IN CASES OF INFRINGEMENT OF INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY RIGHTS, COMPENSATION FOR MORAL DAMAGES IS COMPATIBLE WITH PECUNIARY DAMAGES CALCULATED ON THE BASIS OF “HYPOTHETICAL ROYALTIES”. Judgment of the CJEU of 17 March 2016 in Liffers, C-99/15 BACKGROUND This CJEU decision stems from legal proceedings brought in Spain by Mr. Liffers, the director, screenwriter and producer of…
On 16 March 2016 the CJEU’s Advocate General Szpunar handed down his Opinion in case C-484/14, Mc Fadden. The case concerns the liability of Tobias Mc Fadden, the owner of a business selling lighting and sound systems in Munich. Mr Mc Fadden operates a Wi-Fi hotspot on the business’ premises, deliberately left unprotected by a…
The English High Court found that an App which allows users to upload, share and view 8 second clips of cricket matches and other sporting events (on a near-live basis) infringed the copyright in the television broadcasts of those matches, and the films made during the course of the production of those broadcasts. England And…
By Jeremy Blum and Sarah Watson, Bristows Ultrasoft Technologies Limited v Hubcreate Limited [2016] EWHC 544 (IPEC) On 16th February 2016 the Intellectual Property Enterprise Court (Hacon HHJ) handed down judgment in the copyright and database right dispute between software competitors Ultrasoft and Hubcreate. The case does not cite a single other judgment regarding the…
The Supreme Administrative Court held that pursuant to § 2, para. 9 of the Law on Copyright and Related Rights (LCRR), permanent objects that represent the synthesis between architecture and other arts should be regarded as works of architecture. Under Article 12, para. 2 of the LCRR, copyright in a work of architecture, created after…
The Supreme Court held that “uses in any other manner” as provided in Article 172a, para. 1 of the Criminal Code covers any possible use of a copyright protected work. It is not necessary to refer to additional statutory rules, because “uses in any other manner” as one of the forms of unauthorised use is…
The federal district court in Manhattan properly awarded over $250,000 in attorney fees and costs to hip-hop star Jay Z (aka Shawn Carter) and his companies, Roc Nation and Roc-A-Fella Records, for their successful defense against time-barred claims brought by sound engineer Chauncey Mahan, the U.S. Court of Appeals in New York City has held….
To ensure you don’t miss out on interesting IP law developments reported by our Trademark Law and Patent Law bloggers, we will, on a regular basis, provide you with an overview of the top 3 most-read posts from each of the blogs. Top 3 Kluwer Trademark Blog posts in February 2016 1)…
On 2 February 2016, the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) delivered its first post-Delfi judgment on the liability of online service providers for the unlawful speech of others. Somewhat puzzlingly, the Court reached the opposite conclusion from that of last summer’s controversial Grand Chamber ruling, this time finding that a violation of Article 10…
A 2001 letter from an attorney representing the heirs of Superman co-creator Jerome Siegel effectively transferred all copyrights in the Superman character to DC Comics, the U.S. Court of Appeals in San Francisco has decided (Larson v. Warner Bros Entertainment, February 10, 2016, per curiam). Siegel’s daughter, Laura Siegel Larson, could not go forward with…
