On 20 April 2023 in the joined cases Blue Air ( C-775/21) and SNTFC (C-826/21) the CJEU pronounced once again on the infringement of the right of communication to the public, making a further contribution to the already rich case law in this field. This time the questions related to the existence (or not) of…
In a recent judgment, the Supreme Court held that the appellant had not justified compelling interest in the appeal and, therefore, ruled the extraordinary cassation and breach of process appeals filed by the claimant inadmissible. This put an end to the dispute ongoing since 2016 concerning whether the role of an expert “professor” in the…
In March 2022 the U.S. Supreme Court agreed to review the Second Circuit’s ruling that Andy Warhol’s series of colorful prints and drawings of Prince were not transformative fair uses of Lynn Goldsmith’s photograph (for a previous comment on this case, see here). Vanity Fair magazine had commissioned Warhol’s artwork in 1984 to accompany an article…
Another court of appeals concludes that the statute of limitations doctrine was not overturned by a Supreme Court laches decision. The Supreme Court did not upend the longstanding discovery rule applicable to Copyright Act cases by merely mentioning in passing that a copyright claim accrues “when an infringing act occurs,” the U.S. Court of Appeals…
This case concerns a conflict between the fundamental right to one’s own likeness and the exceptions to unlawful interference with the right to one’s own likeness. The Supreme Court gives prevalence to the right to one’s own image. The dispute centres on the use of the image as part of a tribute to the artist…
Welcome to the first trimester of the 2023 round up of EU copyright law! In this edition, we report on an AG Opinion that came out late in 2022 and update you on what has happened in the first trimester of 2023 in EU copyright law. This includes Court of Justice (CJEU) and General Court…
The limitation might have failed in an earlier period, but more recent precedents were more forgiving. Parties to a photo image license were free to contract for a two-year statute of limitations under California law, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit has held. The court, in an unpublished opinion, also affirmed a…
On 30 December 2022, the Italian Supreme Court (Corte di Cassazione) issued an order that intervened again on the interpretation of the quotation exception under Article 70 of the Italian Copyright Act (l. 633/1941, l.aut.). The decision concerns an advertising campaign of a mineral water company. The commercial video promoting the mineral water features a…
According to French law, to fall under the parody exception, the second work must evoke the pre-existing work and present significant differences from it so there is no possible confusion with the parodied work, as well as constitute a manifestation of humour and mockery. If the second work does not satisfy these conditions, and does…
This post is based in part on an amicus brief filed by the Harvard Cyberlaw Clinic on behalf of Authors Alliance and ComicMix before the United States Supreme Court in Jack Daniels v. VIP Products. Ordinarily, authors who write parodies look to copyright limitations and exceptions to protect their rights. In the United States, the…
