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The duty to supply and the obligation to deliver printed matter, set out in the Media Act, have now, after much planning, been extended to other forms of media (except phonograms and moving picture carriers) (see IRIS 1999-7: 13). The corresponding amendment to the Media Act entered into force on 1 September 2000. The Parliament has also abolished the system provided for in the Copyright Act whereby collecting societies are entitled to claim appropriate compensation on behalf of artists whose work is exhibited for profit-making purposes. Consequently, a significant part of the 1996 amendment to...

An important amendment has been made to both the Kabel- und Satelliten-Rundfunkgesetz (Cable and Satellite Broadcasting Act), which governs private broadcasters, and the Rundfunkgesetz (Broadcasting Act), which covers the Österreichischer Rundfunk (Austrian public service broadcaster - ORF). Provisions concerning events of major importance for society have been added to both Acts, bringing them fully into line with the revised EC "Television Without Frontiers" Directive. Most changes necessitated by the Directive had already been introduced in 1999. The Cable and Satellite Broadcasting Act has...

In a judgment of 21 September 2000, the Austrian broadcasting legislation is once more being analysed by the Strasbourg Court (Second Section) from the perspective of Article 10 of the European Convention, this time after a complaint by a private organisation that did not obtain a licence to set up and operate a television transmitter in the Vienna area. In its judgment of 24 November 1993 in the Informationsverein Lentia case, the European Court of Human Rights already decided that the monopoly of the Austrian public broadcasting organisation ORF was in breach of Article 10 of the European Convention...

After examining, on its own initiative, Article 13 of the Regionalradiogesetz (Regional Radio Act - RRG) (see IRIS 2000-3 : 5), which established the Privatrundfunkbehörde (Commercial Broadcasting Authority, formerly known as the Regional Radio and Cable Broadcasting Authority) as an independent collegiate tribunal with judicial powers, the Verfassungsgerichtshof (Constitutional Court - VfGH) ruled at the end of June 2000, as was widely anticipated, that it was unconstitutional. The examination procedure followed a host of complaints about the way in which regional and local radio licences were...

A decision on the subject of web cameras was given recently by the Supreme Court (OGH). While, on the surface, this is only a matter of the photograph producer's analogous protection right, in reality it is also a question of the admissibility of hyperlinks. The events surrounding the case took place in a skiing area of Western Austria. At the behest of the high ridge cable railway an Internet provider had bought some digital cameras and installed them around this cable railway's highest station. The cameras produced images that were transmitted into the valley and onto a computer belonging to...