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Unit 13: Acts Related to Library Legislation

Notes
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Caution Certain legal systems allow copying but incorporate a mechanism for payments
to be made to the owners of rights in order to compensate for the prejudice to their
economic interests, through a fee imposed on sales of blank tapes and/or tape recorders.
As noted above, non-voluntary licenses allow use of works in certain circumstances without the
authorization of the owner of rights, but, require that compensation be paid in respect of the use.
Such licenses are called “non-voluntary” because they are authorized by the law and do not
result from the exercise of the copyright owner’s exclusive right to authorize particular acts.
Non-voluntary licenses were usually created in circumstances where a new technology for the
dissemination of works to the public had emerged, and where the national legislature feared
that owners of rights would prevent the development of the new technology by refusing to
authorize use of works. This was true in the Berne Convention, which recognized two forms of
non-voluntary licenses: firstly, to allow the mechanical reproduction of musical works and
secondly for broadcasting. It should be noted, however, that the justification for non-voluntary
licenses is called increasingly into question, since effective alternatives now exist for making
works available to the public based on authorizations given by the owners of rights, including
in the form of collective administration of rights.

13.1.7 Ownership and Transfer of Copyright

The owner of copyright in a work is generally, at least in the first instance, the person who
created the work, that is to say, the author of the work. There can be exceptions to this general
principle. Such exceptions are regulated by the national law. For example, the national law may
provide that, when a work is created by an author who is employed for the purpose of creating
that work, and then the employer, not the author, is the owner of the copyright in the work.

Notes It is to be noted, however, that the “moral rights” always belong to the author of the
work, whoever may be the owner of the copyright.

In many countries, copyright (with the exception of moral rights) may be assigned. This means
that the owner of the copyright transfers it to another person or entity, who becomes the owner
of the copyright An assignment may apply to all economic rights or only to one (example the
reproduction right) or a few of them (reproduction and translation rights, for example). It may
be limited also to a territory (assignment of the right to publish in India) and to a period of time
(assignment for the entire term of copyright or for a more limited term, say 20 years). The
assignee (person to whom the right has been transferred) becomes the owner of the copyright,
with respect to the right, (or rights), term and territory for which the assignment has been
granted.

Example: If an Indian author “X” has assigned his right to reproduce his novel written in
English, to a publisher “Y”, and that the assignment is limited to a period of 20 years and to
India, the ownership rights of publisher Y would be limited only to reproductions of the book
that take place in India and for a term of 20 years. Anybody who reproduces the novel in India
within the term of 20 years but without Y’s authorization will have infringed his copyright. But
a publication of the same novel that takes place outside India does not need Y’s authorization,
and will not therefore constitute a violation of the latter’s copyright.

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