Abstract
To tackle the financial difficulties facing the newspaper industry, different solutions have been advanced in Europe. These have resulted in either the conclusion of consensual agreements or the adoption of national legislative initiatives to create sui generis rights over news content. Currently also the EU Commission is considering whether a neighbouring right for publishers – whether in the press sector alone or also other sectors – should be proposed for adoption at the EU level. This contribution discusses: (1) the compatibility with EU law of national legislative initiatives that have resulted in the creation of sui generis rights for press publishers; and (2) whether a neighbouring right for publishers may be adopted at the EU level and, if so, what changes of the copyright acquis are required. It concludes that, while the former may be contrary to Member States’ obligations under EU law, the latter may be pursued by amending relevant Directives.
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Notes
Price (2015), p. 3.
Barthel (2015).
Madsen and Andsager (2012).
Calin et al. (2013).
Directive 2001/29/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 22 May 2001 on the harmonisation of certain aspects of copyright and neighbouring rights in the information society, OJ L 167, 10–19.
Directive 2006/115 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 12 December 2006 on rental and lending right and on certain rights neighbouring to copyright in the field of intellectual property (codified version), OJ L 376, 28–35.
Nils Svensson and Others v. Retriever Sverige AB, C-466/12, EU:C:2014:76.
Hewlett-Packard Belgium SPRL v. Reprobel SCRL, C-572/13, EU:C:2015:750.
C More Entertainment AB v. Linus Sandberg, C-279/13, EU:C:2015:199.
Eva-Maria Painer v. Standard VerlagsGmbH and Others, C-145/10, EU:C:2011:798.
Barabash (2013), p. 244.
On the latter see Scalzini (2015), pp. 461–463.
Rosati (2012).
Schmidt (2013).
Geerts (2012).
La Stampa (2016).
ANSA (2016).
Rabenstein (2013).
Lardinois (2013).
Bundeskartellamt (2015).
Gingras (2014).
InfoSoc Directive, Recital 15.
Commission of the European Communities, Green Paper on Copyright and Neighbouring Rights in the Information Society, COM(95) 382 final.
Commission of the European Communities, Communication from the Commission: Follow-Up to the Green Paper on Copyright and Neighbouring Rights in the Information Society, COM(96) 568 final.
Hugenholtz (2000), p. 500.
InfoSoc Directive, Recital 6.
Ibid, Recital 7.
Ibid, Recital 6.
Ibid, Recital 7.
DR and TV2 Danmark A/S v. NCB – Nordisk Copyright Bureau, C-510/10, EU:C:2012:244, [35], referring to Laserdisken ApS v. Kulturministeriet, C-479/04, EU:C:2006:549, [26] and [31]–[34].
InfoSoc Directive, Recital 24.
Rosati (2014).
Nils Svensson and Others v. Retriever Sverige AB, cit, [16], referring to ITV Broadcasting Ltd and Others v. TV Catch Up Ltd, C-607/11, EU:C:2013:147, [21] and [31].
Ibid, [17]. On this point see also – more recently – OSA - Ochranný svaz autorský pro práva k dílům hudebním os v. Léčebné lázně Mariánské Lázně as, C-351/12, EU:C:2014:110, [23]; Sociedade Portuguesa de Autores CRL v. Ministério Público and Others, C-151/15, EU:C:2015:468, [12]; SBS Belgium NV v. Belgische Vereniging van Auteurs, Componisten en Uitgevers (SABAM), C-325/14, EU:C:2015:764, [14].
Nils Svensson and Others v. Retriever Sverige AB, cit., [18].
Ibid, [20].
Ibid, [21], referring to Sociedad General de Autores y Editores de España (SGAE) v. Rafael Hoteles SA, C-306/05, EU:C:2006:764, [37, 38]; and ITV Broadcasting Ltd and Others v. TV Catch Up Ltd, cit, [32].
Ibid, [24], referring by analogy to Sociedad General de Autores y Editores de España (SGAE) v. Rafael Hoteles SA, cit, [40] and [42]; Organismos Sillogikis Diacheirisis Dimiourgon Theatrikon kai Optikoakoustikon Ergon, C-136/09, EU:C:2010:151, [38]; and ITV Broadcasting Ltd and Others v. TV Catch Up Ltd, cit, [39].
Ibid, [25].
Ibid, [26].
Ibid, [27].
BestWater International GmbH v. Michael Mebes and Stefan Potsch, C-348/13, EU:C:2014:2315.
GS Media BV v. Sanoma Media Netherlands BV, Playboy Enterprises International Inc and Britt Geertruida Dekker, C-160/15 (in progress).
Nils Svensson and Others v. Retriever Sverige AB, cit, [34].
Ibid, [35].
Ibid, [36].
Ibid.
InfoSoc Directive, particularly Recitals 1 and 7.
Ibid, Recital 7.
C More Entertainment AB v. Linus Sandberg, cit, [25].
Ibid, [27].
Ibid, [29].
Ibid, [30].
Ibid, [31].
Ibid, [33].
C More Entertainment AB v. Linus Sandberg, cit., [35].
Ibid.
Opinion of Advocate General Pedro Cruz Villalón in Hewlett-Packard Belgium SPRL v. Reprobel SCRL, C-572/13, EU:C:2015:389, [127].
Ibid, [124].
Ibid, [125].
Ibid, [126].
Amazon.com International Sales Inc. and Others v. Austro-Mechana Gesellschaft zur Wahrnehmung mechanisch-musikalischer Urheberrechte Gesellschaft mbH, C-521/11, EU:C:2013:515, [49, 50] and [53].
