The Impact of General Data Protection Regulation on the grey literature

On 27 April 2016, the European Commission adopted new "general data protection regulation" that will be effective in all Member States from 25 May 2018. This article focuses on the impact of such regulation on the operators of grey literature, especially with regard to the administrative requirements introduced by new "privacy by design rules". The article also assesses the statutory licenses of a public repository to process and make available personal information even without the consent of a data subject.Článek pojednává o dopadech GDPR na repozitáře šedé literatury, jež nabyde účinnosti v květnu 2018.On 27 April 2016, the European Commission adopted new "general data protection regulation" that will be effective in all Member States from 25 May 2018. This article focuses on the impact of such regulation on the operators of grey literature, especially with regard to the administrative requirements introduced by new "privacy by design rules". The article also assesses the statutory licenses of a public repository to process and make available personal information even without the consent of a data subject

Legal framework for digitalisation and storage of digital works by public archives

The article observes the legal framework of Czechia for making digital copies and their further use by cultural heritage institutions. The article generally describes the laws regulating copyright exemptions and then describes the functioning of individual exemptions harmonised by InfoSoc directive within the Czech legal system. Finally, the article describes the exemptions not directly presumed by InfoSoc directive that are formulated as a duties of public institutions towards public but involve copyrighted works.The article observes the legal framework of Czechia for making digital copies and their further use by cultural heritage institutions. The article generally describes the laws regulating copyright exemptions and then describes the functioning of individual exemptions harmonised by InfoSoc directive within the Czech legal system. Finally, the article describes the exemptions not directly presumed by InfoSoc directive that are formulated as a duties of public institutions towards public but involve copyrighted works

The Gambling on Internet – A True Challenge for Fundamental Freedoms

The article focuses on the European case law on-line gambling and gambling in general. The case law is notable due to the clashes of fundamental freedoms of common market, namely freedom to provide services and freedom of establishment, and fundamental interests of member states, namely moral, religious or ethical values, protection of consumers, prevention from crime and more importantly the considerable income for state from taxation of gambling. The Court of Justice was traditionally reluctant to intervene in national legislation where the moral and ethical values were involved. However in the last decade, the court was forced to narrow possibilities to justify such restrictions to fundamental freedoms when the member states started to abuse this benevolent approach in order to disguise protectionist measures which aimed to prevent online-gambling companies from entering national markets. The article contains the analysis of C-275/92 Her Majesty's Customs and Excise v. Schindler, Case no C-124/97 Markku Johani, Case C-67/98 Zenatti, C-243/01 Piergiorgio Gambelli Joint cases C-338/04, C-359/04 and C- 360/04 Placanica and others

"Sucks Cases" in WIPO Domain Name Decisions

Does the use of a domain name for criticism constitute the use of the domainname in Bad Faith?   Is there any right to register a domain name confusingly similar with the name ofa well known company to tell other people that it is vivisecting animals? Or is it alegitimate interest to register domain name like bridgestonesucks.com when yourcar skids on the wet road?   Generally speaking there are two approaches to answer these questions. The firstapproach says that the right to criticize does not extend to registering a domainname that is identical or confusingly similar to the owner’s registered trademark.Second approach considers the freedom of speech and says that there is a legitimateinterest in using the trademark as part of the domain name of a criticism site if theuse is fair and non-commercial.   Both approaches can be found in the WIPO domain name decisions. The mainissue is to consider whether defendants in “sucks cases” are really intending topractice their freedom of speech or are just trying to blackmail the complainants. Toprove a good faith defendants have to prove that they are not competitors ofcomplainants in any way and that they have no commercial profit from their sites.If there is no other intent than to protest and to ridicule the complainants, thedefendands have legitimate interests in respect of the disputed domain name

Privacy Issues in Online Service Users’ Details Disclosure in The Recent Case-Law; Analysis of Cases Youtube v. Viacom And Promusicae vs. Telefonica

Personal data of Internet service users can serve as crucial evidence in proceedings against alleged infringers of intellectual property rights. It is therefore not surprising that Internet service providers have to deal with proposals to disclose information about on-line activities of their users. ISPs are often reluctant to disclose such information since it could be used against them or against their customers. Both legislation and case-law still struggle to provide clear legal answers on this problem.This paper compares the two most discussed recent cases dealing with this problem which are: - the decision of European court of Justice no. C-275/06, which stated that EC directives do not establish an obligation to disclose user data to a third party - ongoing dispute between Youtube vs. Viacom which i.a. deal with the disclosure of user data

Creative Commons

The fact that there is no Czech version of Creative Commons licenses, obviously didn’t deter Czech internet users from using them. The Czech internet domain currently contains thousands of works licensed under Creative Commons, however a great part of these licenses are used improperly and can be considered invalid. The article describes the impacts of Creatives Commons movement on Czech internet community and analyses legal aspects of license contracts concluded via Creative Commons licensing schemes. The article comes to a conclusion that, generally speaking, these licenses can be considered valid however their validity can be questioned under certain circumstances. The article compares legal consequences of licensing work under Creative Commons and placing the work on the webpage without any attempt to create a licensing scheme. This comparison resulted in a conclusion that the differences between both alternatives are relatively small. I hold the opinion that the main contribution of Creatve Commons licenses in the Czech legal environment lies in improving the awareness of intellectual property rights among internet users. Better awareness about copyright regulation could then lead internet users to respect the intellectual property rights of other users

