Directive on Copyright and Related Rights in the Information Society
In November 1996 the European Commission adopted a communication concerning the follow-up to the Green Paper on
- the legal protection of computer programs
- rental right, lending right and certain rights related to copyright in the field of
- copyright and related rights applicable to broadcasting of programs by satellite and cable retransmission
- the term of protection of copyright and certain related rights
- the legal protection of databases
The proposal was first presented by the Commission in January 1998, amended in May 1999 and currently is at second reading before the Parliament. Final adoption of the Directive could take place at the end of 2000 or the beginning of 2001 respectively.
A full-text version for download (pdf file) of the amended proposal for a Directive on copyright and related rights in the Information Society is available on the website of the European Commission (DG Internal Market):
General critique concerning the proposed EU Directive includes:
- Open networks
The new law could require (technological) surveillance of communications to ensure enforcement. Also because Service Providers might be legally liable for transmitting unauthorized copies, the might in turn have to deny access to anybody who could not provide them with financial guaranties or insurance.
- Interoperable systems
The draft could negate the already established right in EU law for software firms to make their systems interoperable with the dominant copyright protected systems. This would be a threat to the democratic and economic rights of users.
- Publicly available information
It is yet unclear whether new legal protections against the bypassing of
Comments from the library, archives and documentation community on the amended Directive embrace:
The Library Association
EBLIDA (European Bureau of Library, Information and Documentation Associations)
Society of Archivists (U.K.) and Public Record Office (U.K.)
EFPICC (European Fair Practices In Copyright Campaign)
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Mormon Church v. Sandra and Jerald Tanner
In a ruling of December 1999, a federal judge in Utah temporarily barred two critics of the Mormon Church from posting on their website the Internet addresses of other sites featuring pirated copies of a Mormon text. The Judge said that it was likely that Sandra and Jerald Tanner had engaged in contributory copyright infringement when they posted the addresses of three Web sites that they knew, or should have known, contained the copies.
Kaplan, Carl S.:
Universal Studios v. Movie-List
The website Movie-List, which features links to online, externally hosted movie trailers has been asked to completely refrain from linking to any of Universal Studio's servers containing the trailers as this would infringe copyright.
Cisneros, Oscar S.: Universal: Don't Link to Us. In:
More cases concerned with the issue of linking,
Ross, Alexandra: Copyright Law and the Internet:
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Intellectual property, very generally, relates to the output that result from intellectual activity in the industrial, scientific, literary and artistic fields. Traditionally intellectual property is divided into two branches: 1) industrial property (
The full title of Dona Haraway's Cyborg Manifesto is "A Cyborg Manifesto: Science, Technology, and Socialist-Feminism in the Late Twentieth Century", published by Routledge, New York, in 1991. Online e excerpts of this classic are located at