Search results : 302

The European Commission has finished the preliminary analysis of the measures implementing the Audiovisual Media Services (AVMS) Directive into national law notified by 16 Member States: Belgium, Bulgaria, Czech Republic, Denmark, Finland, France, Greece, Ireland, Italy, Malta, the Netherlands, Romania, Spain, Sweden, Slovakia and the United Kingdom. Subsequently, the European Commission has sent fact-finding letters to these states inquiring about these implementing measures. The Commission is thus seeking to ensure that all provisions of the AVMS Directive have been correctly transposed into...

The Irish High Court on 11 October 2010 ruled that remedies to block or disable access to Internet sites, to interrupt a transmission over a network or to cut off Internet access are not permitted by Irish law. This case was the latest of several taken by record companies against Internet service providers seeking to address the issue of copyright infringement over the Internet (see: IRIS 2005-10/28, IRIS 2006-4/26 and IRIS 2010-6/34). The record companies (EMI, Sony, Universal, Warner and WEA) sought relief against Internet service provider UPC, requiring it to stop unauthorised copying and file-sharing...

On 24 June 2010, the European Commission issued a set of reasoned opinions to 12 member states (Austria, Cyprus, Estonia, Greece, Finland, Hungary, Lithuania, Luxemburg, Latvia, Poland, Portugal, and Slovenia) requesting that they proceed with updating their national broadcasting legislation in order to bring it into compliance with the Audiovisual Media Service (AVMS) Directive. The Directive, which replaced the Television without Frontiers Directive of 1989 (as amended), was adopted in December 1997 with the intention of bringing the EU’s broadcasting rules up to speed with the digital age. The...

The commercial division of the High Court decided on 23 March 2010 that a preliminary ruling should be sought from the European Court of Justice on the interpretation of Articles 8 and 10 of Directive 92/100/EC on rental right and lending right and on certain rights related to copyright in the field of intellectual property, as codified by Directive 2006/115/EC. The case was taken by PPI, a licensing body which acts on behalf of phonogram producers who hold rights in sound recordings. The central issue is whether section 97 of the Irish Copyright Act 2000 is contrary to Ireland’s obligations pursuant...

The Irish High Court on 16 April 2010 approved a settlement agreed in earlier litigation (January 2009) between a number of record companies (EMI, Sony, Universal and Warner) and Eircom, an Internet service provider which has about 40% of the market share. The settlement provided for a three strike approach to dealing with copyright infringement. On first detection a notice from Eircom would inform the subscribers that they had been detected infringing copyright; on a second infringement, they would receive a warning that unless they desisted they would be disconnected from the service; and finally,...