The Ministry of Justice is proposing a draft bill to legalize CD burning for private use.
The ministry yesterday published a draft Copyright Law (Duplication of Material) to legalize the private copying of music CDs, provided that it is done on stipulated types of media. A fee will be paid to the holders of the copyright, performers and recording producers for these types of media.
The purpose of the draft bill is to settle in a balanced manner the widespread private copying of music.
In discussions prior to the publication of the draft bill, Minister of Justice Joseph (Tomy) Lapid stated that the legal authorities should make it clear to the public that the copying of CDs was permitted for private use, and did not infringe copyrights.
At the same time, royalties should be set to be paid to artists and producers who invest their best time, money and talent in their creations, and have the right to be paid for their work.
The draft bill lists the permissible types of media that can be copied. Copying fees will be determined on the basis of frequency of use of the media type for the private copying of music. For instance, if a type of media includes CD burners, the law will explicitly permit the burning of music for private use and impose a fee on CD burners to be paid by the CD producer and importer.
The draft bill proposes that the state collect a fee from media producers and importers. This fee will be distributed to three representative royalties companies, which represent the producers, the performing artists, and recording producers.
The royalties companies will distribute revenue from the fee among their members - artists, performers, and recording producers - in the same way they distribute other royalties from copyrights they manage. The minister of justice will be authorized to set the guidelines for the distribution of the money.
Lapid said, "The state has discriminated against artists for years. Many people earn money from the artists' labors, leaving them with nothing. The time has come to correct this distortion."
Published by Globes [online] - www.globes.co.il - on October 20, 2004