The Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) has been advised that copyright is not exhausted when it comes to the re-sale of e-books.
In an opinion issued today, September 10, advocate general (AG) Maciej Szpunar said that while there were strong arguments to say that copyright is exhausted when downloaded works are resold, this is not the case under current EU law.
The case in question involves Dutch company Tom Kabinet, which re-sells used e-books, which it purchases from both individuals and official distributors.
Tom Kabinet argues that its model benefits from the principle of exhaustion, which states that the copyright of the work is exhausted after its initial sale.
In this view, the company is free to sell these digital copies on without the permission of the copyright owner.
However, according to the AG, exhaustion of copyright should not apply to the sale of downloaded works, such as e-books, under current EU law.
The AG said that applying the principle of exhaustion in this case would damage the interests of copyright owners.
According to the AG, this would result in a ''risk of competition from copies of the same quality offered at a fraction of the original market price ''.
The AG also suggested that applying the rule of exhaustion in this case could ''contribute to the development of piracy and make it more difficult to implement the measures intended to combat it ''.
Source: Wipr
