Title: The EU Collective Rights Management Directive and the RRO

Authors: Olav Stokkmo

Addresses: International Federation of Reproduction Rights Organisations (IFRRO), Rue du Prince Royal 85, 1050 Brussels, Belgium

Abstract: In the text and image sector, the collective management organisations are referred to as Reproduction Rights Organisations (RROs). They administer certain secondary uses of already published works, and typically grant the user preauthorisation to make multiple copies of portions of already published publications to which the user has legal access, for personal, information or administrative uses in institutions, organisations, or corporations. This article sets out the role and functioning of RROs, and examines their operation in relation to the Directive on Collective Rights Management (CRM Directive, 2014), which the EU adopted 26 February 2014. It postulates that the CRM Directive allows RROs to continue their operation, with none, or only minor changes to their current practices. In this vein, the clarification in the CRM Directive that the term 'rightholder' comprises both authors and publishers is useful; it is also consistent with current RRO practice. Furthermore, the CRM Directive allows explicitly current RRO membership arrangements, legal set ups, models of operation and distribution practices to be carried forward; and well-functioning RROs generally comply with the transparency, accountability and good governance criteria of the CRM Directive.

Keywords: CRM Directive; reproduction rights organisations; RROs; collective management organisations; CMOs; text and image sector; text and image works; secondary use; operation models; rightholders; transparency; accountability; good governance; EU Collective Rights Management Directive; Directive 2014/26/EU; distribution practices; copyright; intellectual property rights; IPR; musical works; music rights; online music; digital music.

DOI: 10.1504/IJIPM.2014.070726

International Journal of Intellectual Property Management, 2014 Vol.7 No.3/4, pp.120 - 134

Received: 03 Nov 2014
Accepted: 03 Feb 2015
Published online: 22 Jul 2015 *

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