reasons. In his view, it should have been notified to the European Commission before the law was passed in Germany. The final word is now with the…
