The year 2014 produced a substantial volume of copyright law developments across jurisdictions. The following is a summary of notable cases, legislative changes, and industry events from the period.<\/p>\n
On March 27th, 2014, the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) ruled that EU Internet Service Providers (ISPs) can be required to block access to copyright-infringing websites, endorsing the European Union’s anti-piracy policy framework. The ruling arose from questions referred by the Commercial Court of Vienna in proceedings brought to compel the Austrian telecommunications company UPC Telekebel to block access to the website www.kino.to, which was alleged to stream and make available films of the German production company Constantin Film Veleih without authorisation.<\/p>\n
India became the first country to ratify the Marrakesh Treaty to Facilitate Access to Published Works for Persons who are Blind, Visually Impaired, or Otherwise Print Disabled. The treaty, concluded under the auspices of the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO), aims to address the “book famine” that limits access to published works for millions of print-disabled persons. It is the first intellectual property treaty to reference human rights in its Preamble.<\/p>\n
BMG Rights Management and Round Hill Music (the Plaintiffs) brought proceedings against the Internet Service Provider Cox Communications for alleged copyright infringement by Cox’s subscribers. The case raised questions about the application of the Safe Harbour Provisions under Title II of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA), also known as the Online Copyright Infringement Liability Limitation Act, which provides ISPs with limited protection from liability for subscriber activity.<\/p>\n
On June 25th, 2014, the United States Supreme Court decided against the legitimacy of Aereo Inc.’s service on the grounds of copyright infringement, concluding the protracted litigation between Aereo (Defendant) and the major US broadcasters American Broadcasting Companies Inc. \u2014 including ABC, CBS, NBC, and Fox (Plaintiffs). The decision has been regarded as a landmark in copyright law given the potential systemic consequences for the broadcast television market had the outcome been different.<\/p>\n
The Eiffel Tower, constructed in 1889, falls within the public domain, and daytime photographs of the structure are rights-free. However, the tower’s nocturnal illumination \u2014 the belles lumi\u00e8res lighting installation \u2014 remains protected by copyright. Reproducing or distributing photographs of the illuminated tower therefore requires permission from the Soci\u00e9t\u00e9 d’Exploitation de la Tour Eiffel (SETE), the tower’s operating company.<\/p>\n
On 28th July, 2014, the Karnataka State Legislature passed the Karnataka Prevention of Dangerous Activities of Bootleggers, Drug-offenders, Gamblers, Goondas, Immoral Traffic Offenders, Slum-Grabbers and Video or Audio Pirates (Amendment) Bill, 2014, commonly referred to as the Goonda Act. The amendment brought offences previously falling under the Information Technology Act, 2000, and the Indian Copyright Act, 1957, within the scope of the Act. Among its provisions, the legislation enables pre-emptive detention in relation to certain digital offences, including the sharing of copyrighted content through messaging platforms.<\/p>\n
With effect from August 1, 2014, copyright applications in India are required to be filed online only. The Indian Copyright Office issued Notification No. F. 27-25\/2014-CP on July 22, 2014, announcing the closure of the Copyright Counter from that date to promote the online filing facility, which had been available since February 17, 2014. The procedure for filing Form XIV (Application for Registration of Copyright) is set out in the guidelines published by the Copyright Office of India.<\/p>\n
In proceedings concerning Leopold Caf\u00e9 and others v. Novex Communications Pvt. Ltd., Justice G S Patel of the Bombay High Court clarified that copyright owners are entitled to license their works directly or through their authorised agents under Section 30 of the Copyright (Amendment) Act, 2012, addressing one of several areas of uncertainty that arose following the passage of the amendment.<\/p>\n
Photographer Bimal Nepal asserted that a photograph taken by him was used without attribution on the Facebook page of Prime Minister Narendra Modi during the Deepavali period. Nepal did not threaten legal proceedings for infringement but sought attribution as the photographer of the image.<\/p>\n
In 2011, British photographer David Slater travelled to Indonesia to photograph a Crested Black Macaque. During the expedition, an animal accessed his camera equipment and produced several self-portraits. One photograph went viral after being uploaded to Wikimedia Commons. Slater issued takedown notices to the Wikimedia Foundation and TechDirt; the Wikimedia Foundation declined to remove the image on the basis that copyright could not vest in a non-human author. The Wikimedia community classified the photograph as a public domain work on the ground that Slater had not taken the picture.<\/p>\n
Video game streaming platform Twitch announced the implementation of technology designed to prevent the storage of video content containing unlicensed third-party audio. Twitch began flagging and partially muting archived video content containing unlicensed music, and advised content creators to use music licensed under Creative Commons, Jamendo, or SongFreedom for their broadcasts.<\/p>\n
Google implemented changes to its search algorithm to demote websites predominantly associated with copyright-infringing content, targeting the search traffic on which many such sites depend. The measure was framed as part of Google’s anti-piracy initiatives.<\/p>\n
A New York court held that a database providing television clips and transcript snippets constitutes fair use, dismissing copyright infringement claims brought by Fox News against TVEyes Inc. TVEyes provides a service that monitors and records content from over 1,400 television and radio stations, allowing subscribers to search for and retrieve video clips and transcripts, and to save, download, and share them.<\/p>\n
This article is for general information and does not constitute legal advice. Readers should consult a qualified attorney before acting on any matter discussed here.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
This article summarises notable copyright law developments and cases from 2014, both in India and internationally. It objectively analyses legislative changes, key court decisions, and major copyright disputes in a structured, legal-academic style.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"iawp_total_views":41,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,6,7],"tags":[12829,1598,1056,12828,540,2888,7183,3621],"class_list":["post-17778","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-copyrights","category-intellectual-property","category-media-and-entertainment-law","tag-american-broadcasting-v-aereo","tag-cjeu","tag-copyright-amendment-act-2012","tag-copyright-law-developments-2014","tag-fair-use","tag-indian-copyright-news","tag-isp-liability","tag-marrakesh-treaty"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bananaip.com\/intellepedia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17778","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bananaip.com\/intellepedia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bananaip.com\/intellepedia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bananaip.com\/intellepedia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bananaip.com\/intellepedia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=17778"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.bananaip.com\/intellepedia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17778\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":149727,"href":"https:\/\/www.bananaip.com\/intellepedia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17778\/revisions\/149727"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bananaip.com\/intellepedia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=17778"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bananaip.com\/intellepedia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=17778"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bananaip.com\/intellepedia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=17778"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}