[pd-discuss] Legal question regarding performance recordings

Wed Feb 1 11:22:20 UTC 2012

HI,

I was wondering if any legal experts here might be able to clear
something up for me regarding the EU law on the copyright term of
audio recorded performances:

The relevant section from the Directive 2006/116/EC
http://eur-lex.europa.eu/LexUriServ/LexUriServ.do?uri=CELEX:32006L0116:EN:HTML
seems to be....

Duration of related rights
1. The rights of performers shall expire 50 years after the date of
the performance. However, if a fixation of the performance is lawfully
published or lawfully communicated to the public within this period,
the rights shall expire 50 years from the date of the first such
publication or the first such communication to the public, whichever
is the earlier.
2. The rights of producers of phonograms shall expire 50 years after
the fixation is made. However, if the phonogram has been lawfully
published within this period, the said rights shall expire 50 years
from the date of the first lawful publication. If no lawful
publication has taken place within the period mentioned in the first
sentence, and if the phonogram has been lawfully communicated to the
public within this period, the said rights shall expire 50 years from
the date of the first lawful communication to the public.
However, this paragraph shall not have the effect of protecting anew
the rights of producers of phonograms where, through the expiry of the
term of protection granted them pursuant to Article 3(2) of Directive
93/98/EEC in its version before amendment by Directive 2001/29/EEC,
they were no longer protected on 22 December 2002.

The case is in question is of a recording made in 1949.
>From this i gather that copyright expires 50 years after the first
publication of a recording, or public communication of this recording.

I have two main questions:
1) what exactly constitutes a communication to the public - how is this defined?
2) what happens if the first commercial publication was in 2000?
(longer than 50 years after the recordings were made).

Many thanks for you help

All the best,

Adam.

-- 
Adam Green

Editor, The Public Domain Review
http://publicdomainreview.org/

The Open Knowledge Foundation
http://okfn.org/