Speakers: Jaani Riordan (8 New Square), James Parish (King's College London) and Emily Gould (Institute of Art and Law)

Chair: Toby Headdon (Bristows). You can read a short summary of the event here.

Speaker: Professor Estelle Derclaye (The University of Nottingham) and Professor Gilles Stupfler (Université d'Angers)

Moderator: Dr James Parish, Lecturer in Intellectual Property and Information Law, King's College London

A lot has been written on the CJEU copyright case law and national implementation laws but not on how Member States’ courts apply it. Do they follow EU law or not? What is the extent of the disharmony in the 27 Member States and the UK too (pre- and post-Brexit)? Does it differ per Member State? Per type of work, type of topic, over time? Why does it still matter to the UK?

This presentation explored these questions in the context of a new book: EU Copyright Law Harmonisation, An Empirical Analysis of National Courts Case Law, published by Hart/Bloomsbury. The presenters explained how they went about finding out the answers to these questions including the statistical methods and limitations they encountered in their research.

Speaker: Professor Mira T Sundara Rajan D.Phil (Oxon)

Chair: Rt Hon Lord Justice Arnold

A recent surge of lawsuits raises the question of whether the training of AI models infringes copyright in the United States, and, increasingly, in other jurisdictions around the world. Curiously, though, one important aspect of copyright remains in the background: the moral rights of authors and artists. Why have moral rights not yet been invoked? Is there a possibility that AI technology infringes moral rights? If so, how should these claims be presented, and what relief might plaintiffs expect? This presentation will explore these issues in the context of a new book: The Moral Rights of Authors and Artists: From the Birth of Copyright to the Age of Artificial Intelligence, published by Oxford University Press.

Speakers: Emily Gould (Assistant Director, Institute of Art and Law), Sarah Kenshall (Partner, Pennington Manches Cooper) and Brigitte Lindner (BLACA, Vice-Chair)

Discussing ideas, expressions, altered copies and substantial parts. The seminar wase a lively discussion chaired by Simon Clark on some of the issues raised in David Stone’s recent decision in Martin v Bodega. These covered the application of the Designers Guild, the approach to the issue of copying a substantial part in this case, the potential scope for passing off where copyright or design rights may not apply, the need for knowledge for joint tortfeasorship, compared with strict liability for first importers under s.18 and best practice for bringing a copyright action.

Speakers: Prof Paul Torremens (University of Nottingham)

Speakers: Alina Trapova (UCL), Gwilym Harbottle (Hogarth Chambers) and Nicholas Caddick KC (Hogarth Chambers)

Chair: Toby Headdon (Bristows)

The speakers shed light on the role of moral rights in the context of AI, a topic which has so far been on the periphery of the debate. We took a look at aspects of moral rights related both to the training of generative AI models and the output and explore whether moral rights are sufficient to protect the personality of authors and performers. You can find Fernanda Galera Soler's slides here.

Speaker: Jonathan Moss of Hogarth Chambers (Counsel for the Defendant)

Speakers

Dr Gaetano Dimita is a Reader in Interactive Entertainment and Intellectual Property Law, Queen Mary Intellectual Property Research Institute/Centre for Commercial Law Studies, Queen Mary University of London; Avvocato (Italian Bar - Rome). He is the founder and editor-in-chief of the Interactive Entertainment Law Review, Edward Elgar, the producer of the More Than Just a Game conference series, the co-author of Mastering the Game 2nd edition, WIPO, and a video games enthusiast.

Dr. Michaela Macdonald is a Senior Lecturer in Management, School of Electronic Engineering and Computer Science, Queen Mary University of London. She is co-editor in chief of the Interactive Entertainment Law Review and co-organizer of the More Than Just a Game conference series. She has worked with the World Intellectual Property Organisation, the UK Intellectual Property Office, the European Space Agency and the European Audiovisual Observatory.

Dr Yin Harn Lee is a Senior Lecturer in Law at the University of Bristol and co-director of the Centre for Global Law and Innovation. She has research interests in intellectual property law (in particular copyright law) and private law remedies. Her most recent projects deal with the status of videogame modifications under copyright law, the challenges presented by copyright law for the preservation of videogames by cultural heritage institutions, and legal and remedial gaps relating to digital assets. She has also recently spoken on the impact of generative AI on creative workers and practices within the videogame industry.

