scholarly journals Can Permissionless Blockchains be Regulated and Resolve Some of the Problems of Copyright Law?

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Guido Noto La Diega ◽  
James Stacey
Keyword(s):  
Intellectual Property ◽  
National Level ◽  
Digital Rights Management ◽  
Copyright Law ◽  
Creative Industries ◽  
Web 3.0 ◽  
Rights Management ◽  
Turing Complete ◽  
User Friendly ◽  
Do So

In October 2018, the European Parliament passed a resolution on distributed ledger technologies that recognised blockchains’ potential to disrupt copyright and creative industries. The aim of this chapter is to examine blockchain technologies and provide an assessment of their disruptive potential upon the legal sphere of intellectual property, and in particular copyright in the music industry. In order to do so, this chapter will start off by clarifying that the blockchain does not exist, because there are several different types of blockchains and, accordingly, different legal and regulatory issues are involved. After identifying the type of permissionless blockchain that is analysed in this chapter – that is permissionless, Turing complete, open, distributed, peer-to-peer, transparent, tamper resistant and censorship resistant –, we move on to identify the definitional and non-definitional features of blockchain technologies. For the blockchain to unleash its disruptive potential, it must be clarified whether it complies with existing laws and whether new regulations are needed. Should existing regulations be found insufficient, only then a serious discussion around new regulations could be started and this should take into account the necessity not to stifle innovation, the level of development of the relevant technologies, the importance of involving all the stakeholders and to place the discussion at a supra-national level. The focus of the chapter is to critically assess whether public permissionless blockchains can be used to disrupt intellectual property law by resolving some of the problems in copyright law, with particular regard to the issues of copyright registration, infringement, and transactions. It will be shown how the blockchains can resolve the registration issues by allowing forms of tamper-resistant, censorship-resistant, user-friendly, and privacy-friendly copyright registration. As to infringement, the blockchains can prevent it by making it easier for copyright owners to track the use of their works and for music consumers and new intermediaries such as Spotify and iTunes to identify the owners, seek a license, and pay the royalties. Finally, smart contracts could be used to automate licensing and as forms of digital rights management, but this could be criticised from an efficient breach perspective, as well as by pointing out the difficulties of this technology in coping with copyright exceptions or defences. It is perhaps too soon to conclude that a 10-year-old technology will ultimately disrupt copyright, but there are already some indications that the Ethereum-type blockchains’ features will radically change copyright by fixing some of its most urgent problems. Please cite as Guido Noto La Diega and James Stacey, ‘Can Permissionless Blockchains be Regulated and Resolve Some of the Problems of Copyright Law?’, in Massimo Ragnedda and Giuseppe Destefanis, Blockchain and Blockchain and Web 3.0: Social, Economic, and Technological Challenge (Routledge 2019)

A Digital Rights Management System for Educational Content Distribution

2009 ◽  
pp. 196-213
Author(s):  
Tom S. Chan
Keyword(s):  
Intellectual Property ◽  
Teaching And Learning ◽  
Content Distribution ◽  
Digital Rights Management ◽  
Educational Environment ◽  
The Internet ◽  
Educational Content ◽  
Digital Rights ◽  
Education Environment ◽  
Rights Management

While delivering content via the Internet can be efficient and economical, content owners risk losing control of their intellectual property. Any business that wishes to control access to, and use of its intellectual property, is a potential user of Digital Rights Management (DRM) technologies. Traditional DRM has a passive one-way downstream consumption of content from producer to consumer focus primarily concerns digital rights enforcement. This model does not translate well to the education environment where openness, informal decision making, sharing of ideas, and decentralization are valued. Collaboration and multiple authorships are common in the educational environment, as is the repurposing and modification of digital content used for teaching and learning. A DRM system for educational content distribution must be substantially more sophisticated and flexible than what is available right now to gain support in the educational community.

Online Music Distribution

2011 ◽  
pp. 325-363
Author(s):  
Francesco Spadoni
Keyword(s):  
Intellectual Property ◽  
Business Models ◽  
Digital Rights Management ◽  
Intellectual Property Protection ◽  
Digital Rights ◽  
Management Standards ◽  
Content Retrieval ◽  
Rights Management ◽  
On Line ◽  
Music Distribution

This Chapter analyses multiple aspects of on-line music distribution, investigating the major problems, the different approaches and business models, considering the different points of view and perspectives, presenting the emerging technologies and Digital Rights Management standards, analysing issues for rights clearing, Intellectual Property protection, content retrieval and metadata management.

scholarly journals Current developments in document delivery in Germany

2014 ◽  
Vol 42 (2/3) ◽  
pp. 75-78 ◽  
Author(s):  
Markus Brammer ◽  
Jens Olf
Keyword(s):  
Full Text ◽  
Scientific Information ◽  
Digital Rights Management ◽  
Copyright Law ◽  
International Exchange ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Document Delivery ◽  
Rights Management ◽  
Wide Scale ◽  
Electronic Delivery

