Non-display uses of copyright works: Google Books and beyond

Copyright @ 2011 The AuthorsWith the advent of mass digitisation projects, such as the Google Book Search, a peculiar shift has occurred in the way that copyright works are dealt with. Contrary to what has so far been the case, works are turned into machine-readable data to be automatically processed for various purposes without the expression of works being displayed to the public. In the Google Book Settlement Agreement, this new kind of uses is referred to as “non-display uses” of digital works. The legitimacy of these uses has not yet been tested by Courts and does not comfortably fit in the current copyright doctrine, plainly because the works are not used as works but as something else, namely as data. Since non-display uses may prove to be a very lucrative market in the near future, with the potential to affect the way people use copyright works, we examine non-display uses under the prism of copyright principles to determine the boundaries of their legitimacy. Through this examination, we provide a categorisation of the activities carried out under the heading of “non-display uses”, we examine their lawfulness under the current copyright doctrine and approach the phenomenon from the spectrum of data protection law as could apply, by analogy, to the use of copyright works as processable data

Search engine liability for autocomplete suggestions: personality, privacy and the power of the algorithm

This article is concerned with the liability of search engines for algorithmically produced search suggestions, such as through Google’s ‘autocomplete’ function. Liability in this context may arise when automatically generated associations have an offensive or defamatory meaning, or may even induce infringement of intellectual property rights. The increasing number of cases that have been brought before courts all over the world puts forward questions on the conflict of fundamental freedoms of speech and access to information on the one hand, and personality rights of individuals— under a broader right of informational self-determination—on the other. In the light 15 of the recent judgment of the Court of Justice of the European Union (EU) in Google Spain v AEPD, this article concludes that many requests for removal of suggestions including private individuals’ information will be successful on the basis of EU data protection law, even absent prejudice to the person concerned

Individual Licensing Models and Consumer Protection

Copyright law is not primarily directed at consumers. Their interests are therefore only marginally accounted for, as the copyright rules exempt specific uses of works from the right holder’s control. This chapter examines the impact of digital technology on the position of consumers of licensed copyrighted content. While ownership of the physical embodiment of a work does not entail the ownership of the rights in the work, how does copyright law deal with ‘disembodied’ works? Whereas digital content is now commonly distributed on the basis of individual licensing schemes, what does it mean for consumers? Do they have a claim under consumer protection law against copyright owners for the impossibility to make a copy for private purposes, the lack of interoperability between devices, and the geo-blocking of their account

Silencing of Vlaro2 for chorismate synthase revealed that the phytopathogen Verticillium longisporum induces the cross-pathway control in the xylem

The first leaky auxotrophic mutant for aromatic amino acids of the near-diploid fungal plant pathogen Verticillium longisporum (VL) has been generated. VL enters its host Brassica napus through the roots and colonizes the xylem vessels. The xylem contains little nutrients including low concentrations of amino acids. We isolated the gene Vlaro2 encoding chorismate synthase by complementation of the corresponding yeast mutant strain. Chorismate synthase produces the first branch point intermediate of aromatic amino acid biosynthesis. A novel RNA-mediated gene silencing method reduced gene expression of both isogenes by 80% and resulted in a bradytrophic mutant, which is a leaky auxotroph due to impaired expression of chorismate synthase. In contrast to the wild type, silencing resulted in increased expression of the cross-pathway regulatory gene VlcpcA (similar to cpcA/GCN4) during saprotrophic life. The mutant fungus is still able to infect the host plant B. napus and the model Arabidopsis thaliana with reduced efficiency. VlcpcA expression is increased in planta in the mutant and the wild-type fungus. We assume that xylem colonization requires induction of the cross-pathway control, presumably because the fungus has to overcome imbalanced amino acid supply in the xylem

The Ascomycete Verticillium longisporum Is a Hybrid and a Plant Pathogen with an Expanded Host Range

Hybridization plays a central role in plant evolution, but its overall importance in fungi is unknown. New plant pathogens are thought to arise by hybridization between formerly separated fungal species. Evolution of hybrid plant pathogens from non-pathogenic ancestors in the fungal-like protist Phytophthora has been demonstrated, but in fungi, the most important group of plant pathogens, there are few well-characterized examples of hybrids. We focused our attention on the hybrid and plant pathogen Verticillium longisporum, the causal agent of the Verticillium wilt disease in crucifer crops. In order to address questions related to the evolutionary origin of V. longisporum, we used phylogenetic analyses of seven nuclear loci and a dataset of 203 isolates of V. longisporum, V. dahliae and related species. We confirmed that V. longisporum was diploid, and originated three different times, involving four different lineages and three different parental species. All hybrids shared a common parent, species A1, that hybridized respectively with species D1, V. dahliae lineage D2 and V. dahliae lineage D3, to give rise to three different lineages of V. longisporum. Species A1 and species D1 constituted as yet unknown taxa. Verticillium longisporum likely originated recently, as each V. longisporum lineage was genetically homogenous, and comprised species A1 alleles that were identical across lineages

