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In international law, the Berne three-step test is a clause that is included in several international treaties on intellectual property. Signatories of those treaties agree to standardize possible limitations and exceptions to exclusive rights under their respective national copyright laws.
The three-step test was first established in relation to the exclusive right of reproduction under Article 9(2) of the Berne Convention for the Protection of Literary and Artistic Works in 1967. Article 9 of the Berne Convention states that:
Right of Reproduction: 1. Generally; 2. Possible exceptions; 3. Sound and visual recordings - (1) Authors of literary and artistic works protected by this Convention shall have the exclusive right of authorizing the reproduction of these works, in any manner or form. (2) It shall be a matter for legislation in the countries of the Union to permit the reproduction of such works in certain special cases, provided that such reproduction does not conflict with a normal exploitation of the work and does not unreasonably prejudice the legitimate interests of the author. (3) Any sound or visual recording shall be considered as a reproduction for the purposes of this Convention.
The test is vague; But, spelled out in the formulation of Hugenholtz and Okediji, [1] the three steps are:
The three-step test in Article 9(2) of the Berne does not apply to copyright exceptions that are implemented under other parts of the Berne convention that have a separate standard, such as those in articles 2(4), 2(7), 2(8), 2 bis, 10, 10 bis and 13(1), or the Berne Appendix.
The three-step test has been modified and transplanted into the Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights, the WIPO Copyright Treaty (Article 10), the WIPO Performances and Phonograms Treaty (Article 16(2)), the EU Computer Programs Directive (Article 6(3)), the EU Database Directive (Article 6(3)), and the EU Copyright Directive (Article 5(5)).
The test as included in Article 13 of TRIPs reads:
"Members shall confine limitations and exceptions to exclusive rights to certain special cases which do not conflict with a normal exploitation of the work and do not unreasonably prejudice the legitimate interests of the rights holder."
The WTO three-step test does not apply to cases where the Berne or Rome Conventions provide separate standards for exceptions, or for rights not covered in the TRIPS Agreement.
The technical legal reasoning which has been applied to suggest how this wording should be interpreted is arcane (see the references below). To date, only one legal case (before a WTO dispute settlement panel, involving U.S. copyright exemptions allowing restaurants, bars and shops to play radio and TV broadcasts without paying licensing fees, passed in 1998 as a rider to the Sonny Bono Copyright Term Extension Act) has actually required an interpretation of the test.
The three-step test may prove to be extremely important if any nations attempt to reduce the scope of copyright law, because unless the WTO decides that their modifications comply with the test, such states are likely to face trade sanctions. Exceptions to copyright protection are required to be clearly defined and narrow in scope and reach. [2] For instance, the three-step test was invoked as a justification for refusing certain exceptions to copyright wished for by members of the French parliament during the examination of the controversial DADVSI copyright bill.
TRIPs Article 30, covering limitations and exemptions to patent law, is also derived from a somewhat different three-step test, that includes "taking account of the legitimate interests of third parties." Exceptions to exclusive patent rights are not subject to this test if they are implemented through Article 31 of the TRIPS, or Articles 6, 40 or 44.2.
A copyright is a type of intellectual property that gives the creator of an original work, or another right holder, the exclusive and legally secured right to copy, distribute, adapt, display, and perform a creative work, usually for a limited time. The creative work may be in a literary, artistic, educational, or musical form. Copyright is intended to protect the original expression of an idea in the form of a creative work, but not the idea itself. A copyright is subject to limitations based on public interest considerations, such as the fair use doctrine in the United States.
The World Intellectual Property Organization Copyright Treaty is an international treaty on copyright law adopted by the member states of the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) in 1996. It provides additional protections for copyright to respond to advances in information technology since the formation of previous copyright treaties before it. As of August 2023, the treaty has 115 contracting parties. The WCT and WIPO Performances and Phonograms Treaty, are together termed WIPO "internet treaties".
The copyright law of the European Union is the copyright law applicable within the European Union. Copyright law is largely harmonized in the Union, although country to country differences exist. The body of law was implemented in the EU through a number of directives, which the member states need to enact into their national law. The main copyright directives are the Copyright Term Directive, the Information Society Directive and the Directive on Copyright in the Digital Single Market. Copyright in the Union is furthermore dependent on international conventions to which the European Union or their member states are part of, such as TRIPS Agreement or the Berne Convention.
Anti-circumvention refers to laws which prohibit the circumvention of technological barriers for using a digital good in certain ways which the rightsholders do not wish to allow. The requirement for anti-circumvention laws was globalized in 1996 with the creation of the World Intellectual Property Organization's Copyright Treaty.
A compulsory license provides that the owner of a patent or copyright licenses the use of their rights against payment either set by law or determined through some form of adjudication or arbitration. In essence, under a compulsory license, an individual or company seeking to use another's intellectual property can do so without seeking the rights holder's consent, and pays the rights holder a set fee for the license. This is an exception to the general rule under intellectual property laws that the intellectual property owner enjoys exclusive rights that it may license—or decline to license—to others.
