B9 10018. Lucie Guibault, IViR: Dutch press exception revisited! Kort commentaar (gepubliceerd op het Kluwer Copyright Blog) bij Gerechtshof Leeuwarden, 26 juli 201, B9 9976.
The summer is no longer quiet for the communications departments of most public sector organizations across the Netherlands. The age long practice of circulating hard copies of newspaper clippings among the employees of an organization is seriously compromised following a decision of the Court of appeal of Leeuwarden. (…) the Court opines that, should the Dutch Copyright Act be interpreted as preventing a reservation of rights on copyright protected articles, this would be in conflict with the intention and the text of the Directive, in particular with the need to grant strong protection to rights owners and to secure equitable remuneration for the use of their work. The fact that the newspaper clippings are done for non-commercial purposes is irrelevant (...)
Consequently, the only interpretation of article 15 paragraph 2 of the Dutch Act that is in conformity with the Directive consists in saying that the prohibition on the reservation of rights can only be made with respect to non-original news items. The Court distinguishes the present case from the Newspaper Clippings decision, saying that the Supreme Court had not examined the issue of the reservation of rights, nor had it considered the interpretation of ‘news reports and miscellaneous reports’. The Court adds that the need to promote the free flow of information, upon which the Supreme Court had based its decision, never implied that the rights owners cannot reserve their rights.
(…) Although I could find some sympathy for the arguments put forward by the Supreme Court in the Newspaper Clippings case, it is true that this interpretation of the Dutch Copyright Act had widened the scope of the provision to an unprecedented extent that found no counterpart in any of the neighboring countries, like France, Belgium or even Germany. The provision has now been brought back to more reasonable proportions, meaning that public sector organizations will, from now on, be obliged to obtain a license from the publishers for the making of newspaper clippings (whether on paper or electronic format). Knowing the precarity of the newspaper publishing business these days, this is a positive outcome for the rights owners.
Lees het volledige commentaar hier.
