Italian Radio Station sentenced to pay overdue Neighboring Rights.

The Court of Milan, with ruling notified on August 2, 2015 sentenced that the nation wide known station radio RTL is obliged to pay to SCF, the Italian consortium of  record producers a sum equal to 2% of the gross receipts.

The judges of the court of Milan have ruled in the context of disputes brought by SCF in 2009 against the major Italian national radio networks. This past April SCF has reached an agreement with other broadcasters involved and judgment continued only against RTL that has not adhered to these arrangements.

The Court, after repeating the substantive and procedural legitimacy of SCF, sentenced  that in the absence of other agreements between the parties, the extent of the compensation for the direct disk or similar device due to the manufacturer in accordance with art. 73 L.A. is equal to 2% of the proceeds.

Tsclex Attorneys to Attend INTA Annual Meeting in San Diego

Tsclex  will be attending the largest trademark conference of the year, with an eye towards solidifying ties with current clients and building new relationships with trademark attorneys from around the world.

 It is more important than ever for our lawyers to interact with their foreign counterparts to share common experiences and best practices to ensure that trademark rights continue to be strengthened in Italy.

Tsclex will be represented at this conference by Partner Gianpaolo Todisco and associate Martina Clochiatti. From May 2-6, 2015 the International Trademark Association (INTA) will hold its 137th Annual Meeting in San Diego, California, USA. Headquartered in New York City, INTA was founded in 1878 and now has more than 6,000 members from more than 190 countries, and is recognized as the world’s leading international organization dedicated to the development and improvement of intellectual property.

To schedule a meeting with either Gianpaolo Todisco or Martina Clochiatti, please contact us at info@tsclex.com.

Are legal documents protected by Copyright?

The Court of Venice has recently ruled on a case regarding plagiarism of the work of a lawyer. 

They ruled that when the legal works are the result of a personal, creative and original process of research and expertise of a specific sector in which the lawyer has developed his knowledge then this should be protected by copyright. The legal work must not be a functional and ordinary exposure of facts and rules. 

With regards to this particular case, a lawyer remarked that a company circulated an internal regulation that was identical to a text he redacted years before for another company.

As a consequence, the lawyer who wrote the original text sent a cease and desist letter to the company who was guilty of using the piece of work without his authorization.

The company tried to justify the occurred by explaining that another lawyer, who was a former associate of the lawyer who produced the original work, provided them with the regulation at issue. 

Even if they stopped using the regulation, the lawyer served a writ of summons on the company, claiming the damages for having not being recognized as the originator of the work.

In response to this, the company joined its legal advisor into the proceedings in order to avoid liability.

The Court’s final decision was to discharge the company from any sort of responsibility, accusing however the other lawyer of being guilty for plagiarism. The lawyer who produced the original work was therefore paid compensation damages by the former associate.

The Court of Venice seems to be up to now one of the few Italian courts which recognized the importance of copyrights in legal works such as the one in case. To conclude, this verdict has to be taken positively as it has finally acknowledged a level of creativity in the sector.

By Francesca Filipo