The Secretary of State’s decision to introduce section 28B of the CDPA 1988, which created an exception to copyright for personal private use without a mechanism for compensating rightholders, was found to be unlawful. The Secretary of State had introduced the provision on the basis that any harm caused to rightholders would be zero or…

E-book lending in public libraries (e-lending) and the need to extend the public lending right (PLR) to these practices has been discussed on several recent occasions. Following the Sieghart report on e-lending in 2013, the UK government has extended the PLR to e-book downloads occurring within the premises of UK libraries. In 2013-14 the Commission…

An interesting case about the legality of a regulation issued by the Estonian Government on the “blank tape levy” The Estonian Authors’ Society, Estonian Performers’ Union and Estonian Association of Phonogram Producers (right holders’ collecting societies) filed a complaint in the administrative court claiming monetary damages (income loss) from the Government of the Republic of…

In the September 3rd edition of Science∣Business, Julia Reda, German Pirate Party member of the European Parliament (MEP) sitting on the EP Justice Committee, was said to be confident that a mandatory text and data mining (TDM) deal could be introduced for researchers. This should come as music to the ears of the members of…

By Jeremy Blum and Jade McIntyre, Bristows The EU Directive on the collective management of copyright and multi-territorial licensing of online music (“the Directive”), published on 26 February 2014, entered into force on 10 April 2014 and must be transposed into national law by 10 April 2016. The policy underpinning the Directive is part of…

We reported here last month that the private copying exception, which took effect on 1 October 2014 as s.28B of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, was declared unlawful by the High Court. The court found that the evidence relied on by the government in order to introduce the exception without also providing a means…

The progressive breakdown of the legal system regulating compensatory remuneration for private copying has given rise to some unusual cases.  We consider this to be true of a Spanish Supreme Court judgment of 6 March 2015 which had to rule on whether mobile telephones and memory cards were subject to compensatory remuneration payment, the amount…

In October 2014 the government introduced a series of changes to the UK’s copyright regime. One change, key to the objective of making copyright law better suited to the digital age, was the introduction of a private copying exception. That exception is now in jeopardy following a successful challenge by the music industry. For the…

On June 4th, the US Copyright Office published a report on Orphan Works and Mass Digitization. The report addresses two situations where the current US copyright system may not fulfill its aim to “promote the Progress of Science”: orphan works and mass-digitization. As regards orphan works, the Office notes that a user’s ability to seek…

The plaintiff alleged infringement under the Copyright and Related Rights Act 2000 (CRRA 2000), breach of trademark, breach of contract, breach of moral rights, breach of confidence and interference with economic relations. The court held that under the statutory claim (s37 and S40 of the CRRA 2000) it is incumbent on the plaintiff to sufficiently…