NEWS

Parliament Report on Enforcement

While we appreciate the general line of the "Gallo-report" and its balanced description of the different positions of players involved, authors are in particular concerned about an alternative resolution that does not appropriately recognise the authors' rights.

EVA signed together with 5 other organisations in the authors' and creators' field a common statement urging the MEPs to vote in favor of the "Gallo-report". The organisations gather over 680.000 authors.

Statement

Gallo report

The MEP Marielle Gallo prepared a balanced draft report on the enforcement of intellectual property right, in particular the copyright for digital uses, in the internal market. Within the 122 amendments proposed are numerous that would water down the necessary level of protection of author's rights by branding unautorised uses, instead of piracy simply as "file-sharing". The EWC and EVA point out the importance of educating the young users and warn that a culture flat rate would prevent the development of use oriented remuneration.

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Commission Hearing on the governance of collective management

With it's recently published work program the Commission announced to work on a frame directive on collective management. The intention is to create a EEA wide frame of regulations on governance and transparency applicable to collective rights managers. As was pointed out in the hearing, the EVA societies take this issues very serious and comply with a high standard of transparency. They have set up their code of conduct published on this site. They also follow the CISAC professional rules.

Prof Dr. Gerhard Pfennig, managing Director of VG Bild-Kunst, urged the Commssion to take care that such regulations apply to all bodies managing rights collectively in order to prevent unfair competition. Collecting societies would need a point of reference when obliged to cooperate with other managers that do not have to comply with the same level of regulations.

Christophe Depreter, Managing Director of SABAM, reminded the Commission that the visual arts societies have created back in 2002 already a one-stop-shop for world wide digitial rights.

Google Settlement

GOOGLE SETTLEMENT

On 7 September the European Commission held a hearing on the pending Google book search settlement. The sector of authors of fine art was represented through OLA the international licensing body set up by EVA members.

CIAGP Resolution on Resale Right

The unanimously adopted resolution addresses three important issues on resale right:

1) the right should be inheritable like all other copyrights and without any exception.

The European Parliament and Council Directive 84/2001 allowed member state's introducing the right for the first time to exclude works of deceased artists for a limited period in order to adapt market structures to the new right. In principle this optional exception should expire at the end of 2009. However, the countries concerned, UK, Ireland, Netherlands, Austria and Malta made use of the optional prolongation for further 2 years despite the fact that the introduction of the right went very smoothly.

2) Article 14ter of the Berne Convention should be made compulsory.

Until today the Berne Convention does not oblige all member states to introduce the right, it is only an option. In order to encourage countries without the right to its introdution the inlander treatment requires for reciprocity. However, it this rules turned out to be no sufficient incentive for introduction of the right. Countries with large and growing international art markets, such as U.S.A., Switzerland and several Asian countries still do not provide for the right, thus depriving many artists and heirs from this important source of income.

3) compulsory collective management

In countries where the right may only be managed by a collecting societies the collection runs very effective and the international revenues are well exchanged and reach authors cross borders.

The resolution is available in English, French and Spanish.

In the frame of the EC's initiative to facilitate the creation of an European digital library EVA expresses its views on the issue of works whose authors and/or rightsholders are untraceable.

EVA Position on so-called Orphan Works

EVA appreciates the EC initiative to facilitating the creation of the European Digital Library - a project which envisages to enable access for the public to Europe's rich culture including many works of fine art and photography. Libraries, archives and museums made the observation that for some material which they have in their possession rights are difficult or even impossible to clear because the authors and other rightsholders are untraceable.

EVA recognises that in such cases the adminsitrative and financial burden for the users can be large. However, it questions to what extent fine arts a really concerned.

A high level of due diligence search regardless of the quality of the works or status of the author is indispensible.

Cut-off ages are not an appropriate tool because they are an unjustified reduction of protection terms.

Special attention should be given to works embedded in books and magazines and rights should be cleared independently.

Collective management societies could play a further role and provide services to facilitate the search or if mandated by legal provisions.

A common letter with authors' and performers' organisations was signed today to address MEPs in connection with the draft report on "Cultural Industries in the context with the Lisbon Strategy" by MEP Guy Bono

Today EVA signed a letter together with other European and International organisations representing authors and performers to emphasise the important role of creators to build and maintain Europe's unique cultural richness. The letter urges MEPs to vote on amendments to the draft report by MEP Guy Bono on "Cultural Industries in the context of the Lisbon Strategy" (2007/2153(INI)) accordingly.

Read the document

The Culture First! Coalition groups 15 organisations of different categories of right holders, including authors, performers, actors, journalists, music publishers and record and audiovisual producers.

The Culture First! Coalition's letter to European Commission president Barroso.

Culture First!/Culture d'abord! alliance was created by the artistic community and the content industry in october 2006 to defend the right to be compensated for private copying.

The Culture First coalition:

rejects the selling off of European culture for purely economic gain;
calls on the Commission to take balanced, unbiased approach to an issue that is of fundamental importance to European culture;
regrets the circulation of economic data which is incorrect or based on indiscriminate estimates, and deplores even further the Commission's willingness to rely on these fantastic figures
recalls that the creative content industry is essential to the digital economy, and that it is precisely in this sector, and not in that of consumer electronics -traditionally dominated by non-European companies - whereEurope has a competitive edge;
underlines that it is the wealth and diversity of the content on offer that motivates consumers to buy digital devices;
insists, therefore, that any initiative which seeks to increase the development of Europe's digital economy and the narrowing of the digital divide must not be carried out at the expense of European right holders; and
demands that the role played by artists and creators in the functioning and development of the information society be recognised and duly taken into account by the European institutions. The quality and diversity of its artistic works are an enormous asset in Europe's global influence. They give it much-needed soul and enable it to compete in international markets. The information society cannot prosper unless the crative industries are dynamic and flourishing.

Read the full declaration

Culture under threat

Copie privée: menace sur la création