unicornnews: Links licence dispute goes to court

The Newspaper Licensing Agency clearly wants a quick resolution to its dispute with the PR and media cuttings sectors over the so called links licence, because rather than waiting for a Copyright Tribunal ruling on the matter, it has now taken the matter to the High Court.

As previously reported, the NLA wants PR companies and cuttings agencies to pay a licence fee whenever they provide a list of links to newspaper articles to their clients, in the same way they would if they provided a pack of photocopies of newspaper articles. The PR industry, led by the PR Consultants Association, say no licence is required under UK copyright law, and they and cuttings people Meltwater have referred the matter to the UK Copyright Tribunal. But the Tribunal won’t rule on the matter until 2011, and the NLA has been forced to put is new links licence on hold in the mean time.

So the NLA has decided that, while the Copyright Tribunal would rule on any dispute on what royalties should be paid, the issue of whether the licence is legal at all can be answered by the High Court, which will likely address the issue much quicker. So much so, the Agency has begun legal proceedings against the PRCA and Meltwater.

Confirming the new legal action, NLA MD David Pugh told reporters: “We believe that clarity on all aspects of our web licences needs to be achieved as quickly and unambiguously as possible. The Copyright Tribunal will rule on the commercial aspects of NLA web licensing – and we welcome and support that process – but the High Court is the proper place to decide on the legality of our web licences. The objective of the action we have initiated today is to achieve as swift and complete a resolution as possible for all parties – publishers, media monitoring companies and their clients. By seeking legal clarity on aggregator and end-user licences, the NLA aims to support the Copyright Tribunal process and end uncertainty in the market”.

Responding to the action, Meltwater and the PRCA issued a joint statement as follows: “Having initially learned about the NLA‘s decision to take Meltwater and the PRCA to court through the press, both parties have only just received the papers concerning this claim. While we understand that the industry will want clarification on this issue, we do not see this development as cause for concern. Naturally, we are reviewing the papers in consultation with our legal advisors. But not wishing to prejudice our case with the Copyright Tribunal, which we believe to be strong, we will study the NLA‘s claim before responding. We remain confident, however, that the NLA‘s proposals for a web licence are flawed and that the courts will support our views on this”.

Posted Friday May 28 2010 by Chris Cooke

Related categories: Legal news