The defendants hired a film to a cinema. The film was based on the plaintiff’s play.
Held: The defendants infringed the plaintiff’s exclusive right conferred by the 1911 Act to authorise a performance of the play. The hirer sold the use which was capable only of being an infringing use.
Bankes LJ followed Monckton v. Pathe Freres Pathephone Ltd. and Evans v. Hulton, to accept that for the purpose of the Act of 1911 the expression ‘authorise’ meant ‘sanction, approve, and countenance’, saying: ‘to ‘authorise’ means to grant or purport to grant to a third person the right to do the act complained of, whether the intention is that the grantee shall do the act on his own account, or only on account of the grantor;’
Atkins LJ said: ‘to ‘authorise’ means to grant or purport to grant to a third person the right to do the act complained of, whether the intention is that the grantee shall do the act on his own account, or only on account of the grantor;’
Judges:
Bankes LJ, Atkins LJ
Citations:
[1926] 2 KB 474
Statutes:
Jurisdiction:
England and Wales
Citing:
Followed – Monckton v Pathe Freres Pathephone Ltd CA 1914
A performance of the musical work by the use of a record was found to be an infringing use and the record was sold for that purpose. Buckley LJ said: ‘The seller of a record authorises, I conceive, the use of the record, and such use will be a . .
Followed – Evans v E Hulton and Co Ltd ChD 1924
Passing on memories for use in a ghosted autobiography is not sufficient for a claim of joint authorship. Tomlin J considered whether a publication had been authorised by the copyright owner and said: ‘where a man sold the rights in relation to a . .
Cited by:
Too wide – CBS Songs Ltd v Amstrad Consumer Electronics Plc HL 12-May-1988
The plaintiffs as representatives sought to restrain Amstrad selling equipment with two cassette decks without taking precautions which would reasonably ensure that their copyrights would not be infringed by its users.
Held: Amstrad could only . .
Cited – Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation and Another v Newzbin Ltd ChD 29-Mar-2010
The defendant operated a web-site providing a search facility of the Usenet news system which allowed its users to locate copies of films online for downloading. The claimant said this was an infringement of its copyrights.
Held: The defendant . .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Intellectual Property
Updated: 07 May 2022; Ref: scu.267925
