Directive 2011/77/EU on the term of protection of copyright and certain related rights amended Directive 2006/116/EC and extended the duration of performers' and producers' rights in phonograms (also known as sound recordings) from 50 to 70 years. [1] It was passed by the Council of the European Union on 12 September 2011 [2] [3] after the European Parliament passed it on 23 April 2009 establishing a term of 70 years, [4] lower than the 95 years the European Commission had proposed on 16 July 2008. [5]
The stated purpose of the extension of the recording copyright term is to "bring performers' protection more in line with that already given to authors - 70 years after their death." The term in Directive 2006/116/EC [6] is 50 years after publishing the performance, or 50 years after the performance if it is not published.
The Impact of Copyright Extension for Sound Recordings in the UK, a PriceWaterhouseCoopers report commissioned by the British Phonographic Industry and cited by the European Commission, [7] suggested that the extension to 95 years would increase revenue by £2.2 million to £34.9 million in present value terms over the next ten years. It also suggested that the "prices of in-copyright and out-of-copyright sound recordings are not significantly different" so that consumers would not be impacted. [8]
The Gowers review of Intellectual Property stated that "is not clear that extension of term would benefit musicians and performers very much in practice." [9] An article written by Dutch academics and published in the European Intellectual Property Review, Never Forever: Why Extending the Term of Protection for Sound Recording is a Bad Idea, concluded that the arguments for copyright extension were not convincing. [10]
{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link) Andrew Gowers The Gowers Review of Intellectual Property pg 50 section 4.29Directive in the news: