At long last, a decent analysis of private copying

Abstract

‘A book may be good for nothing; or there may be only one thing in it worth knowing; are we to read it all through?’ (Samuel Johnson) This section is dedicated to the review of ideas, articles, books, films and other media. It will include replies (and rejoinders) to articles, the evaluation of new ideas or proposals, and reviews of books and articles both directly and indirectly related to intellectual property law. There have been books on copyright exceptions before, in particular Burrell and Coleman's Copyright Exceptions: The Digital Impact (originally issued as a hardback in 2005, with a paperback version in 2009). This new book by Stavroula Karapapa, a well-known Reading University senior lecturer in law, is both broader and narrower than Burrell and Coleman's book. It is broader in that, rather than taking a UK viewpoint, it looks at the state of the law throughout the EU. However, it is narrower because it looks—in considerable detail—at just one exception, ie the private copying exception. And what a good job it does of it! In eight clearly articulated and argued chapters, the author analyses the legal nature of private copying, the permitted activities, defining ‘private’ and distinguishing it from ‘public’, defining ‘non-commercial’, the relationship between the exception and the Berne three-step test, as well as the practical issues of charging levies, the use of TPMS (technological protection measures) to prevent users from exercising the ‘right’, and the question of whether contracts can override the exception. In doing so, she covers much wider ground that the title of the book might lead you to assume. In particular, the question of what is private and what is public, and the use of TPMs and of contracts to override exceptions to copyright apply not just to the private copying exception, but to all other exceptions. The book is supported by a useful schematic overview of how the key Articles in the Copyright Directive 2001/29 have been transposed into local law, together with a lengthy bibliography and a brief index. It would have been helpful if the full text of the Directive had also been supplied.