The report can be found here.

This meeting related to the ALAI Congress held on 24 and 25 October in Santiago de Chile

Speakers: Professor Alison Firth, Surrey University and BLACA’s immediate past Chair; James Parish, Lecturer in Intellectual Property and Information Law, King’s College, University of London

Chair: Stephen Edwards, Chair, BLACA

Michele Woods, Director of the Copyright Law Division at WIPO

At this meeting we experimented with a new format: rather than listening to one or more speakers, we met informally around a table for a discussion on the authorship and copyright ownership of the world-famous Boléro, which was composed by Maurice Ravel in 1928.

Taking as a starting point the judgment rendered by the Tribunal Judiciaire de Nanterre on 28 June 2024, which confirmed Maurice Ravel as the sole author of his Boléro, we explored the legal situation from a UK perspective and discuss whether Ravel as the composer of the work is its sole author or whether, under UK law, other creative contributors to the ballet, such as the choreographer and/or the set designer, could make the Boléro a work of joint authorship. The case raises challenging questions regarding the applicable law as well as the rules regarding joint authorship and thus offers an opportunity to revisit the Martin v Kogan litigation.

At the beginning of the meeting, there was a brief introduction with information on the circumstances of the creation of the Boléro and the judgment of the Tribunal Judiciaire de Nanterre by Brigitte Lindner and a recapitulation of the main principles of joint authorship by Professor Alison Firth in order to facilitate the discussion.

Recommended reading and audiovisual materials

Boléro

• Article by Olivier Vrins of Altius: The authors of Ravel’s Boléro: Towards a revival of copyright in the Basque composer’s masterpiece?
• SACEM – Press release regarding the judgment of the Tribunal Judiciaire de Nanterre – in French
• Ravel conducting his Boléro with the Orchestre des Concerts Lamoureux, Paris
• Matthew D. Nielsen – A Beginner’s Guide to Boléro by Maurice Ravel
• Short video on the creation of the Boléro – in French

Joint authorship under UK law

• Article by Jeremy Blum and Jake Palmer of Bristows on Kluwer Copyright Blog: Martin v Kogan 2: Florence Foster Jenkins returns to the IPEC – with links to earlier decisions and posts of the Martin v Kogan litigation
• Daniela Simone (2020) ‘Kogan v Martin: A new framework for joint authorship in Copyright Law’, Modern Law Review83(4), 877-892 

• 13 June 2024: Jerker Ryden, Senior Legal Adviser to the Swedish Royal Library (National Library of Sweden), Remunerated cross-border access to research materials, EODOPEN and other projects involving the Swedish Royal Library, 5.30 for 5.45 (please note earlier start time)

Speaker: Jerker Ryden, Senior Legal Adviser to the Swedish Royal Library (National Library of Sweden) since 2007, where he assists on legal matters, especially copyright, data protection and matters relevant to the making available of the library’s Corpus; Board member, Trust for Legal Information, Stockholm University; formerly in practice at the Swedish Bar, before becoming Senior Legal Counsel of the National Heritage Board.

Commentator: Confirmed commentator: Dr Maria Asunción Esteve Pardo, Associate Professor, Department of Private Law, University of Barcelona, where her research interests include intellectual property, contract and data protection; Visiting Academic Fellow, Queen Mary, University of London. Asuncion has conducted research into open access to scientific publishing, in Spain, Europe and the UK. She has investigated the advantages and disadvantages of different models, and the complexities of contractual solutions between research funders, authors, publishers, universities, and libraries. An article on her research findings will be published in July, in issue 6 of IIC (the International Review of Intellectual Property and Competition Law).

