Legislation
On 31 March 2016 an act was passed in Denmark regarding the collective management of copyrights. The Act contains a large number of requirements concerning good management practices for collective management organisations, including Producers Rights Denmark (PRD).
The new act has some of the following implications for PRD's rights management: A clearer transfer of rights through membership, an annual general meeting ensuring that members have more influence and a greater transparency towards rights holders and the public in the form of general policies regarding distribution of remuneration and deductions, etc. The transparency reports are also presented on the website.
EU Directive on Collective Management of Copyright and its implementation in Danish legislation
In February 2014 the EU Directive 2014/26/EU on Collective Management of Copyright was adopted. The Directive aims to harmonise the collective management of copyrights. It imposes a number of requirements on management organisations in areas such as transparency and members’ influence, which must be complied with in connection with the collective management of rights.
This Directive has now been implemented in Danish legislation through the adoption of L77 – the Act on Collective Management of Copyright.
The Act on Copyright in Denmark
The Act on Copyright contains a set of rules that protect authors of works and performers as regards works they have created or perform, and producers as regards visual and sound recordings. Section 67 is particularly relevant for audio-visual producers, in that this provision affords film and video producers separate protection against the copying of visual recordings and making them available to the public.
See the current Consolidated Act on Copyright in Danish via retsinformation.dk.
About extended collective licence
The Copydan agreements usually have the effect of an extended collective licence, which means they comprise not only rights holders directly represented by the rights organisations under Copydan but also those not represented by a rights organisation. PRD therefore settles payments with rights holders that have not directly given us a mandate, but which are encompassed by the extended collective licence.
In areas where it is assessed impossible or very difficult to enter individual agreements concerning content use, the Act on Copyright opens up possibilities for entering agreements equivalent in effect to an extended collective licence.
Examples in point include:
- Section 13 of DAC (reproduction for educational activities)
- Section 17(3) (recording of works for the use of visually and hearing-impaired people)
- Section 30a (reuse of DR’s and TV2’s own archive productions)
- Section 35 (retransmission, etc)
- Section 50(2) (general provisions on extended collective licence)
See the license approvals of the Danish Ministry of Culture