The Institute for Information Law (IViR) at the University of Amsterdam, in collaboration with Kluwer Law International, publisher of the Information Law Series, has launched an online archive of older book volumes published in the series. The Information Law Series, which was established in 1991, is the world’s first and foremost academic book series in…
Earlier this year, the Italian Supreme Court (Corte di Cassazione) issued an order (Cass., ord. no.11413/2024) in a case concerning the protection by copyright of a lamp design. Part I of this post outlined the decisions issued as the case made its way through the Italian court system. Part II will now turn to the…
With an order (Cass., ord. no.11413/2024) that suprisingly triggered little attention, at the end of last April the Italian Supreme Court (Corte di Cassazione) proffered yet once more its original approach and reading of the principles inspiring the EU copyright harmonization – and particularly of those developed by the CJEU case law. This time,…
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 district court erred in taking the statute of limitations into account in determining who was the prevailing party. A defendant in a copyright infringement action is not the prevailing party for purposes of the attorney fee statute where the plaintiff has voluntarily dismissed its case without prejudice—even if that plaintiff would be barred by…
Generative AI (GenAI) is promising to revolutionise higher education. Whether it concerns legal scholars using ChatGPT to write their essays, computer science majors relying on GitHub Copilot to generate programming code, or art students turning to Midjourney to create visual artistry: the relevant AI tools to assist with educational assignments are readily available online. The…
Large language models are built on scale. The bigger they are, the better they perform. The appetite for letters of these omnivorous readers is insatiable, so their literary diet must grow steadily if AI is to live up to its promise. If Samuel Johnson, in one of his famous Ramblers of 1751, grumbled about 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…
The effect of rapid development of generative AI on copyright law continues to challenge the lawmakers and courts. Whilst the UK High Court is yet to reach its decision on liability for copyright infringement in the AI training data in Getty Images v Stability AI, the Chinese case of Ultraman became the first to recognise…
