Revision as of 11:11, 18 July 2006

EUCD Review and Implementation Wiki

Purpose

Currently, the EU Directive on the harmonisation of certain aspects of copyright and related rights in the information society (EUCD) is subject to a comprehensive and official review process. In preparation for a working session on the EUCD at the “Wizards of OS 4 – Information Freedom Rules” (WOS 4), a network of European copyright experts from civil society seeks to contribute to the stock-taking exercise and initiate a complementary and collaborative assessment of the EUCD. The outcome of this exercise will be a best-practice guide to EUCD implementation.

This initiative has four goals:

(1) to guide governments working to implement the EUCD as well as public interest copyright experts working to influence those governments. Target countries include Ukraine, Romania, Bulgaria, Southeast European countries, but also countries in the Caucasus and Central Asia (2) to guide EU member states who are considering, today or in the future, copyright law reform (3) to provide a platform for networking and knowledge exchange between Western and Eastern/Southeastern European copyright experts (4) to serve as a resource guide for the EUCD workshop at WOS 2006, which will examine whether the directive achieved its goals. Has it hampered legitimate uses? Where there are flexibilities in the EUCD, which of the national implementations are better for freedom than others? Does it create unnecessary restrictions compared to the WCT that it transposes? Are there implementations of the WCT in countries outside the European Union that have found better solutions than the EUCD?

Deliverables

In a first phase, contributors from various EU countries will provide a description of the ways in which the relevant provisions of the EUCD have been transposed into national law. This collection of materials – made available to the public on this Wiki – shall serve as a shared resource for all stakeholders as well as policy-makers who have an interest in exploring alternative designs of national copyright regimes within the framework established by the EUCD. In addition to providing materials, the national experts might decide (and are encouraged) to offer annotations, general comments, comparative analyses, specific critiques, or even comprehensive assessments of the respective national implementations of the EUCD. Non-EU country experts will also post information about respective national copyright laws and implementation processes

In a second phase, a smaller group of experts will take the materials and comments as the basis for a report that seeks to identify and map the alternative design choices, evaluate them against the backdrop of the core values of today’s information society, and to formulate annotated principles that shall form the foundation of a “best practice” guide addressed to states working towards EU membership in south-eastern Europe, the Caucasus and Central Asia who are required to transpose the EUCD as well as to member states who are considering, today or in the future, copyright law reform.

The report will be ready for the Wizards of OS 4 on 14 - 16 September 2006 where a panel and a workshop will take place.

Preceding Work

• Euro-copyrights.org by a pan-European network of young copyright scholars, striving to educate as many people as possible about the implementation of the European Copyright Directive and copyright laws on an objective and easy to understand way.

• EUCD-Status Wiki by AEL Association Electronique Libre

• Ian Brown (ed.), Implementing the European Union Copyright Directive, by-country report from 2003

• Urs Gasser, Michael Girsberger, Transposing the Copyright Directive: Legal Protection of Technological Measures in EU-Member States. A Genie Stuck in the Bottle?, November 2004. An update page brings it up to June 2005.

• Link Collection by the Institut für Urheber- und Medienrecht Munich (in German / Stand vom 12. Juli 2004).

Other Resources

Collection of National Copyright Laws

• UNESCO's Collection of National Copyright Laws

Background Materials on EUCD and National Copyright Laws

• Gowers Report, will review the current IP framework in the UK.

• Bernt Hugenholtz, Why the Copyright Directive is Unimportant, and Possibly Invalid. Published in [2000] EIPR 11, p. 501-502

• iffro, Study on Reproduction Rights Organisations (RROs) in European Countries , Report, 22 June 2005

Specific Issues/Areas of Implementation

(a) Technological Protection Measures

• Wencke Bäsler, Technological Protection Measures in the United States, the European Union and Germany, How much fair use do we need in the "Digital World"?, Virginia Journal of Law & Technology Vol. 8, Nr.13 (2003)

• Stefan Bechtold Digital Rights Management in the United States and Europe American Journal of Comparative Law, Vol. 52, pp. 323-382, 2004

• Ian Brown, The Evolution of Anti-Circumvention Law, International Review of Law, Computers and Technology (forthcoming)

• Natalie Helberger et al., Digital Rights Management and Consumer Acceptability, December 2004, INDICARE

• Gwen Hinze, EFF, Seven Lessons from a Comparison of the Technological Protection Measure Provisions of the FTAA, the DMCA, and recent bilateral Free Trade Agreements

• Urs Gasser, Legal Frameworks and Technological Protection of Digital Content: Moving Forward Towards a Best Practice Model, February 2006

• Patricia Akester, draft UNESCO study on the WIPO 'Casting Treaty, July 2006

(b) Teaching and Research Exceptions

• Kenneth D. Crews/ Jacque Ramos, Comparative Analysis of International Copyright Law Applicable to University Scholarship

• Silke Ernst/ Daniel Haeusermann, EUCD Teaching Exceptions in Selected E.U. Member States - A Rough Overview, June 2006

• Kernochan Center for Law, Media and the Arts, Project on anti-circumvention of technological protection of copyrighted works, Final Report Columbia Journal of Law and the Arts, Volume 27, No. 4.

European Commission

• European Commission page on Copyright and Neighbouring Rights

• Commission Staff Working Paper on the review of the EC legal framework in the field of copyright and related rights June 19, 2004

• EDRI, FIPR, VOSN, Response to the European Commission consultation on the review of the "acquis communautaire" in the field of copyright and related rights October 27, 2004

• European Charter on Film Online.

Reports from other Jurisdictions

• Standing Committee on Legal and Constitutional Affairs, House of Representatives, The Parliament of the Commonwealth of Australia, Review of technological protection measures exceptions Canberra, February 2006

• DMCA Section 104 Report, A Report of the Register of Copyrights Pursuant to § 104 of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act August 2001

25 current EU members

• Belgium
• Denmark
• Finland
• France
• Germany
• Greece
• Italy
• Luxembourg
• Netherlands
• Norway
• Portugal
• Slovenia
• Spain
• Sweden
• United Kingdom
• ...

Accession States

• Bulgaria
• Rumania
• Ukraine
• Serbia
• Macedonia
• ...

Countries outside the EU implementing the WCT/WPPT

• Switzerland
• Australia
• USA
• India

Project Leads

• Urs Gasser
• Ian Brown

Contributors

• ...

Best Practice Guide

Best Practice Guide Page

Consult the User's Guide for information on using the wiki software.

admin