Yesterday, the European Copyright Society (ECS) published its Opinion on the CJEU MIO/konektra cases C- 580/23 and C-795/23 (originality and infringement test of works of applied art).  The Executive Summary is reproduced below and the full Opinion is available here: ecs-opinion-mio-konektra.pdf   Executive summary Background. In Cofemel, the CJEU recognized that (i) the standard test…

Once again, the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) will be asked to provide clarity on the concept of “communication to the public” as laid down in article 3 of the 2001 Copyright in the Information Society Directive (InfoSoc Directive). On 20 September 2024, the Dutch Supreme Court expressed its intention to refer…

Now that the summer is formally over it is time for the third trimester of the 2024 roundup of EU copyright law. In this edition, we update you on what has happened between July and September 2024 in EU copyright law – all the way from the CJEU, through Advocate General (AG) Opinions, to important…

On 26 September 2024, the Belgian Constitutional Court referred a highly topical issue of fair remuneration of authors and performers on online streaming platforms to the Court of Justice of the EU (CJEU). The reference, which is poised to result in one of the most significant CJEU judgments in the copyright law field, concerns the…

The Advocate-General’s opinion in the Kwantum v. Vitra referral is remarkable in several ways. The case concerns the protection under Dutch copyright of the iconic “DSW” chair designed by American designers Charles and Ray Eames. Kwantum, a popular low-budget furniture store chain, sold copies of the chair without rightholder Vitra’s permission. Before the Dutch courts…

In its jugment of 30 April 2024 (C-470/21), the Court of Justice of the European Union answered three questions referred by the French Administrative Supreme Court (‘Conseil d’Etat’), that can be summed up as follows: must Article 15(1) of Directive 2002/58 on privacy and electronic communications be interpreted as precluding national legislation which authorises the…

In November 2023, the CJEU cast light on the right to fair compensation under the private copying exception harmonised by Article 5(2)(b) InfoSoc Directive and the thorny issue of whether broadcasters are entitled to it. This post considers this judgment. The big question is whether there’s anything more to this seemingly mechanical judgment from the…

How did we get here? Case C-159/23 Sony Computer Entertainment Europe revolves around the scope of protection of computer programs under the 2009 Software Directive. The Court of Justice of the EU (CJEU) will respond to two preliminary questions posed by the German Supreme Court. The detailed background of the case was discussed in a…

On 21 March 2024, the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) issued its ruling in case C-10/22 Liberi Autori ed Editori (LEA) v. Jamendo SA. The decision confirms that Independent Management Entities (“IMEs”) can provide their copyright management services in the European Union (EU) alongside Collective Management Organizations (“CMOs”). National legislation in one…

The Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) is about to write yet another chapter in the never-ending, or so it seems, ‘Metall auf Metall’ saga. The facts of the case are all too familiar by now: in 2004, German band Kraftwerk took hip hop producer Moses Pelham to court for copyright infringement after…