The Internationalisation of Copyright Protection - Conventions & Treaties

The rights granted under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988 are geared to ensure economic reward and remuneration for performers. Performing rights and recording rights are granted to musicians, singers, dancers, and actors amongst others.

Part I of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988

Authors’ rights are protected by international copyright law by the Berne Convention for the Protection of Literary and Artistic Works 1886, which has been further updated by the WIPO Copyright Treaty (WCT) and the Universal Copyright Convention.

Berne Convention

The Berne Convention is based on the national treatment principle, which grants citizens of other member states the same protection as it offers its own citizens. This differs from the Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights Protocol (TRIPS) for instance in that it does not interfere with the laws of signatory countries in this regard.

TRIPS

TRIPS is administered by the World Trade Organization (WTO), was a significant step in setting minimum standards worldwide for intellectual property rights in contracting countries. The and international enforcement procedures.

This Convention provides protection to broadcasts and sound recordings, and is granted to producers of phonograms and broadcasters. Performers also benefit under the TRIPS Convention, as their live performances remain protected by copyright under the Convention.

How does copyright protection apply on the Internet?

The UK Copyright, Designs and Patents Act has been updated on a number of occasions to keep legal protection abreast with technology developments and means to distribute material. The Software Directive and Copyright Regulations for instance introduced a right of communication a work, which rendered copyright infringement technology neutral in the UK - a significant clarification of the law.

Part II of Copyright Designs and Patents Act

Part II of the Copyright Designs and Patents Act 1988 grants exclusive rights to live performers such musicians, singers, dancers, artists to protect their performances. Loosely speaking, the rights granted under Part II of the Act equate to those granted under Part I. The rights include the right to reproduce, distribute, make available, and communicate works to the public.

Performance and recording rights find themselves in this separate Part of the Act to accommodate the difference in nature between Part I and Part II works, due to the status of the rights when they were introduced into UK law. Part II rights at the time of the passage of the Act in force in 1988 were considered inferior rights to Part I works, and not assignable and did not prevent imitation of performances. The intellectual property rights granted in Part II where not proprietary in nature, that is, were not property rights - they were simply rights to prevent the exercise of any of the exclusive rights. In practise this made little difference other than in awards for damages. The reason of the difference in status was that a performance, for instance of a song - is required to fully appreciate a Part II work. On the other hand, a Part I work, such as an artistic work or literary simply needs to be viewed to be appreciated.

Performance and recording rights are of increased importance in the light of the ease of copying, brought about by the ability to manufacture copies of performances and recordings on an industrial scale, which is now within the reach of a personal computer and relatively affordable industrial copying apparatus.

Updates to the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act

Since the passage of the Copyright Designs and Patents Act, Part II has been updated by a number of pieces of legislation:

1. Rental and Lending Rights Directive (92/100/EEC), which required the implementation of rights to reproduction, fixate, broadcast, communicate, distribute, rent and lend works to the public. The Directive granted the right to equitable remuneration to performers whose performances were broadcast or displayed in public. This Directive elevated reproduction, distribution, rental and lending rights to full proprietary rights such as those granted in Part I of the Act.
2. Satellite Broadcasting Directive (93/83/EEC) extended performance rights to broadcasts made by satellite.
3. Term Directive (93/98/EEC), which harmonised the duration of performance rights protection across the EU to 50 years and implementation of reciprocal treatment for non-EU nationals.
4. Information Society Directive (2001/29/EC), which required members States implement to make copyright protection technology neutral.

Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property (TRIPs)

The TRIPs Protocol, which forms part of the Marrakesh Agreement Establishing the WTO has had a significant effect on performance rights. The Protocol extends performance rights and imposes those standards on over 120 countries around the world. TRIPs requires signatory countries implement legal regimes to prevent fixation of performances, broadcasting and communicating performances to the public without the permission of the performer for a period of at least 50 years from the date of creation.

At an international level, related rights are conferred by the Rome Convention for the Protection of Performers, Producers of Phonograms and Broadcasting Organizations 1961.

Performers and producers of phonograms are also protected by the WIPO Performances and Phonograms Treaty 1996. The Convention for the Protection of Producers of Phonograms protects against the unauthorised duplication of phonograms (the Phonograms Convention) and protection is also given by the Convention relating to the Distribution of Programme-carrying Signals Transmitted by Satellite 1974 (the Satellite Convention).