In our capacity as accredited observers of the WIPO Standing Committee on Copyright and Related Rights (SCCR), we are attending the 45th session of the Committee, which is currently taking place in Geneva (April 15-19, 2024).
We made the following statement regarding the protection of Broadcasting Organizations (Agenda Item 4):
Dear Delegates,
The proposed broadcast treaty, in its current version, remains a threat to the Public Domain and usage rights, particularly when legal protection of broadcasters is shaped in the form of exclusive rights, on top of rights that apply to content.
The rights-based model suggests that broadcasters will benefit from secondary rights for exploitation and control following fixation of the broadcast signal, without sufficient consideration for the public interest needs related to access to knowledge and information of signal content. In the current text, none of the exceptions are mandatory and there is no Public Domain safeguard.
Broadcasters own extensive collections of exclusive content that is highly valuable for researchers, educators, learners, cultural heritage institutions, and the general public. These collections document not only popular culture and the entertainment industry, but also function as historical documents, educational resources and research sources.
Often, the only way of accessing high-quality copies of the content in those collections is through broadcasting. Therefore, it is essential to limit exclusive rights with adequate usage rights, and ensure that, when the signal content is in the Public Domain, broadcasters are prevented from claiming exclusive rights and taking that content out of the Public Domain.
Countries opting for a rights-based model should be required to implement at least those exceptions that are already mandatory for copyrighted works (quotation, news of the day, and providing access for the visually impaired). Furthermore, they shall be required to provide in their domestic laws that, when the term of protection of the signal content has expired, the rights and protection guaranteed in this Treaty shall not apply.
