Copyright Levies Can Be Imposed On Sale Of Printers, Computers, EU High Court Rules 27/06/2013 by Intellectual Property Watch 2 Comments Share this:Click to share on Twitter (Opens in new window)Click to share on LinkedIn (Opens in new window)Click to share on Facebook (Opens in new window)Click to email this to a friend (Opens in new window)Click to print (Opens in new window)By Dugie Standeford for Intellectual Property Watch Governments can impose copyright levies on sales of printers and computers, the European Court of Justice (ECJ) said in a 27 June ruling. The ruling is available here [pdf]. In the joined cases, Verwertungsgesehhschaft Wort (VG Wort) v. Kyocera, Epson Deutschland GmbH, Xerox GmbH, Canon Deutschland GmbH and Fujitsu Technology Solutions GmbH, Hewlett-Packard GmbH v. VG Wort, copyright collecting society VG Wort sought remuneration by way of a levy on personal computers and printers sold in Germany from 2001-2007. The German Federal Court of Justice referred the case to the ECJ to interpret relevant European law provisions. Under EU law, governments may provide exceptions or limitations to copyright that allow the making of private copies and reproductions on paper or a similar medium using photographic techniques, but they must ensure that copyright owners receive “fair compensation,” the ECJ said. The concept of “reproductions on paper….” includes copies made using a printer or personal computer where the two are linked together, it said. It is up to member states to decide how to decide who must pay the levy, it said. Share this:Click to share on Twitter (Opens in new window)Click to share on LinkedIn (Opens in new window)Click to share on Facebook (Opens in new window)Click to email this to a friend (Opens in new window)Click to print (Opens in new window) Related "Copyright Levies Can Be Imposed On Sale Of Printers, Computers, EU High Court Rules" by Intellectual Property Watch is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.
John says 27/06/2013 at 8:03 pm How exactly are the proceeds distributed? It’s all stuff you need to use while creating things. I would go through more hard drives shooting & editing raw video than I would copying compressed files. So it is more of a tax on creation than copying. Reply