Purpose – The purpose of the paper is to give an overview about the framework of copyright law and licences as well as the development of German National Library of Science and Technology (TIB) full-text supply services within that framework. The change of German copyright law in 2008 posed a challenge to TIB’s full-text supply services. While TIB can deliver on the basis of a statutory limitation any document to customers within Germany via mail and fax, there are restrictions for electronic delivery. Design/methodology/approach – The article describes the framework of German copyright law and licences for document delivery as well as activities of TIB to continue servicing customers in a best possible way within the existing framework. Findings – Licence agreements with publishers or intermediaries such as Rights Reproduction Organizations are now in place to allow delivery of electronic documents on a wide scale. Within this complicated framework of licence agreements, digital rights management (DRM) systems are a challenge for customers and the delivery service. However, it can be noted, that a simple watermark suffices nearly all publishers in agreements covering pay-per-view delivery of generic digital article files, and only 25 per cent require strict DRM for document delivery scanned from the print. At the same time, TIB looks for more customer-friendly DRM systems. Also, TIB is looking for ways to cooperate with partners to raise efficiency gains and to offer a more convenient service to its customers. Finally, TIB experiences that inadequate copyright law still poses a major hindrance for the international exchange of scientific information being part of its collection. Originality/value – The article describes the development of document supply services of the major TIB publications. It also shows the barriers which inadequate copyright law poses to the exchange of scientific information.

Intellectual Property Issues on Ip Networks

2001 ◽  
Vol 101 (1) ◽  
pp. 57-71
Author(s):  
George Michaelson
Keyword(s):  
Intellectual Property ◽  
Digital Rights Management ◽  
Ip Networks ◽  
Value Proposition ◽  
Digital Rights ◽  
Rights Management ◽  
Made In

Some fundamental behaviours of the current (and foreseeable) global internet do not fit well with the requirements for successful digital rights management (DRM) and for control of access to IP rights-protected content. This has implications for longer term development of regulation in the digital domain. This paper considers some of these behaviours from a broad and unashamedly biased perspective. For the purposes of this paper, it is assumed that effective digital rights management depends on being able to constrain people not to use the network for direct, rights management-avoiding purposes. If we can assume total law-abiding communities, much of this discussion is pointless. The polemic probably lies in the area of suggesting that the value proposition for DRM is weak, and that such claims as are made in respect of ability to limit use are overstated.

Digital Rights Management for E-Content and E-Technologies

2008 ◽  
pp. 570-579
Author(s):  
Yingge Wang ◽  
Qiang Cheng ◽  
Jie Cheng ◽  
Thomas S. Huang
Keyword(s):  
Digital Rights Management ◽  
Distribution Channel ◽  
Creative Industries ◽  
Consumer Electronics ◽  
Digital Content ◽  
The Internet ◽  
Digital Products ◽  
Digital Rights ◽  
Emerging Trends ◽  
Rights Management

Digital rights management (DRM) provides digital content creators and owners with a range of controls over how their information resources may be used. It is a fairly young discipline yet is becoming increasingly important as digital content can be copied and distributed so easily that the piracy of them is growing critical. In addition, with the rapid adoption of the Internet as an e-content delivery channel, complex DRM systems are required to protect the digital content besides the distribution channel. Risking their intellectual property (IP) rights, many major e-content providers are relying on DRM to not only protect the packaged digital products, but also to promote the e-content market over the Internet. As a multidisciplinary technology, DRM has advanced innovative research and development in various fields such as biometrics, watermarking, security protocols, smart-card technology, forgery detection, and secure collaboration and data sharing. Commercially, DRM provides the e-content market with a significant impetus to grow, where secure e-content distribution is essential. Despite its short history, many DRM tools have already been developed by IBM, Sony, Real Networks, Intertrust, and Thomson. These products need be compatible with existing standards for contents, consumer electronics, and often times, different DRM systems. Standardization efforts in industry are ongoing to ensure the interoperability of DRM products and services. Another important impetus is the legal and regulatory framework. Technical measures provide an effective hurdle for limiting abuse, but legal actions against violators can prevent organized piracy from infringing. With a properly integrated legal, technological, and commercial framework, we expect that the DRM products and services will greatly foster the growth of the e-content market that is eagerly awaited by content providers and consumers. Without proper DRM technologies and laws, the creative industries that create digital products such as DVDs, business software, music recordings, theatrical films, and digital TV programs will suffer from piracy and would be reluctant to support Web-based commerce. The socioeconomic impact of DRM is huge. In this article, DRM techniques using cryptography, data hiding, and biometrics are discussed. Also covered are the standardization issues, emerging trends, and challenges in DRM-related technologies, commerce, and legislative regulations.

