Berne Convention

The Berne Convention for the Protection of Literary and Art is an international treaty that was adopted in 1886 in Bern.

The on December 5, 1887 first in eight countries (Belgium, Germany, France, Great Britain, Italy, Switzerland, Spain and Tunisia) came into force in the Berne Convention established for the first time the recognition of copyright between sovereign nations. She had been drawn up on the initiative of Victor Hugo. Prior to ratification, it declined States from frequently to treat works of other nations as protected. For example, could a London- published work that was in the UK under protection, be freely distributed in France and vice versa.

In the following years there were several revisions. Since 1908, therefore, we speak of the Revised Berne Convention ( Berne Convention ). Austria joined the 1920 Treaty in accordance with Article 239 of the Treaty of St. Germain.

The Berne Convention provides in Article 5.1 that each State Party to the protection of works of citizens of other contractors as well as recognizes the protection of works of its own citizens ( " protective principle ' ). This equality of foreign authors is unnecessary with national authors, do research on the foreign protection regulations. The protection is done automatically according to the Berne Convention, ie no registration and no copyright notice is required.

The (R ) BÜ guarantees which protect at least fifty years after the death of the author ( postmortem auctoris ) addition. States Parties has the option to extend this period. For example, the European Union has extended in 1993 in their quest for harmonization of copyright protection, this period to 70 years. The United States followed suit with the Sonny Bono Copyright Term Extension Act of 1998.

The U.S. refused initially to join the Berne Convention, as this would have required major changes in its copyright law (in particular with respect to the moral law and the registration of the protected works ). Therefore, the Universal Copyright Convention (Universal Copyright Convention, UCC ) of UNESCO in 1952 accepted, which lessened these concerns. But since 1 March 1989, the Berne Convention applies there as well.

Since 1967, the Berne Convention by the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO ) is managed.

The World Trade Organization (WTO ) has been introduced in the Uruguay Round, the Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights ( Agreement on Trade -Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights, TRIPS) rights for its member states mandatory. Since the vast majority of states are members of the WTO, and non-signatory of the Berne Convention are obliged to accept a large part of their conditions.

Quotes

" The Heads of State of the German Reich, Belgium, Spain, France, Great Britain, Haiti, Italy, Liberia, Switzerland and Tunisia, uniformly animated by the desire to protect the copyright in works of literature and art in as effective and uniform a manner as possible, have decided to conclude an agreement for this purpose. "

" The book as a book belongs to the author, but as a thought it belongs - the term is not too strong - of mankind. Every thinking person has a right to it. If one of the two rights, the author or the human mind, was to be sacrificed, it would, no doubt, the right of the author, because our only concern is for the public interest, and the general public, I'll explain, seems to us. "