Copyright in the Netherlands is governed by the Dutch Copyright Law, copyright is the exclusive right of the author of a work of literature or artistic work to publish and copy such work.
Spanish copyright law, or authors' right law, governs intellectual property rights that authors have over their original literary, artistic or scientific works in Spain. It was first instituted by the Law of 10 January 1879, and, in its origins, was influenced by French authors' right law and by the movement led by Victor Hugo for the international protection of literary and artistic works. As of 2006, the principal dispositions are contained in Book One of the Intellectual Property Law of 11 November 1987 as modified. A consolidated version of this law was approved by Royal Legislative Decree 1/1996 of 12 April 1996: unless otherwise stated, all references are to this law.
"Author's rights" is a term frequently used in connection with laws about intellectual property.
In copyright law, related rights are the rights of a creative work not connected with the work's actual author. It is used in opposition to the term "authors' rights". Neighbouring rights is a more literal translation of the original French droits voisins. Both authors' rights and related rights are copyrights in the sense of English or U.S. law.
Copyright in Russia developed originally along the same lines as in Western European countries. A first copyright statute dated back to 1828, and in 1857, a general copyright term of fifty years was instituted. The copyright law of 1911 was inspired by Western laws of the continental European tradition. One noteworthy exception in Russian copyright law was the "freedom of translation"—any work could be freely translated into another language.
The current Copyright law of the Russian Federation is codified in part IV of the Civil Code of the Russian Federation. It entered in force on January 1, 2008.
The international copyright relations of Russia were virtually non-existent for much of the Imperial era continuing into the history of the Soviet Union until the Cold War. The Russian Empire had only a few bilateral copyright treaties with other nations were concluded; these treaties moreover were weak and of short duration. The treaties from Imperial times had all expired by the time of the Russian Revolution.
The Berne Convention for the Protection of Literary and Artistic Works, usually known as the Berne Convention, was an international assembly held in 1886 in the Swiss city of Bern by ten European countries with the goal of agreeing on a set of legal principles for the protection of original work. They drafted and adopted a multi-party contract containing agreements for a uniform, border-crossing system that became known under the same name. Its rules have been updated many times since then. The treaty provides authors, musicians, poets, painters, and other creators with the means to control how their works are used, by whom, and on what terms. In some jurisdictions these type of rights are referred to as copyright; on the European continent they are generally referred to as author' rights or makerright.
The Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS) is an international legal agreement between all the member nations of the World Trade Organization (WTO). It establishes minimum standards for the regulation by national governments of different forms of intellectual property (IP) as applied to nationals of other WTO member nations. TRIPS was negotiated at the end of the Uruguay Round of the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) between 1989 and 1990 and is administered by the WTO.
The Copyright and Information Society Directive 2001 is a directive in European Union law that was enacted to implement the WIPO Copyright Treaty and to harmonise aspects of copyright law across Europe, such as copyright exceptions. The directive was first enacted in 2001 under the internal market provisions of the Treaty of Rome.
Limitations and exceptions to copyright are provisions, in local copyright law or the Berne Convention, which allow for copyrighted works to be used without a license from the copyright owner.
On January 26, 1999, the European Community (EC) and its Member States requested consultation with the United States concerning a dispute over discrepancies between the WTO Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights and Section 110(5) of the United States Copyright Act amended by the Fairness in Music Licensing Act. The dispute was over the legality of "the playing of radio and television music in public places without the payment of a royalty fee" (World). The disputed parties worked through the existing process of WTO Dispute Settlement. First the EC lodged a complaint against the US with the Dispute Settlement Body (DSB) and requested consultation over the dispute. Then the parties requested a panel leading to the body's eventual formation, followed by the circulation of the panel report. The parties accepted the Panel Report without appeal and the dispute ended in arbitration over implementation of the panel's recommendations. Australia, Brazil, Canada, Japan, and Switzerland acted as third parties in this dispute (World).
The copyright law of South Africa governs copyright, the right to control the use and distribution of artistic and creative works, in the Republic of South Africa. It is embodied in the Copyright Act, 1978 and its various amendment acts, and administered by the Companies and Intellectual Property Commission in the Department of Trade and Industry. As of March 2019 a major amendment to the law in the Copyright Amendment Bill has been approved by the South African Parliament and is awaiting signature by the President.
The Copyright law of El Salvador is legal rights to creative and artistic works under the laws of El Salvador. It was implemented in the Decree No. 604 of the Legislative Assembly of El Salvador on 16 of August 1993. This law aims to protect the economic and moral rights of Salvadoran authors and foreigners residing in El Salvador, granted by the mere fact of creating works that are literary, artistic and scientific.