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Broadcasters vs Producers on Content Integrity
mpawlo writes "I just did a quick write-up for Greplaw on an interesting pending law suit in Sweden. Two Swedish directors, Vilgot Sjoman and Anders Eriksson, are about to file a suit against Swedish broadcaster Tv 4. According to the author's rights or droit moral doctrine, the work may not be displayed or changed in a way degrading to the author or the author's work. Tv 4 has just changed its policy for commercial breaks. Breaks are now introduced during movies. The commercial breaks used to be placed between the end and start of a program.
The directors argue the breaks are degrading from an artistical point of view. They want to try the commercial breaks in court from a copyright perspective."
Continental copyright law is not like US law. There is the doctrine of the moral rights of the author. The widow of Peter Sellers used this right to sue the producers of 'on the trial of the Pink P{anther' which used footage from the previous panther movies which Sellers had rejected.
There are also a bunch of cases where the directors of movies have prevented studios from agreeing to cuts to comply with censorship boards.
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Here in Norway, they sometimes put news&weather in the middle of movies, because they aren't allowed to put commercial breaks in movies. Also this would stop the network's self-promotion in the middle of movies (basicly a commercial for the later shows of the evening), equally annoying but usually shorter though.
But I suppose if this goes through as a general precendent in copyright law, the movie producers will simply get a lower prices for movies that they can't break up. Nothing like sacrificing "artistic integrity" for a bit more money...
Kjella
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The local cable monopoly, Videotron, does exactly that; they sell Digital cable on having a higher picture quality, and more choice over what channels you get. They also compete directly with sattelite TV, and further make the claim that while sattelite signals degrade or fail in poor weather, digital cable is always strong.
Anybody living here, however, knows that with the huge strikes going on at Videotron, their service is less reliable than sattelite.
The directors argue the breaks are degrading from an artistical point of view.
This concept is so foreign in the United States I'm not sure if anyone will get it.
I am _not_ any kind of lawyer, but: I believe you can not bring a case directly to the europeans court. Instead, you either make your national court ask for an interpretation of european law from the court; or you have a judgement from the national court that you ask to be overturned by the european court. First stop is always your local court in any case.
Trust the Computer. The Computer is your friend.
It makes no difference where the broadcast is uplinked from, whether it is London or Sweden - broadcasts to Europe have to abide by the laws of all countries in Europe, unless they are encrypted, and subscriptions are not available in all countries.
The ITC, (Independent Television Commission in the U.K.), recently fined a Swedish broadcaster for screening an unsuitable trailer - details here.
For the curious, a FAQ on moral rights and their place in U.S. law is here.
In short, U.S. law provides very little moral rights protection, except for visual fine art.
A noun: art.
Noun turned into an adjective: if something has the quality of art, it is artistic.
Adjective turned into a redundant adjective to add more syllables so the author sounds smarter: artistical.
Hey, let's turn it back into a noun by adding more syllables! How about artisticalness?
Same thing with symmetrical. If something has symmetry (noun) it is symmetric (adjective). WTF does "symmetrical" mean that "symmetric" doesn't?
I can explanate how to administrate your network. You must configurate and segmentate it, so it can computate.
In some countries in Europe we believe that good things should not depend solely on the whim of private donors.
Is it nice for PBS to have to beg?