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On 6 May 2010, the Beauftragte der Bundesregierung für Kultur und Medien (Federal Government Commissioner for Culture and the Media - BKM) presented a model for the financial support of full cinema digitisation, developed in partnership with the Filmförderungsanstalt (Film Support Office - FFA). The aim of the project is to protect the diversity of the cinema landscape and provide a basic cultural service. To this end, cinema operators who cannot afford to switch to digital projection technologies themselves will receive financial support. These particularly include art house cinemas, municipally-owned...

On 27 April 2010, the Verwaltungsgericht Berlin (Berlin Administrative Court - VG) ruled on the decisive criteria for defining "structural improvement" in the sense of Art. 56 para. 1 no. 1 of the Filmförderungsgesetz 2004 (2004 Film Support Act - FFG 2004) and the date on which such criteria should be applied. In the underlying case, the plaintiffs had applied to the Filmförderungsanstalt (Film Support Office - FFA) in 2006 for financial assistance with the construction of a multiplex cinema with 10 screens and 1,200 seats. The FFA refused the application, most recently in a decision taken on...

On 27 April 2010, the Oberlandesgericht Düsseldorf (Düsseldorf Regional Appeal Court - OLG) ruled that file-hosting site "Rapidshare" was not liable for copyright infringements committed by third parties using its service. In the OLG's view, Rapidshare was not responsible, either as perpetrator or participant, for copyright infringements committed by users. Rapidshare made storage space available for the uploading of files and offered access to stored data by providing a download link. The site operator itself did not publish any content, so it could not be guilty of infringing copyright. As long...

In a recently published ruling of 19 November 2009, the Bundesgerichtshof (Federal Supreme Court - BGH) decided that the use of photographs taken in connection with the production of a film does not infringe the right of cinematographic exploitation enshrined in Art. 91 of the Urheberrechtsgesetz (Copyright Act - UrhG). The defendant operates an online archive of around 400,000 photographs from various films, including some the rights to which are owned by the plaintiff, a film producer. These images can be viewed in thumbnail form and downloaded for a fee. The plaintiff argued that this service...

On 12 May 2010, the Bundesgerichtshof (Federal Supreme Court - BGH) granted an injunction to a music rights marketing company against the private operator of a WLAN under contributory negligence rules. A piece of music, the rights to which were marketed by the plaintiff, had been shared on the Internet using the defendant's WLAN. The plaintiff claimed damages from the defendant and demanded an injunction as well as reimbursement of the cost of sending a cease-and-desist demand. The Landgericht Frankfurt/Main (Frankfurt/Main district court) had essentially upheld the plaintiff's application. On...