A plaintiff may claim damages under section 97(2) in addition to claiming an account of profits, as his primary remedy. A person claiming joint rights in the copyright as author must contribute to the ‘production’ of the work and create something protected by copyright which finds its way into the finished work. There is no restriction on the way in which a joint author’s contribution may be funnelled into the finished work, and in particular that there is no requirement that each of the authors must have exercised penmanship.
The fact that there are numerous similar works produced by the author does not mean that he does not have to prove that one or more discrete copyright works have been copied.
Judges:
Ladde J
Citations:
Ind Summary 30-Oct-1995, [1995] FSR 36
Statutes:
Copyright Designs and Patents Act 1988 97(2)
Jurisdiction:
England and Wales
Citing:
See Also – Cala Homes (South) Ltd and others v Alfred McAlpine Homes East Ltd ChD 6-Jul-1995
The plaintiff alleged that the defendant had copied its house designs after a senior employee involved in creating the designs left and eventually came to work for the defendant. The plaintiff alleged that the copying was flagrant allowing . .
Cited by:
Cited – Sean Sweeney, Graham Edward Camps v Macmillan Publishers Limited, Danis Rose ChD 22-Nov-2001
The claimants were trustees of the estate of James Joyce, and complained at the publication of unpublished parts of the work Ulysses in a readers edition by the defendants. Published works are protected for fifty years after the author’s death, but . .
Cited – Robin Ray v Classic FM Plc PatC 18-Mar-1998
Contractor and Client Copyrights
The plaintiff had contributed a design for a system of classifying and selecting tracks to be played on a radio station. He did so under a consultancy contract.
Held: A Joint authorship claim required that the contributor had made some direct . .
Cited – IPC Media Ltd v Highbury-Leisure Publishing Ltd ChD 21-Dec-2004
The claimant magazine publisher alleged breach of copyright by the defendant in their magazine, as to the cover page designs used. It was not clear just which cover was said to have been copied.
Held: The first step in a copyright action is . .
Cited – Phonographic Performance Ltd v Ellis (T/A Bla Bla Bar) CA 18-Dec-2018
Additional infrimgement damages were not a fine.
The Society had succeeded in its claim of copyright infringement. The defendant having continued his breaches, it sought additional damages and committal for contempt. Having granted the committal the trial judge declined to award additional . .
Overruled – Redrow Homes Ltd and others v Bett Brothers Plc and others HL 22-Jan-1998
Additional damages under section 97 of the 1988 Act, can only be awarded with compensatory damages, not with a claim for damages under section 96. . .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Intellectual Property, Damages
Updated: 07 December 2022; Ref: scu.78830