This case concerned the famous Brompton bicycle which can be folded to carry away after use (Case C‑833/18, SI, Brompton Bicycle Ltd. v. Chedech / Get2Get). The bike was once protected by a patent and, following its expiry, the defendant (Chedech/Get2Get) embarked on selling a similar bike in Belgium (the designs of the two bikes…

In Response Clothing Ltd v The Edinburgh Woollen Mill Ltd [2020] EWHC 148, His Honour Judge Hacon (“HHJ Hacon”) found that copyright subsisted in a fabric design as a work of artistic craftmanship and that the sale of garments made from such fabric amounted to copyright infringement. The case is an interesting development in English law…

Hospital infringed on credentialing service’s copyright by using forms, but the infringement began when the forms were not yet registered. A medical credentialing support service is barred from recovering statutory damages and attorney’s fees for a hospital’s use of its credentialing forms after their relationship ended, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit…

Part I of this post discussed the current position of host providers and the changes that will be brought about by Article 17. Part II addresses the major problems in relation to Article 17 and how it should be implemented to try and minimize these. The host provider privilege as a safeguard for a diverse…

On July 6, the EU adopted the Directive on Copyright in the Digital Single Market (DSM Directive), following heated discussions of Articles 15 (formerly 11) and 17 (formerly 13) in particular. In Germany, tens of thousands of people took to the streets to demonstrate against the planned legislation in the lead-up to the vote in the European Parliament…

Ed Sheeran’s ‘Shape of You’ was a giant hit of the last decade, a runaway success story – well almost. There is a fly in the ointment. Sami Chokri (a.k.a. Sami Switch) is claiming Sheeran and his fellow songwriters infringed his copyright, copying part of the chorus of ‘Oh Why’. You can hear the two…

Part 1 of this post outlined two of the three main takeaways from the Article 17 stakeholder dialogue so far. This part will cover the third of these, lack of transparency, and look ahead to the next phase of the dialogue. Lack of transparency on all sides There was finally one issue that all stakeholders…

As 2020 unfolds, the European Commission’s stakeholder dialogue pursuant to Article 17 of the Directive on Copyright in the Digital Single Market (CDSM directive) enters its third (and likely final) phase. After four meetings that focussed on gathering “an overview of the current market situation as regards licensing practices, tools used for online content management…

While EU Member States are trying to implement the press publishers’ right (also known as ‘link tax’) that was recently introduced in Art 15 of the Directive on Copyright in the Digital Single Market (DSM Directive), Australia is only just starting its policy debate on this highly contested topic. Australian media companies (or ‘press publishers’)…

As we enter a new year, we would like to take this opportunity to pass on our best wishes for 2020 to all of our readers, as well as reflect on developments in copyright over the past year.  Last year was another busy one in the copyright world, with a number of landmark CJEU decisions,…