The judgment arose from a Danish case, Copydan vs Nokia, in which royalty collecting agency Copydan sought payment from the tech giant for creating devices equipped for private copying (and containing memory cards) from 2004 to 2009.
The Danish court which handled the case approached the European Court of Justice for clarification on whether compensation should be payable for enabling the private copying of a legally acquired musical work.
The European Court deemed: ‘When evaluating these circumstances, a valuable criterion would be the possible harm to the rightsholders resulting from the act in question.
‘In cases where rightsholders have already received payment in some other form, for instance as part of a licence fee, no specific or separate payment may be due.
‘The level of fair compensation should take full account of the degree of use of technological protection measures referred to in this Directive. In certain situations where the prejudice to the rightsholder would be minimal, no obligation for payment may arise.’
Current EU copyright law includes an exception for making a copy of legally acquired copyright music for personal use.
In some European countries, levies are applied to compensate rightsholders, however this is not the case in the UK.
Last year, the UK government introduced the European private copying exception, and deemed that no compensation was needed for rightsholders.
This prompted the Musicians’ Union (MU), the British Academy of Songwriters Composers and Authors (BASCA) and UK Music to file for a judicial review.
They believe that compensation-free implementation was incompatible with the directive and therefore illegal.
The Copyright and Rights in Performances (Personal Copies for Private Use) Regulations, which came into force on 1 October 2014, granted consumers the legal right to copy CDs and DVDs onto personal computers, mobile devices and internet-based cloud locker services.
While the MU, BASCA and UK Music welcome the underlying purpose of the new measures, they claim the exceptions incorrectly implement copyright law by failing to include fair compensation for musicians, composers and rightsholders.
Read the full story.
Read the European Court of Justice ruling in full.
The Danish court which handled the case approached the European Court of Justice for clarification on whether compensation should be payable for enabling the private copying of a legally acquired musical work.
The European Court deemed: ‘When evaluating these circumstances, a valuable criterion would be the possible harm to the rightsholders resulting from the act in question.
‘In cases where rightsholders have already received payment in some other form, for instance as part of a licence fee, no specific or separate payment may be due.
‘The level of fair compensation should take full account of the degree of use of technological protection measures referred to in this Directive. In certain situations where the prejudice to the rightsholder would be minimal, no obligation for payment may arise.’
Current EU copyright law includes an exception for making a copy of legally acquired copyright music for personal use.
In some European countries, levies are applied to compensate rightsholders, however this is not the case in the UK.
Last year, the UK government introduced the European private copying exception, and deemed that no compensation was needed for rightsholders.
This prompted the Musicians’ Union (MU), the British Academy of Songwriters Composers and Authors (BASCA) and UK Music to file for a judicial review.
They believe that compensation-free implementation was incompatible with the directive and therefore illegal.
The Copyright and Rights in Performances (Personal Copies for Private Use) Regulations, which came into force on 1 October 2014, granted consumers the legal right to copy CDs and DVDs onto personal computers, mobile devices and internet-based cloud locker services.
While the MU, BASCA and UK Music welcome the underlying purpose of the new measures, they claim the exceptions incorrectly implement copyright law by failing to include fair compensation for musicians, composers and rightsholders.
Read the full story.
Read the European Court of Justice ruling in full.
