CDSM Directive, Digital Single Market, European Union, France, Legislative process, Press Publishers ’ Right, Remuneration (equitable)

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Overview After fierce lobbying, European press publishers, backed by the French government, obtained the much criticized press publishers’ right (see e.g. here; here; and here) in Article 15 of Directive (EU) 2019/790 on copyright and related rights in the Digital Single Market (CDSM Directive). The objective of this new right is to allow the media…

CDSM Directive, Digital Single Market, European Union, Germany

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A year after the adoption of Directive 2019/790 on copyright and related rights in the Digital Single Market, many questions about its compatibility with fundamental rights remain unanswered. Germany, the epicenter of public protests against the directive’s most controversial provisions, is also the origin of frequent fundamental rights-related requests for preliminary rulings on EU copyright…

Case Law, Infringement, USA

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Infringement claims based on failure to obtain licenses for three other songs failed because the plaintiff licensing company did not hold exclusive rights in those works. The vocal music director of Burbank High School and other defendants associated with the school’s student choir program engaged in fair use by adapting, altering, and performing segments of…

Case Law, Infringement, Originality, Reproduction (right of), Spain

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The Spanish Supreme Court has ruled in a case concerning the infringement of copyright of a student whose professor reproduced, without the former’s consent, certain sections of the student’s research work. This case gave the Court the opportunity to analyse the issue of originality of academic works and provide guidance on authorship of a University…

Belgium, CJEU, Communication (right of), Enforcement, European Union, Liability

(Institute for Information Law (IViR), University of Amsterdam)/ /1 Comment

On 6 August 2019 the Ondernemingsrechtbank Antwerpen (the court) submitted a request for a preliminary ruling to the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) on a dispute between Mircom, a company registered under Cypriot law, and Telenet, a Belgian internet service provider whose users presumably shared copyright protected works via Bit-torrent. This case…

Case Law, CDSM Directive, CJEU, Communication (right of), Digital Single Market, European Union, Liability, Netherlands

(Institute for Information Law (IViR), University of Amsterdam)/ /Leave a comment

On 12 June 2019, the High Court of the Netherlands referred four questions to the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) for a preliminary ruling. The questions concern an ongoing battle between Stichting Brein, a Dutch anti-piracy organisation representing movie and music industries, and NSE (News-Service.com), an online platform for Usenet services. Stichting…

Case Law, Infringement, USA

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Jury instructions not erroneous or prejudicial to plaintiff; court dumps “inverse ratio rule” providing for lower standard of proof of substantial similarity when a high degree of access is shown. After an en banc rehearing, the U.S. Court of Appeals in San Francisco has affirmed a district court’s judgment after a jury trial in favor…

CDSM Directive, Digital Single Market, European Union, Legislative process

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Impartial observers of the 2018-19 debates around the new European Directive on Copyright must have been mystified. They were used to the acrimonious disputes between lobbies representing conflicting short-term economic interests. No surprise there. The shock came from elsewhere; from citizen reactions, community responses and societal questions. What if these reactions, responses and questions were…

Case Law, USA

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Because hard drives used in audio recording devices in cars sold by Ford, GM, and Chrysler did not contain “only sounds,” they were not covered by the Audio Home Recording Act of 1992. The Alliance of Artists and Recording Companies (AARC)—a nonprofit organization formed to collect and distribute royalties under the Audio Home Recording Act…

Case Law, Damages, USA

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The paintings, although temporary, had achieved “recognized stature” as artworks and were protected by the Visual Artists Rights Act. Artists who created “aerosol art” paintings on the exteriors of buildings in the well-known “5Pointz” area of Long Island City, New York, with the consent of the buildings’ owners, were properly granted $6.75 million in statutory…