Copyright: UK sets out digital exchange issues



24 April 2012


The man in charge of assessing whether the UK needs a Digital Copyright Exchange set out last month what he thinks is wrong with the country's digital copyright regime. Richard Hooper published his diagnostic report on whether copyright licensing is fit for purpose in the digital age. This month he will start work on the second part of the project, finding what he calls "industry-led" solutions to the problems he has identified.

These include a complex system for licensing rights, a complexity of licensing organisations, difficulties in finding out who owns rights in different countries and in paying to use those rights, the high cost of licensing copyright for the high volume/low value deals that typify digital business, and a lack of common standards and a common language for sharing rights information between creative sectors and across national borders.

Hooper cited a number of examples where industry representatives explained the business and wider economic impact of the difficulties of licensing material. In one, he says that a BBC radio manager told the Study that he asked for a particular programme to be put on the website as a downloadable podcast. The immediate response was that it was "too much hassle" to license and then pay all the many contributors relatively small sums of money (£27/$43 in one case).

Europe

ACTA receives blow from politician. A European politician has recommended that ACTA be rejected, making it increasingly unlikely that the Agreement will ever be implemented in Europe. Rapporteur David Martin MEP said the threat to civil liberties outweighed the benefits of improved IP protection. He presented his recommendation to Parliament's International Trade Committee in April. The Committee will vote on the Agreement in May.

US

IP Tsar favours voluntary action. The top White House official for intellectual property sent Congress a report documenting enforcement efforts, but declined to endorse further legislative efforts to target online piracy. The report by US IP Enforcement Coordinator Victoria Espinel only acknowledges in passing the stalling in January of two bills targeting online infringement, PIPA and SOPA.

New Zealand

Is three strikes working? Copyright owners and ISPs provided feedback in April on the fee provision in New Zealand's three-strikes law. The law came into effect on September 1 2011, and implemented a system for rights holders to notify ISPs of infringing users. Clause 7 of the bill allows ISPs to charge rights holders up to NZ$25 ($20) per notice. The law called for a review of the fee after six months.

US

Amicus briefs in Flava Works v Gunter. Internet companies and Hollywood faced off in April in friend-of-the-court briefs filed in a case that could have major implications for copyright online. Flava Works won against Marques Rondale Gunter, creator and owner of myVidster.com, last year in the Northern District of Illinois, which ruled Gunter had sufficient knowledge of infringement on the site to support claims of contributory infringement.

A ruling from the English High Court could limit the ability of copyright owners to issue so-called speculative invoices to people they believe have breached their IP rights online.

Statutory damages for infringement could be doubled, with triple damages for wilful and repeat infringers, under draft changes to China's Copyright Law. The proposed amendments have been published by the National Copyright Administration and comments were submitted running up until the end of April.

As the period ended for responses to the UK government proposals on copyright reform, Oxford Economics published a report saying the government's economic analysis was flawed.

A group of Australian academics told a key parliamentary committee that they believe Australia should reconsider ratifying ACTA.

The UK government said it will publish a green paper on its Communications Bill within the next few months.

A first-of-its-kind US government study titled Intellectual Property and the US Economy: Industries in Focus concluded that intellectual property results in more than one-third of GDP. and one-quarter of US jobs.


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