Chair: Prof Uma Suthersanen, BLACA and Professor of Global Intellectual Property Law, Queen Mary, University of London

The Royal Library and its Senior Legal Advisor are involved in many projects related to copyright, including online access to source material for higher education and research. A conference on artificial intelligence is planned later this year with Stockholm University and the Patent and Trademark Office (Swedish IPO). A 2011 Memorandum of Understanding on out-of-commerce works as well as cross-border pilots were per-cursors to provisions in the Copyright in the Digital Single Market Directive (EU) 2019/790. Another initiative, which will be an important aspect of this meeting, is a pilot licensing project between Swedish Copyright Management Organisations and those in a Commonwealth country – Malawi - to facilitate cross-border access to source material. With thanks to EODOPEN, a project that aims to make 20th and 21st century textual materials digitally available, particularly for young people and those with special needs, and to spread best practice in rights clearance internationally: https://eodopen.eu

Tanya Aplin is a Professor of Intellectual Property Law at the Dickson Poon School of Law, King’s College London.

Brigitte Lindner, BLACA Vice-Chair, is a barrister and a member of the bar of Berlin/Germany

Brigitte Lindner examined the origin and scope of the pastiche exception in select EU member states and the reference of the German Federal Supreme Court to the European Court of Justice in Pelham (C-590/23). Tanya Aplin will contrast the pastiche and quotation exceptions from an international and UK perspective and advocate for the supremacy of quotation.

You will find the report of the event here.

Speaker: Dr Fernanda Galera Soler

Dr Galera is a lawyer, lecturer and researcher specialising inIntellectual Property, Entertainment and Media Law with a PhD and master’s degree in Intellectual Property from the University of São Paulo. She is a lecturer at Fundação Getúlio Vargas, São Paulo, and at Universidade Federal de São Carlos, as well as at the London College of Contemporary Music. Dr Galera will share with us her insights into how technologycould be used for the distribution of fair remuneration to each participant in the copyright value chain without the need of complex and broad economic rights, drawing on her research in Brazil and as an academic visitor at the Oxford Intellectual Property Research Centre which culminated in her recently completed PhD thesis.

Chair: Stephen Edwards, BLACA Chairman

You can read the report of the seminar by Aaliyah Lindo here.

Speakers: James Parish, Kings College, London, Gwilym Harbottle, Hogarth Chambers, Adela Wang, Herchel Smith PhD candidate at Queen Mary University, Alison Firth, BLACA Vice-Chair

Chair: Stephen Edwards, BLACA Chairman

You can find the report of the event produced by Aaliyah Lindo here.

The slides are available here.

Speaker: BLACA member James Parish is Lecturer in Intellectual Property and Information Law at the Dickson Poon School of Law, KCL. He holds a BA in Animation & Film Production, as well as law bachelors and masters degrees. He is a solicitor qualified in England & Wales. James will share with us his recent research on classification of exceptions and limitations to copyright and the practical implications of this work.

Chair: Brigitte Lindner, Vice-Chairman, BLACA

here

Two speakers who presented at the June ALAI Congress on 'Copyright, related rights and artificial intelligence' in Paris - Prof Jane Ginsburg and Sophie Goossens - have kindly confirmed as speakers for our November BLACA seminar. They will bring discussions and insights from the Paris meeting to BLACA members and consider some recent developments in US case law, which were unfolding in June. We are grateful to Reed Smith for hosting this meeting.

Speakers

Prof Jane Ginsburg is Morton L. Janklow Professor ofLiterary and Artistic Property Law at Columbia University School of Law, NewYork, ALAI Vice-President, and a member of ALAI’s Bureau and Executive Committee. She is author with Sam Ricketson of International Copyright and Neighbouring Rights: The Berne Convention and Beyond (3rd ed2022, OUP) and many other scholarly works on copyright.

BLACA member Sophie Goossens is a dual-qualified partner (France and England & Wales) in Reed Smith's Entertainment and MediaIndustry Group. She taught International & European Copyright law atFaculté Jean Monnet, Université Paris-Saclay for two years. She is lead authorof Reed Smith’s Entertainment & Media Guide to AI (2023) andcontributor to the Reed Smith Guide to the Metaverse (2022).Chair: Alison Firth (BLACA Chairman)

A new research handbook on moral rights, edited by Prof Ysolde Gendreau, has just been published by Edward Elgar. We are delighted that Prof Gendreau and BLACA members who have contributed to the work will be sharing highlights and insights at our October meeting. As reviewer Peter Yu has put it “This volume could not have been published at a more opportune time when there are growing demands for greater protections for authenticity, artistic integrity and creative agency. It shows why moral rights protection not only is of contemporary relevance but also deserves our renewed attention.”

