Digitisation and European Copyright Protection

The increasing digitisation necessitates amendments to copyright protection. Both the European Parliament and the European Commission have now presented proposals addressing this issue. This is necessary because the way in which creative goods are produced and distributed has been changed dramatically by digital technologies and the spread of the internet. One challenge that arises from this is the application of the Country of Origin principle and the resulting practice of geo-blocking. The resale of digital good represents another challenge in this context. Individual stakeholders have different interests with regard to copyright protection in a digital economy. For example, consumers (private or institutional users) have an interest in the resale of digital goods, whereas suppliers (authors, collecting societies, publishers) do not. The EU Parliament’s proposal for copyright reform sides more with the suppliers than with the consumers. Future policy at EU level should attempt to create a clear, comprehensible legal framework and thus establish legal certainty.