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Spoilers Under European Internet Law

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EU Internet Law in the Digital Era

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Abstract

This chapter discusses the legal framework of “spoilers”, defined here as the revelation of elements of a plot of a piece of fiction that the public is not yet aware of. The author distinguishes between “relative spoilers”, i.e., information about an already published work of mind, and “absolute spoilers”, i.e., information about a non-published work of mind. In the first part, it is argued that relative spoilers do not raise any liability as the person who publishes the spoiler is protected by freedom of expression. However, the question of moderation touches on sensitive legal issues related to the need to enforce a stronger horizontal effect of freedom of expression on the Internet. The second part focuses on the “absolute spoiler” and considers it as a form of information theft that is nowadays regulated by the Directive on trade secrets. In the third and last part of the chapter, the author shows how, alternatively, copyright law could be of use in guarding against both relative and absolute spoilers.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    Hedley Byrne & Co Ltd v Heller & Partners Ltd (1964) AC 465 (HL).

  2. 2.

    Rhodes v OPO [2015] UKSC 32.

  3. 3.

    Cour de Cassation, Chambre civile 1, du 27 September 2005, 03-13.622, Publié au bulletin 2005 I N° 348 p. 289.

  4. 4.

    “Vu l’article 1382 du Code civil; Attendu que les abus de la liberté d’expression envers les personnes ne peuvent être poursuivis sur le fondement de ce texte”.

  5. 5.

    See for instance Cour de Cassation, 1 re ch. civ. 2013, Comité du débarquement c/ Mme X. et AspEG.

  6. 6.

    Derieux (2014). See at the opposite, Latil (2014).

  7. 7.

    See Kiderra (2011).

  8. 8.

    ECHR, Observer et Guardian, App No 13585/88, 26 November 1991.

  9. 9.

    See Bartz and Ehrlich (2012).

  10. 10.

    Fuentes Bobo c. Espagne, no 39293/98, 29 Février 2000.

  11. 11.

    See Bioy (2012).

  12. 12.

    ECHR, Appleby et autres v Royaume-Un, App No 44306/98, 24 September 2003.

  13. 13.

    See Hartmann (2013).

  14. 14.

    See Bychawska-Siniarska (2017).

  15. 15.

    ECHR, Khurshid Mustafa and Tarzibachi v Sweden, App No 23883/06, 16 March 2009.

  16. 16.

    See Stapley-Brown (2018).

  17. 17.

    Directive (EU) 2016/943 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 8 June 2016 of the protection of undisclosed know-how and business information (trade secrets) against their unlawful acquisition, use and disclosure, OJ L 157.

  18. 18.

    See Catala (1984).

  19. 19.

    See Trosow (2005).

  20. 20.

    Directive 96/9/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 11 March 1996 on the legal protection of databases, OJ L 77.

  21. 21.

    Communication from the Commission to the European Parliament European Commission, the Council, the European Economic and Social Committee and the Committee of the Regions, Building a European Data Economy COM (2017) 9 final.

  22. 22.

    Douglas v Hello! Ltd [2005] EWCA Civ 595.

  23. 23.

    OBG Ltd v Allan [2007] UKHL 21.

  24. 24.

    Cour d’Appel de Paris, n° 13/08861, 21 Octobre 2015.

  25. 25.

    See Vivant (2006).

  26. 26.

    Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights, adopted on Apr. 15, 1994, Marrakesh Agreement Establishing the World Trade Organization, Annex 1C, The Legal Texts: The Results of the Uruguay Round of Multilateral Trade Negotiations 320 (1999), 1869 U.N.T.S. 299, 33 I.L.M. 1197 (1994).

  27. 27.

    See Knaak et al. (2014).

  28. 28.

    Art. 2.1 of the Directive: (1) ‘trade secret’ means information which meets all of the following requirements: (a) it is secret in the sense that it is not, as a body or in the precise configuration and assembly of its components, generally known among or readily accessible to persons within the circles that normally deal with the kind of information in question; (b) it has commercial value because it is secret; (c) it has been subject to reasonable steps under the circumstances, by the person lawfully in control of the information, to keep it secret”.