Digital Rights Management and E-Commerce Transactions

2009 ◽  
pp. 214-242
Author(s):  
Dimitrios P. Meidanis
Keyword(s):  
Intellectual Property ◽  
Property Rights ◽  
Intellectual Property Rights ◽  
Business Models ◽  
Digital Rights Management ◽  
Electronic Trade ◽  
Digital Rights ◽  
Organizational Challenges ◽  
Rights Management

This chapter investigates intellectual property rights clearance of as part of e-commerce. Rights clearance is viewed as another online transaction that introduces certain technological and organizational challenges. An overview of the current intellectual property rights legislation is used to describe the setting in which business models and digital rights management systems are called to perform safe and fair electronic trade of goods. The chapter focuses on the technological aspects of the arising issues and investigates the potentials of using advanced information technology solutions for facilitating online rights clearance. A case study that presents a working online rights clearance and protection system is used to validate the applicability of the proposed approaches.

scholarly journals The Maker Movement: Copyright Law, Remix Culture and 3D Printing

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Matthew Rimmer
Keyword(s):  
Intellectual Property ◽  
3D Printing ◽  
The United States ◽  
Copyright Law ◽  
Patent Law ◽  
Creative Industries ◽  
Maker Movement ◽  
Marcel Duchamp ◽  
The Impact ◽  
The Maker Movement

Rimmer, Matthew (2017) The Maker Movement: Copyright law, remix culture, and 3D printing. University of Western Australia Law Review, 41(2), pp. 51-84.There has been much interest in how intellectual property law, policy, and practice will adapt to the emergence of 3D printing and the maker movement. Intellectual property lawyers will have to grapple with the impact of additive manufacturing upon a variety of forms of intellectual property – including copyright law, trade mark law, designs law, patent law, and trade secrets. The disruptive technology of 3D printing will both pose opportunities and challenges for legal practitioners and policy-makers.Rather than try to survey this expanding field, this article considers a number of early conflicts and skirmishes in respect of copyright law and 3D printing. There has been significant interest in the impact of 3D printing on copyright law and the creative industries. There have been classic issues raised about copyright subsistence, and the overlap between copyright law and designs. There has also been a moral panic about 3D printing facilitating copyright infringement – like peer to peer networks such as Napster in the past. There has been a use of open licensing models such as Creative Commons licensing to facilitate the sharing of 3D printing files. Such battles highlight a conflict between the open culture of the Maker Movement, and the closed culture of copyright industries. In many ways, such conflicts touch upon classic issues involved in ‘information environmentalism’. Part II looks at the controversy over Left Shark. In particular, it examines the copyright claims of Katy Perry in respect of the Left Shark figure. Part III considers questions about scanning. Augustana College tried to assert copyright against a maker, Jerry Fisher, who was scanning statues of Michelangelo (although copyright had long since expired in such work). Part IV focuses upon copyright law, 3D printing and readymades. The Estate of Marcel Duchamp lodged a copyright protest over a 3D printed set of chess, based on the work of Marcel Duchamp. Part V examines the intervention of a number of 3D printing companies in a Supreme Court of the United States dispute in Star Athletic v. Varsity Brands. Part VI considers copyright law and intermediary liability. Part VII examines the operation of technological protection measures in the context of copyright law and 3D Printing

Intellectual Property Rights

2011 ◽  
pp. 3442-3486
Author(s):  
Richard A. Spinello ◽  
Herman T. Tavani
Keyword(s):  
Intellectual Property ◽  
Property Rights ◽  
Digital Media ◽  
Intellectual Property Rights ◽  
Digital Rights Management ◽  
Court Cases ◽  
Policy Makers ◽  
Digital Rights ◽  
Copyright Laws ◽  
Rights Management

This chapter presents some foundational concepts and issues in intellectual property. We begin by defining intellectual objects, which we contrast with physical objects or tangible goods. We then turn to some of the normative justifications that have been advanced to defend the granting of property rights in general, and we ask whether those rationales can be extended to the realm of intellectual objects. Theories of property introduced by Locke and Hegel, as well as utilitarian philosophers, are summarized and critiqued. This sets the stage for reviewing the case against intellectual property. We reject that case and claim instead that policy makers should aim for balanced property rights that avoid the extremes of overprotection and underprotection. Next we examine four different kinds of protection schemes for intellectual property that have been provided by our legal system: copyright laws, patents, trademarks, and trade secrets. This discussion is supplemented with a concise review of recent U.S. legislation involving copyright and digital media and an analysis of technological schemes of property protection known as digital rights management. Finally, we consider a number of recent controversial court cases, including the Napster case and the Microsoft antitrust suit. Many of the issues and controversies introduced in this chapter are explored and analyzed in greater detail in the subsequent chapters of this book.

Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document