When original works of art are resold, the EU’s artists’ resale right Directive 2001/84/EC requires that a royalty is paid to the author of the work by the seller. The Directive goes on to allow either the seller or professional sellers, such as art galleries, to share the liability for paying the royalty in accordance with national law. In this case, a French auction house decided to change its terms and conditions so that the buyer, and not the seller, became liable to pay the royalty. Can contract derogate from the seller’s obligation to pay the royalty that is enshrined in the Directive?
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Case C-30/14, Ryanair – grounding a go compare an airfare website
Price-comparison websites in the EU are often lawful because the websites they take their information from are databases frequently unprotected by either copyright or the ‘sui generis’ right enshrined in the EU’s Database Directive 96/9/EC. This is true of Ryanair’s website. But Ryanair’s website is however protected by a plank of deviant Dutch ‘copyright’ law. In this case, a Dutch website that compares the price of airfares is seeking to rely on a Dutch exception to the Dutch ‘copyright’ rule, an exception that corresponds to one found in the EU’s Database Directive. The legal question has become whether the Directive applies to all databases and thus websites – even the unprotected ones – and, if so, whether the price-comparison website qualifies as a ‘lawful user’, who does not need to obtain Ryanair’s consent to use Ryanair’s website.
Continue readingCase C-421/13, Apple – seeking trade mark protection for the layout and design of a retail store
Is the layout and design of a shop capable of being protected by EU trade mark law? And if so, then what conditions should be attached to prevent a right holder from invoking their monopoly against the stores of their competitors?
Continue readingCase C-419/13, Art & Allposters International – from paper art poster to canvas picture
When a company takes paper posters of famous art works and puts them onto canvas, is the company infringing an author’s right to control the distribution of a copyright-protected work as enshrined in Article 4 of the EU’s InfoSoc Directive 2001/29?
Continue readingCase C-98/13, Martin Blomqvist – deliberately purchasing a fake Rolex from China
When a consumer deliberately buys a fake Rolex from a Chinese website and then Danish customs seizes the watch, is the watch to be destroyed without compensation?
Continue readingCase C-348/13, BestWater International – objecting to the embedding of videos
Where a company’s website allows a visitor to view a video that has actually been made by a rival company, can the rival rely on the EU’s InfoSoc Directive 2001/29 to stop its video from being shown?
Continue readingCase C-117/13, Technische Universität Darmstadt – introducing modern EU copyright law
When a university library scans a book to permit the electronic reading of a book, can the book’s publisher put a stop to this unauthorised reproduction? And can a German university successfully invoke a ‘library’ exception enshrined in the EU’s InfoSoc Directive 2001/29?
Continue readingCase C-279/13, C More Entertainment – skating on thin ice with embedded links in EU copyright law
Where a person puts a clickable link on his website enabling visitors to watch sports matches for free, then does this constitute a ‘communication to the public’ under the EU’s InfoSoc Directive 2001/29?
Continue readingCase C-201/13, Johan Deckmyn – parody in EU law
Belgium has a tradition of creating comic book figures. Tintin is perhaps the most famous comic book character but another popular comic strip chronicles the adventures of ‘Spike and Suzy’ [Suske and Wiske]. Comic books can be protected by copyright. In this reference, the issue is whether the right holders can stop a political party from circulating a picture that spoofs the cover of a Spike and Suzy story.
Continue readingCase C-351/12, OSA – EU copyright law checks in for a long stay at a health spa
For the purposes of the EU’s InfoSoc Directive 2001/29, are the televisions and radios found in Czech health spas communicating copyright-protected works to the public?
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