  29. 29.

    See Hooton (2017).

  30. 30.

    See Hart (2009).

  31. 31.

    See Lawson (2012).

  32. 32.

    As interviewed by the journalist of the Wired—see note above.

  33. 33.

    Geiger (2009).

  34. 34.

    Berne Convention for the Protection of Literary and Artistic Works (Paris Act of 24 July 1971 as amended on 28 September 1979).

  35. 35.

    See in France: Tribunal of First Instance of Paris, 29 May 1989, RIDA January 1990, p. 353. Of course, as an Italian court points out, it is not the principle of the advertisement cut that is illegal per se. It is on a contrario perspective the effect of the cuts considering the quality of the movie and the duration and the number of the advertisements. See Rome Court of Appeal, 16 November 1989, Germi v Reteitalia and Rissoli Film, RIDA 1990, no 144, p. 184.

  36. 36.

    See in Spain, Judgment of 18 January 2013 issued by the Plenary of the Judges of the Civil Chamber of the Supreme Court, when the renowned sculptor Andrés Nagel sued the city hall of the Spanish city of Amorebieta when the latter decided to move a work of art from its initial placement. Here again, the judges adopted an a contrario position: the relocation itself does not violate the right to integrity per se. It violates the author’s right only assuming that the relocation “substantially interferes in interpretation of the work.” For further details, see Abogados (2013).

  37. 37.

    BGH GRUR 1999, 230, 232—Treppenhausgestaltung.

  38. 38.

    The right is expressly stated in Belgium, France, Germany, Greece and Spain as an independent moral right. Some countries, for instance Austria, do not distinguish it from economic publication right. At the opposite, it does not exist at all in Ireland, Luxembourg, Netherlands, Portugal and Cyprus. Source: Salokannel and Strowel (2000).

  39. 39.

    See Siabon (2016).

  40. 40.

    See Hughes (2005).

  41. 41.

    Directive 2001/29/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 22 May 2001 on the harmonisation of certain aspects of copyright and related rights in the information society. Article 2 defines the right of reproduction as the “the exclusive right to authorise or prohibit direct or indirect, temporary or permanent reproduction by any means and in any form, in whole or in part” of the work of mind.

  42. 42.

    CJEU, Infopaq International A/S v Danske DagbladesForening, C 5/08, Judgment of the Court (Fourth Chamber) of 16 July 2009.

  43. 43.

    Twin Peaks Productions, Inc v Publications International, Ltd, Louis N Weber, Scottknickelbine, and Penguin USA, Inc, 996 F.2d 1366 (2d Cir. 1993).

  44. 44.

    LG Hamburg, 12.12.2003, 2004 GRUR-RR 65, Neue JuristischeWochenschrift, 2004, p. 610.

  45. 45.

    Temple Island Collections Ltd v New English Teas Ltd & another [2012] EWPCC 1.

  46. 46.

    BGH, 15.11.1957, 1958 GewerblicherRechtsschutw und Urheberrecht [GRUR] 354.

  47. 47.

    Leslie Klinger v Conan Doyle Estate, US Court of Appeals, No 14-1128 (7th Cir. 2014).

  48. 48.

    See ECHR (5th section), Ashby Donald and others v France, App No 36769/08, 10 January 2013.

  49. 49.

    See in Holland, Louis Vuitton v Nadia Plesner, District Court of the Hague of 4 May 2011.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. School of Law, European University Cyprus, Nicosia, Cyprus

    Philippe Jougleux

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  1. Philippe Jougleux
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Correspondence to Philippe Jougleux .

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  1. Department of Law, University of Cyprus, Nicosia, Cyprus

    Tatiana-Eleni Synodinou

  2. School of Law, European University Cyprus, Nicosia, Cyprus

    Philippe Jougleux , Christiana Markou  & Thalia Prastitou ,  & 

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Jougleux, P. (2020). Spoilers Under European Internet Law. In: Synodinou, TE., Jougleux, P., Markou, C., Prastitou, T. (eds) EU Internet Law in the Digital Era. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-25579-4_8

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-25579-4_8

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