Exceptions and Limitations to copyright are provisions which allow for works protected by copyright to be used in specific situations without a licence from the copyright owner. There are numerous limitations and exceptions found in copyright legislation including, for example, the fair use exception, exceptions for libraries, archives and educational institutions, and the back-up copy exception.
On 16 June 2011 the Court of Justice of the European Union gave judgment in Case C-462/09, Stichting de Thuiskopie v. Opus Supplies Deutschland GmbH, Mijndert van der Lee and Hananja van der Lee (case C 462/09), a reference for a preliminary ruling from the Hoge Raad der Nederlanden (the Dutch Supreme Court). As in…
On 2 May 2011 the Ministry of Culture in Portugal made public a law proposal concerning the regulation of private copying levies (the English version of which is unfortunately not available). The law currently in force dates from 2004 and had in turn made some changes to the original law, dated from 1998. There have…
On April 11, 2011, the Dutch secretary of state, Fred Teeven, sent his long awaited ‘Priorities Letter Copyright 20@20 ” to the House of Representatives. Among the priorities mentioned, is ‘the promotion and protection of new business models on the Internet through a bill to combat infringing websites and facilitating a re-evaluation of the private…
On 12 April 2011, Advocate General Trstenjak delivered her Opinion in Case C-145/10, Painer v Standard VerlagsGmbH et al., in which the ECJ has been asked to give preliminary guidance on various questions concerning copyright in portrait photos used in news reports. Eva-Maria Painer, a professional photographer, produced portrait photos of Natascha Kampusch prior to…
As mentioned in a previous post, on 22 March 2011 the Spanish Audiencia Nacional (High Court) annulled for formal reasons the Spanish ordinance that determines which digital reproduction equipment and media are subject to the private copying levies. The ordinance had been challenged before the Spanish courts by the Asociación de Internautas (an Internet users’…
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…
On 2 March 2011 the Audiencia Provincial de Barcelona took note of the judgment of the Court of Justice of the EU (CJEU) in the case Padawan v SGAE (C-467/08) and decided that the indiscriminate obligation of paying private copying levies as provided for in Art. 25 of the Spanish Ley de Propiedad Intelectual (Intellectual…
Discussions around a fair use defence are not new in The Netherlands. Already in the years immediately following the adoption of the EU Copyright Directive, the idea of introducing a fair use defence in the Dutch Copyright Act had given rise to heated debate, at least in the literature. The debate recently resurged when the…
On 15 February 2011, the Spanish Parliament adopted the Ley de Economía Sostenible (Sustainable Economy Act). This act aims at turning Spain’s economic model into a more sustainable one from not only a economic but also social and environmental point of view. Among many other issues, this act includes some very controversial provisions amending three…
