The use of a photograph of a politician with a child, in combination with a satirical text, in a self-advertisement of a news magazine, is not covered by the freedom of satire when the satire does not concern daily political events but is merely commercially self-serving. Furthermore, the implication of a political relationship between the…

In this decision the Court of Cassation confirmed that Dailymotion was an online intermediary provider, who did not intervene in the content and choice of videos posted by users on its platform. In addition, the commercial exploitation of the website through the sale of advertising spaces did not induce that Dailymotion could intervene on the…

What is and what is not a copyright work is a question even copyright lawyers find difficult to answer when confronted with subject matter on the verge of the required standard of originality. Polish copyright law has quite a long tradition of setting the threshold rather low, which may encourage frivolous lawsuits forcing courts to…

Two contradictory legislative proposals have been quite recently submitted for discussion at the Belgian Parliament, which should implement solutions to the thorny file-sharing issue. On the one hand, Senators Morael and Pyryns proposed on 9 December 2010 [Doc 5-590/1] a law “aiming at adapting the perception of copyright to the technological evolution while preserving privacy…

In four recent decisions (respectively relating to the movies “le génocide arménien”; “l’affaire Clearstream”; “les dissimulateurs” and “Mondovino”), the Paris Court of Appeal held Google liable for copyright infringement. The facts of the different cases are similar: an Internet user had placed an unauthorized copy of a movie on Google Video. Following the procedure set…

The variation of the Austrian National Anthem by setting it to a modernised “rock-version” of the classic tune and by changing the line “You are home to great sons” to “You are home to great sons and daughters” for use in an information campaign by the Austrian Federal Ministry for Education, Arts and Culture, does…

The defendant, the so-called “cooperative of CD co-owners”, abuses the ‘personal use’ exeption under Article 30 of Copyright, together with the three-step-test under Article 29(1) of Copyright Act, while he operates as a covert form of lending company (see previously reported cases concerning cooperatives of CD co-owners, in Kluwer database). The court, as in previous…

Survey:
HADOPI, cultural goods and Internet use: The French users’ practices and perceptions (“Hadopi, biens culturels et usages d’Internet: pratiques et perceptions des internautes français”), presented on 23 January 2011 at the MIDEM (Marché International du Disque et de l’Edition Musicale- International Market for Records and Musical Edition): http://www.hadopi.fr/download/hadopiT0.pdf
Press

Press releases:
Etude de la HADOPI sur le téléchargement: des chiffres providentiels, ZDNet.fr
http://www.zdnet.fr/actualites/etude-de-la-hadopi-sur-le-telechargement-des-chiffres-providentiels-39757755.htm

Midem: un internaute français sur deux pirate, La Tribune.fr
http://www.latribune.fr/technos-medias/medias/20110123trib000594860/midem-un-internaute-francais-sur-deux-pirate-.html

Selon une étude de l’HADOPI, 49% des internautes ont eu recours “au moins une fois à un usage illicite de biens culturels”, Le Monde.fr, Blogs
http://midem.blog.lemonde.fr/2011/01/24/selon-une-etude-de-l%E2%80%99hadopi-49-des-internautes-ont-eu-recours-%C2%AB-au-moins-une-fois-a-un-usage-illicite-de-biens-culturels-%C2%BB/

Italy is currently being interested by an intense querelle about the role of the Communications Authority (“Autorità per le Garanzie nelle Comunicazioni”) in the enforcement of the provisions of Law n. 633/1941 (“Copyright Law”) with respect to users’ unauthorized posting of copyrighted contents online. The debate has become particularly hot after the Communications Authority has…

A Belgian band uploaded some songs on a freely accessible website under a non-commercial & no derivative Creative Commons licence. A Belgian theatre used one of the songs to create an advertisement for the next theatrical season, which was broadcasted on several national radios channels. The Court found that the theatre did not respect the…