Chair: Alison Firth, BLACA Chair

Confirmed speakers: Ysolde Gendreau, Gillian Davies, Brigitte Lindner, Paul Torremans

Ysolde Gendreau is professor of Law at the Université de Montréal, Canada, where she teaches intellectual property law. She was president of ALAI Canada from 2006 to 2011 and is an active member of ALAI, sitting on its Executive Board and Bureau as a Vice-President.

Gillian Davies is a barrister and professor of International & EU Intellectual Property Law at QMUL’s Centre for Commercial Law Studies. She a past chairman of BLACA and was a member of ALAI’s Executive Board for many years.

Brigitte Lindner, BLACA vice-chair, is a barrister, qualified in England and Wales, and at the Berlin bar. She has experience of working in international organisations and copyright industry bodies, as well as private practice.

Paul Torremans is professor of Intellectual Property Law at the University of Nottingham and co-director of its Commercial Law Centre. He is a past Chairman of BLACA and has a personal seat on ALAI’s Executive Board as a co-opted member.   

The proposed ‘sunsetting’ of EU-derived legislation in the Retained EU Law (Revocation and Reform) Bill) has been much curtailed, but the Bill remains significant as a further repainting of the post-Brexit landscape. Professor Johnson discussed how the legislation, including the end of “retained” EU supremacy, could work in the future and how it could fit with the general implementation of the UK-EU Trade and Cooperation Agreement and other UK Free Trade Agreements.

Speaker:

Professor Phillip Johnson

Professor Johnson is a barrister and professor of commercial law at Cardiff Law School. As well as intellectual property and related areas of law, he has research interests in legal and parliamentary history, public law and private international law (the subject of his doctoral thesis). He was formerly a lawyer in the Government legal service, advising the Intellectual Property Office. He is a qualified arbitrator and sits as an Appointed Person to hear trade mark and design appeals from the Office. Since 2022, he has been editor of Intellectual Property Quarterly.

Chair: Alison Firth (Chairman, BLACA)

Speaker:

Dr Martin Schaefer, Partner, Boehmert & Boehmert, Berlin

Martin is a practising copyright lawyer, specialising in music and media, a proficient author and a member of severaldistinguished associations, including the Board of ALAI Germany. His passion for gardens led him to write his doctoral thesis on the ‘copyrightability of works of garden architecture’ and to embark on the process of publishing a comprehensive guidebook on the gardens of Sanssouci in Potsdam.

Simon Clark, Honorary Secretary,BLACA

Chair: Brigitte Lindner, Vice-Chair, BLACA

Speaker:

Colin Hulme (Partner, Burness Paull LLP)

Colin leads Burness Paull’s IP team which has won the Managing IP Contentious Firm of the Year (Scotland) award in 2020, 2021 and 2022. The team is top Ranked in Chambers UK, Legal 500, World Trade Mark Review, IAM Patent 1000 and IP Stars. In recent year’s Burness Paull’s IP team have been involved in more than half of all IP actions in the Scottish IP Court.

For our first session of 2023, we looked at the UK’s orphan works regime which governs creative works or performances for which one or more of the right holders is either unknown or cannot be found. Maria Mercedes Frabboni summarised the academic discussions around the Orphan Works Directive and developments under UK law, and Lord Justice Colin Birss talked us through his personal experience of applying for and successfully obtaining an orphan works licence.

Lord Justice Birss was appointed a Lord Justice of Appeal on 25 January 2021 and Deputy Head of Civil Justice from 11 January 2021. He took silk in 2008, was appointed as a Specialist Circuit Judge of what we now know as IPEC in 2010, was appointed to the High Court in 2013, and has been a Deputy Chair of the Copyright Tribunal.

Dr Maria Mercedes Frabboni, Lecturer in Law, University of Sussex, has conducted research on regulation of non-attributable or abandoned visual art and published on issues surrounding the use of orphan works. She has also commented on reforms affecting the management of copyright by collecting societies in the music and art sectors, and is the Honorary Treasurer of BLACA.

