The European Commission decided to refer Bulgaria, Luxembourg, Romania and Spain to the Court of Justice of the EU for failure to notify complete transposition of EU rules on collective management of copyright and related rights, and multi-territorial licensing of rights in musical works for online use into national law as foreseen by 10 April 2016 Collective Rights Management Directive, Directive 2014/26/EU.
Comments closedMonth: January 2018
In the present case, the parties are in dispute in particular as to whether the principles developed in SGAE ruling, which concerned copyright and hotel bedrooms, can be applied by analogy to the related rights of phonogram producers and performers, where a radio broadcast in which phonograms are used is audible in a dental practice. The referring court wished to know, first of all, whether a dentist who makes radio broadcasts audible in his practice is required to pay equitable remuneration for the indirect communication to the public of phonograms communicated in the radio broadcasts.
Comments closedArticle 8 obliges Member States to enable the competent judicial authorities to order that the infringer or certain other persons provide precise information on the origin of the infringing goods or services, the distribution channels and the identity of any third parties involved in the infringement. Any order by the competent judicial authorities to provide information issued under Article 8 should only concern information which is actually needed to identify the source and scope of the infringement.
Comments closedNon-regulatory options are not considered because they would not be sufficient to achieve the objectives. Their effectiveness would be similar to the baseline scenario, and they would not provide the necessary degree of legal certainty.
Comments closedThe Copyright Act defines a literary work as “works, other than audiovisual works, expressed in words, numbers, or other verbal or numerical symbols or indicia, regardless of the nature of the material objects, such as books, periodicals, manuscripts, phonorecords, film, tapes, disks, or cards, in which they are embodied.”
Comments closedIn the view of the Portuguese Republic, the person who makes the work directly available to the public and who therefore effects an ‘act of communication’ within the meaning of Article 3(1) of Directive 2001/29 is the person who places the work on the server from which the internet user is able to access it. The Portuguese Republic submits that it is not the ‘hyperlinker’ — who merely makes a secondary or indirect ‘communication’ — that ensures that ‘members of the public may access [the works] from a place and at a time individually chosen by them’. The act which actually produces that effect is undertaken by the person who effected the initial communication.
Comments closedYouTube, owned by Google, operates a website onto which users may upload video files free of charge. Uploaded files are copied and formatted by YouTube’s computer systems, and then made available for viewing on YouTube. Plaintiffs claimed that “Defendants had ‘actual knowledge’ and were ‘aware of facts or circumstances from which infringing activity was apparent,’ but failed to do anything about it.”
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The Court was called upon to tell the national court explicitly whether, under European Union law, a national court is permitted to adopt a measure, ordering an internet service provider to introduce a system for filtering and blocking electronic communications.
Comments closedDigital services, such as video streaming, should be made available to all EU citizens irrespective of the Member State in which they are located; it should to call on the Commission to request that European digital companies remove geographical controls (e.g. IP address blocking) across the Union and allow the purchase of digital services from outside the consumer’s Member State of origin.
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