Αρχική Νόμος για τη συλλογική διαχείριση δικαιωμάτων πνευματικής ιδιοκτησίαςΆρθρο 69-Καταργούμενες και λοιπές ρυθμίσειςΣχόλιο του χρήστη IFRRO | 22 Ιανουαρίου 2016, 15:28
  • Σχόλιο του χρήστη 'IFRRO' | 22 Ιανουαρίου 2016, 15:28

    IFRRO, the International Federation of Reproduction Rights Organisations, represents national Reproduction Rights Organisations (RROs) and national and international associations of creators and publishers across the world, with some 145 members in some 80 countries worldwide, including in Europe. RROs administer reproduction and other relevant rights for certain secondary uses of already published text- and image-based works on behalf of publishers and authors, including visual artists, through different models, one of them being the legal licence with, or without, copyright levies. An important function of the exclusive copyright is to enable authors, publishers and other rightholders to claim remuneration for the significant value they contribute to the society through the creation and dissemination of cultural goods. Directive 2001/29 (the ‘InfoSoc Directive’) provides that Member States may adopt exceptions to the exclusive reproduction right for private use under the condition that rightholders are compensated for the possible harm they suffer from reproductions made under this exception (thus keeping the principal function of copyright). One of the systems established to compensate rightholders is based on so-called levies, which are paid in relation to devices and media that can be used for private copying and other types of copying. This system is long established, since the sixties at least, and has been recognized in a number of decisions of the Court of Justice of the European Union: see, for example, in the VG Wort v. Kyocera and others case (C-457/11 to C-460/11, on remuneration sought by way of a levy on personal computers and printers sold in Germany; the Court said that ‘the concept of “reproductions on paper….” includes copies made using a printer or personal computer where the two are linked together)’, in the Amazon v. Austro-Mechana case (C 463/12) and in the Nokia v. Copydan Båndkopi case (C-572/13). Levies are not a tax, as the money collected is not transferred to the State budget, but they constitute the remuneration of the rightholders for certain usages of their works, and they are collected by and distributed to the rightholders via their Collective Management Organisations (CMOs). The system of levies provides a balance between the free access of end users to millions of works and the remuneration given to rightholders. Any equipment, media or device capable of making reproductions of works, and thus creating damage to rightholders, should normally be subject to levies. Personal computers are undoubtedly a device that is widely used to make private copies, as also acknowledged by the Court of Justice of the European Union in a number of decisions, already mentioned above; see also the Opinion of the Advocate General in the EGEDA and others case (C-470/14, under Recital 43). Levies on PCs, or in relation to their internal disk, have therefore been introduced in national legislation, such as in the Czech Republic, France, Germany, Lithuania and Slovakia – see the IFRRO-WIPO study on copyright levies for more information on the devices and media levied in the world, including many EU Member States. Furthermore, the collection and distribution of revenues to Greek and other rightholders for private copying stands out as low compared to that in other EU Member States, as documented on the IFRRO website where information on the collection and distribution of revenues to rightholders annually by IFRRO’s members is available: http://www.ifrro.org/rro. Finally, there is no documentation of any particular relationship between the levying and the end user price of the device, and also no proven impact of the levy on the dissemination of IT goods. On the other hand, the prices on reprographic devices increased in Spain in 2013 despite the scrapping of the levies. Rather, IT goods become more attractive when they can be used to make copies of copyright works, including for private purposes. IFRRO therefore supports the proposal of the Greek Government to extend the scope of the levy scheme to include personal computers and OSDEL’s submission on the proposal, and stands ready to provide further information if need be.