Chair: Simon Clark, Honorary Secretary, BLACA

The UK IPO recently signalled its intention to introduce an expansive new text & data mining exception for both copyright and database right to facilitate TDM for any purpose. This discussion will address the context for this exception, its substance and the extent to which it may or may not be compatible with the Three Step Test.

Speaker: Toby Headdon, Senior Associate, Bristows LLP

Chair: Alison Firth, BLACA Chairman

This meeting was on aspects of the metaverse relevant (or not!) to copyright. Our speaker outlined key features and concepts. Our commentator followed with comments from a practitioner perspective before we opened the floor for questions and comments from the audience.

Speaker: Andres Guadamuz, University of Sussex

Commentator

Sophie Goossens, Reed Smith, London

Chair: Alison Firth, BLACA Chairman

The keynote address was delivered by Lord Justice Arnold, who presented the case in favour of new legislation, identifying nine reasons why a new Act is required and discussing how the framing of the new Act should be approached.

(The slides by Lord Justice Arnold are available here).

A panel discussion, chaired by Eleonora Rosati (Stockholm University) followed. The Panellists were (in alphabetical order) John Enser (British Screen Advisory Council), John Mottram (PRS for Music), Nicola Solomon(Society of Authors), Catriona Stevenson (Publishers’ Association), and Uma Suthersanen (Queen Mary University of London).

Our distinguished expert panel addressed recent research and explored the role copyright plays in the theatre:

Speaker: Dr Luke McDonagh (London School of Economics) will introduce us to his new book on ‘Performing Copyright: Law, Theatre and Authorship’;

Professor Ysolde Gendreau (Université de Montréal) will give us an account of her research on the rights of stage directors of theatrical productions conducted in the context of a WIPO Study; Philippe Kern (KEA European Affairs, Brussels) will report on a study compiled for the European Commission on the state of theatres in Europe.

Chair: Brigitte Lindner, BLACA Vice-Chair

This seminar will discuss a current UK ‘Hot topic’ – exhaustion of rights, with emphasis on downstream uses of copyright works. A distinguished panel from legal, policy and the copyright industries has been invited by our vice-chairman Stephen Edwards to discuss the issues and alternative options. The UK currently has an ‘asymmetric’ exhaustion policy for products of EEA origin. A recent government consultation did not produce a definite recommendation on future exhaustion policy.

Speakers: Catriona Macleod Stevenson (General Counsel, Publishers Association), David Harmsworth, (General Counsel, Phonographic Performance Limited), Professor Guido Westkamp (Chair in Intellectual Property and Comparative Law, Centre for Commercial Law Studies)

Chair: Stephen Edwards (BLACA Vice-Chairman)

After a period as a commercial lawyer in private practice, Charlotte Waelde joined the University of Edinburgh Law School in 1995, becoming Professor of Intellectual Property Law there in 2008. In 2010 she moved to a chair in Intellectual Property Law at the University of Exeter and was Head of the Law School there. Since 2016, she has been Professor of Intellectual Property Law at C-DaRE. Prof Waelde’s research has explored the interplay of law, technology and culture in a series of interdisciplinary books and articles, including A World of Muscle, Bone & Organs: Research and Scholarship in Dance (2018, Ellis, S., Blades, H. & Waelde, C., eds) and Research Handbook on Intellectual Property and Creative Industries (2018, Waelde, C. & Brown, A.. eds, 2018, Edward Elgar).

Speaker: Charlotte Waelde, Professor of Intellectual Property Law, Research Centre for Dance Research, University of Coventry (C-DaRE)
Chair: Paul Torremans, BLACA

Speakers: Ignacio de Castro, Director - IP Disputes and External Relations Division - WIPO Arbitration and Mediation Center (Geneva), Dev Gangjee is Professor of IP Law at the University of Oxford.

Panel: Jennifer Haywood, barrister specialising in commercial/chancery work, an arbitrator and CEDR accredited mediator, Brigitte Lindner, Barrister and a member of the Bar of Berlin/Germany

Chair: Professor Alison Firth, BLACA Chairman

After a very brief outline of the UK’s exit from the EU, including the Withdrawal and Trade & Cooperation Agreements, UK legislation, retained EU law, the position of the Courts and the movement of goods and services, the seminar will focus on implications for design law.