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When the room you booked on Airbnb is already occupied Earlier this week, The IPKat received an intriguing couple of questions from a reader who is currently studying IP law: does someone renting out their spare bedroom on  Airbnb  around 50% of the time have to acquire a separate licence for the TV set which they have in said room? and what if they also have a radio set that allows guests to play music in said environment?  From an EU perspective, issues of this kind require consideration of the string of case law of the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) on the right of communication to the public under the  InfoSoc  and  Rental and Lending Rights  Directives, including a pending referral -  Stim and SAMI , C-753/18   [Katpost  here ]   ( the Opinion of the appointed Advocate General is  expected  on 15 January 2020) - asking whether: the hiring out of cars equipped as standard with radio receiver...

Are libraries allowed to lend electronic books in their collections under the  Rental and Lending Rights Directive ? If so, under what conditions?  Is there such thing as digital exhaustion under the  InfoSoc Directive ? These were t he  questions  in  Vereniging Openbare Bibliotheken v  Stichting Leenrecht , C-174/15, a reference for a preliminary ruling to the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) from the  Rechtbank Den Haag (District Court of The Hague, Netherlands).  As  reported  by this blog, this reference arose in the context of proceedings brought by the association of Dutch public libraries which - contrary to the position of Dutch government - holds the view that libraries should be entitled to lend electronic books included in their collections according to the principle "one copy one user".  This envisages the possibility for a library user to download an electronic copy of a work included in the col...

AG Maciej Szpunar Are libraries allowed to lend electronic books in their collections under the  Rental and  Lending Rights Directive ? If so, under what conditions? Is there such thing as digital exhaustion under the   InfoSoc Directive ? As to the latter, we know - via   UsedSoft   [Katposts  here ]  there that there is such thing under the   Software Directive , but whether this is also true for the principal copyright directive has been debated for a while   [with some possible hints provided by  Allposters ,  here , although not everybody agrees: see below ] . Those above are - in a nutshell - the  questions  currently pending before the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) in  Vereniging Openbare Bibliotheken v  Stichting Leenrecht , C-174/15, a reference for a preliminary ruling from the  Rechtbank Den Haag (District Court of The Hague, Netherlands).  This reference has arise...

After hotels  [ here ] , dentist waiting rooms  [ here ] , and spas  [ here ] , it is now the turn of  rehabilitation centres. This morning Advocate General (AG) Yves Bot made a comeback to the copyright scene and issued his Opinion in  Reha Training , C-117/15. This is a reference for a preliminary ruling to the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) from  the  Landgericht Köln (Regional Court, Cologne), seeking clarification on - guess what (once again) - the right of communication to the public.  This German court is essentially asking essentially whether  [the questions in full can be accessed  here ] : the making available of TV broadcasts by means of TV sets on the premises of a rehabilitation centre falls within the scope of  Article 3(1) of the   InfoSoc Directive  and Article 8(2) of the  Rental and Lending Rights Directive ; and  the concept of ‘communication to the public’ for the purpos...