The quotation exception under eu copyright law: Paving the way for user rights

A fundamental act of permissible use in copyright law, quotation, has a relatively broad scope under EU copyright as the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) has affirmed. Developing a principle-based perspective on the theoretical justification underpinning copyright protection as a dialogue between authors and users, cases C-469/17 Funke Medien, C-476/17 Pelham, and C-516/17 Spiegel Online explain that exceptions and limitations to copyright, including the quotation exception, crystallize the balance between copyright and fundamental freedoms, such as freedom of speech. External application of fundamental freedoms as defensive rules is hence not necessary. A natural unfolding of the implications of the concept of the balance between copyright and fundamental rights is that the CJEU affirmed the integral status of copyright exceptions and limitations as user rights. This is a ground-breaking insight on the legal nature of these defensive rules under EU copyright law, aligning with scholarly consensus toward the recognition of copyright user rights and departing from national precedents denying the existence of rights of the users. The present contribution discusses the scope of permissible quotation under EU copyright, investigates the legal nature of this provision and, going beyond current scholarship, inquires the contextual framework and legal implications emerging from the judicial declaration of the relevant legal provision as a right of the users of copyright protected works

Online Data Processing Consent Under EU Law: A Theoretical Framework and Empirical Evidence from the UK

This article analyses the results of an empirical study on the 200 most popular UK-based websites in various sectors of e-commerce services. The study provides empirical evidence on unlawful processing of personal data. It comprises a survey on the methods used to seek and obtain consent to process personal data for direct marketing and advertisement, and a test on the frequency of unsolicited commercial emails (UCE) received by customers as a consequence of their registration and submission of personal information to a website. Part one of the article presents a conceptual and normative account of data protection with a discussion of the ethical values on which European Union (EU) data protection law is grounded and an outline of the elements that must be in place to seek and obtain valid consent to process personal data. Part two discusses the outcomes of the empirical study, which unveils a significant departure between EU legal theory and practice in data protection. Although a wide majority of the websites in the sample (69 per cent) has in place a system to ask separate consent for engaging in marketing activities, it is only 16.2 per cent of them that obtain a consent which is valid under the standards set by EU law. The test with UCE shows that only one out of three websites (30.5 per cent) respects the will of the data subject not to receive commercial communications. It also shows that, when submitting personal data in online transactions, there is a high probability (50 per cent) of incurring in a website that will ignore the refusal of consent and will send UCE. The article concludes that there is a severe lack of compliance of UK online service providers with essential requirements of data protection law. In this respect, it suggests that there is an inappropriate standard of implementation, information and supervision by the UK authorities, especially in light of the clarifications provided at EU level

Online Data Processing Consent Under EU Law: A Theoretical Framework and Empirical Evidence from the UK

This article analyses the results of an empirical study on the 200 most popular UK-based websites in various sectors of e-commerce services. The study provides empirical evidence on unlawful processing of personal data. It comprises a survey on the methods used to seek and obtain consent to process personal data for direct marketing and advertisement, and a test on the frequency of unsolicited commercial emails (UCE) received by customers as a consequence of their registration and submission of personal information to a website. Part one of the article presents a conceptual and normative account of data protection with a discussion of the ethical values on which European Union (EU) data protection law is grounded and an outline of the elements that must be in place to seek and obtain valid consent to process personal data. Part two discusses the outcomes of the empirical study, which unveils a significant departure between EU legal theory and practice in data protection. Although a wide majority of the websites in the sample (69 per cent) has in place a system to ask separate consent for engaging in marketing activities, it is only 16.2 per cent of them that obtain a consent which is valid under the standards set by EU law. The test with UCE shows that only one out of three websites (30.5 per cent) respects the will of the data subject not to receive commercial communications. It also shows that, when submitting personal data in online transactions, there is a high probability (50 per cent) of incurring in a website that will ignore the refusal of consent and will send UCE. The article concludes that there is a severe lack of compliance of UK online service providers with essential requirements of data protection law. In this respect, it suggests that there is an inappropriate standard of implementation, information and supervision by the UK authorities, especially in light of the clarifications provided at EU level