Opinion of Advocate General Pedro Cruz Villalón in Hewlett-Packard Belgium SPRL v. Reprobel SCRL, cit., [128].
Ibid, [130].
Ibid, [140].
European Copyright Society (2015).
Ibid, 4.
See Question 1 at http://www.publishersright.eu/.
Huss-Ekerhult (2015), p. 1.
Hewlett-Packard Belgium SPRL v. Reprobel SCRL, cit, [47].
Ibid, [48].
Ibid, [49].
Schütze (2012), p. 364.
Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union (consolidated version 2012), OJ C 326, 47–200.
Craig and de Búrca (2015), pp. 84–85.
Ibid, Protocol (No 25) on the exercise of shared competence.
InfoSoc Directive, Recital 6.
Ibid, Recital 7.
In relation to exclusive rights, see e.g. Martin Luksan v. Petrus van der Let, C-277/10, EU:C:2012:65, particularly [64]; Football Dataco Ltd and Others v. Yahoo! UK Ltd and Others, C-604/10, EU:C:2012:115, particularly [52] (both discussed further in Rosati (2014), pp. 589–590).
Football Association Premier League Ltd and Others v. QC Leisure and Others, C-403/08); and Karen Murphy v. Media Protection Services Ltd, C-429/08, EU:C:2011:631.
Ibid, [96].
Ibid, [97, 98].
Ibid, [99].
Ibid, [100].
Vesterdorf (2015), pp. 265–267.
Communication from the Commission to the European Parliament, the Council, the European Economic and Social Committee and the Committee of the Regions, A digital single market strategy for Europe, COM (2015) p. 192 final.
Ibid, p. 2.
Ibid, pp. 3–4.
European Commission, Communication from the Commission to the European Parliament, the Council, the European Economic and Social Committee and the Committee of the Regions, Towards a modern, more European copyright framework, COM (2015) p. 626 final.
Gummer and Robinson (2014).
Ibid, p. 10.
European Commission – Fact sheet, Making EU copyright rules fit for the digital age – questions and answers (9 December 2015), available at http://europa.eu/rapid/press-release_MEMO-15-6262_en.htm.
European Commission, Public consultation on the role of publishers in the copyright value chain and on the ‘panorama exception’ (23 March 2016 – 15 June 2016), available at https://ec.europa.eu/digital-single-market/en/news/public-consultation-role-publishers-copyright-value-chain-and-panorama-exception.
Ibid.
Boyd (2015).
These are the European Publishers Council (http://www.epceurope.eu), the European Newspapers Publishers Association (http://www.enpa.eu), the European Magazine Media Association (http://www.magazinemedia.eu), and News Media Europe (http://www.newsmediaeurope.eu): see http://www.publishersright.eu/.
Ibid, Question 2.
Ibid, Question 3.
Hugenholtz (2016).
Xalabarder (2014).
Computer and Communications Industry Association (2015).
See Ricketson (1999), 64, who speaks of “reasonably generous boundaries” in relation to the scope of Art. 10(1) of the Berne Convention.
Xalabarder (2014), p. 2.
Martin Luksan v. Petrus van der Let, cit.
Ibid, [64].
Lewinski (2008), §5.163.
Ficsor (2002), §5.11.
Goldstein and Hugenholtz (2013), p. 392.
In the same sense, see Lewinski (2010a, b), §11.5.58: “Making a ‘quotation’ implies the requirement of using a part of another person’s work or even, where excerpting is not possible, an entire work (such as a photograph or short poem), for the purpose of illustrating or proving a proposition neighbouring to the quoted work”.
Eva-Maria Painer v. Standard VerlagsGmbH and Others, cit, [119].
Ibid, [127].
Ibid, [134].
Ibid, [135].
Ibid, [120] (emphasis added).
Ibid, [131].
Ibid, [136].
Article L-122-5(3)(a) of the Code de la propriété intellectuelle states that quotations are allowed insofar as they clearly indicate the name of the author and the source, and are justified for by the critical, polemic, educational, scientific or information of the work in which they are incorporated. According to Benabou (2012), p. 148, the CJEU decision in Painer has de facto abolished the rule that a quotation must be attached to another work or subject-matter. In the same sense, see Derclaye (2014), p. 718.
Johan Deckmyn and Vrijheidsfonds VZW v. Helena Vandersteen and Others, C-201/13, EU:C:2014:2132, [20].
Opinion of Advocate General Pedro Cruz Villalón in Johan Deckmyn and Vrijheidsfonds VZW v. Helena Vandersteen and Others, C-201/13, EU:C:2014:458, [57].
Johan Deckmyn and Vrijheidsfonds VZW v. Helena Vandersteen and Others, cit, [21].
Ibid.
Opinion of Advocate General Melchior Wathelet in GS Media BV v. Sanoma Media Netherlands BV, Playboy Enterprises International Inc and Britt Geertruida Dekker, C-160/15, EU:C:2016:221, [77].
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I am grateful to Cédric Manara (Google) and Lionel Bently (University of Cambridge) for their comments on an earlier draft, as well as the anonymous peer-reviewers of the International Review of Intellectual Property and Competition Law. Errors and omissions remain my own.
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Rosati, E. Neighbouring Rights for Publishers: Are National and (Possible) EU Initiatives Lawful?. IIC 47, 569–594 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/s40319-016-0495-4
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s40319-016-0495-4