Data protection and codes of conduct in collaborative research

The article aims to describe the current status quo of codes of conduct applied by research institutions to manage data protection issues in light of the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR). We assessed whether the current codes of conduct meet the criteria of codes of conduct as defined by Article 40 of the GDPR. We have found that there are very few ‘codes of conduct’ or good practices that would meet the definition set out in Article 40 of the GDPR. We have found that universities and research institutions had neither the incentives nor the resources to create internationally binding codes of conduct and settled for declarative documents or internal guidelines. A good level of compliance with the Data Protection Directive and national laws was adopted even without codes of conduct which would apply beyond a single institution or grant agency. We have identified that the demand and need for binding codes of conduct are increasing, albeit only in specific research fields. The main incentive is international cooperation, the need for the standardization of data protocols, and most likely fear of high sanctions introduced by GDPR.The article aims to describe the current status quo of codes of conduct applied by research institutions to manage data protection issues in light of the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR). We assessed whether the current codes of conduct meet the criteria of codes of conduct as defined by Article 40 of the GDPR. We have found that there are very few ‘codes of conduct’ or good practices that would meet the definition set out in Article 40 of the GDPR. We have found that universities and research institutions had neither the incentives nor the resources to create internationally binding codes of conduct and settled for declarative documents or internal guidelines. A good level of compliance with the Data Protection Directive and national laws was adopted even without codes of conduct which would apply beyond a single institution or grant agency. We have identified that the demand and need for binding codes of conduct are increasing, albeit only in specific research fields. The main incentive is international cooperation, the need for the standardization of data protocols, and most likely fear of high sanctions introduced by GDPR

Dangers of Over-Enthusiasm in Licensing under Creative Commons

In this paper we assess the Creative Commons licensing scheme that offers a simple, user-friendly tool to allow anyone to distribute or build upon others' work without the necessity of drafting legal documents. Even a person without any legal education or knowledge of law can use the Creative Commons website to license her work under a professionally drafted license contract. We argue that this user-friendliness has its risks and pitfalls. The licensing procedure itself is perhaps too easy and may create an illusion that nothing can go wrong. But licensing is not as simple as it may appear from the first visit of Creative Commons' website. The most frequent mistake a user can make when using a license under the Creative Commons is to license a work for which he has no legal title. Surprisingly to many users, even the author of the work does not always have the right to license its work under the Creative Commons licensing scheme. We have assessed the most common issues arising out of the situation and suggested possible solutions. We demonstrate that alongside the widely debated issues of the Creative Commons licenses compatibility with current copyright laws of various jurisdictions, as well as the compatibility of the licenses among themselves, a much deeper problem is inherent to the system. It persuades wide range of users with no legal background that it is possible to safely enter into highly complex legal relationships without proper information and assistance. This results in incorrect use of the Creative Commons licenses and countless number of people unintentionally infringing copyright. The situation left unattended may very well lead to the breakdown of the whole Creative Commons system. Indeed, this would be extremely unfortunate, considering the undeniable value of the whole system and the effort that has been already put into its creation. We have formulated easy-to-follow advice for common users and public bodies to foster the development of the Creative Commons. Besides, we have also formulated several suggestions on how to improve the current online licensing tool the Creative Commons organization use to offer the licenses. The common denominator of the changes should be the refocus from simplicity to provision of a complete set of information – shift from gung-ho approach to a responsible and ‘well-informed’ user approach

Nuclear Anxiety Amid the Russian-Ukrainian War 2022 (RUW-22): Descriptive Cross-Sectional Study

Nuclear anxiety, which refers to the fear of nuclear war and its consequences, is expected to increase amid the Russian-Ukrainian War of 2022 (RUW-22). This study aimed to evaluate the prevalence of nuclear anxiety and its associated variables among university students in the Czech Republic during the first weeks of RUW-22. A cross-sectional survey-based study was carried out from March-April 2022, utilizing a digital self-administered questionnaire (SAQ) to collect data from the target population. The SAQ consisted of multiple-choice items inquiring about demographic characteristics; generalized anxiety symptoms using generalized anxiety disorder-7 (GAD-7); depressive symptoms using patient health questionnaire-9 (PHQ-9); and attitudes towards civilian uses of nuclear power, and nuclear war-related anxiety. Of the 591 participating students, 67.7% were females, 68.2% were Czech nationals, and 61.8% followed the RUW-22 news at least once daily. The mean GAD-7 score of our participants was 7.86 ± 5.32 (0-21); and their mean PHQ-9 score was 8.66 ± 6.29 (0-27). Regarding the civilian uses of nuclear power, most participants agreed that nuclear power was safe (64.5%), denied being afraid that civilian use of nuclear power might deteriorate their health (79.7%), and thought that public acceptance was important for building new nuclear power plants (56.9%). About 42.1% and 45.5% of the participants reported feeling depressed at the possibility of nuclear war and agreed that the chances that there would be a nuclear war in their lifetime were very high, respectively. When asked about their preparedness measures during the previous four weeks, less than one quarter (23.9%) reported looking for recommendations for protection against nuclear accidents, and less than one-fifth (19.3%) were looking for the nearest bomb shelter. The depression about nuclear war possibility was positively and relatively strongly correlated with the level of "feeling concerned about the RUW-22" (rs = 0.401), and it was moderately correlated with GAD-7 (rs = 0.377) and PHQ-9 (rs = 0.274) scores and weakly correlated with RUW-2-related news-following frequency (rs = 0.196). Within the limitations of the present study, nuclear anxiety was common among Czech university students. Its associated factors may include but are not limited to the female gender; common psychological disorders such as generalized anxiety and depression; RUW-22-related news following-frequency; and the level of "feeling concerned"