萬國法律事務所

The Economics Committee of the Legislative Yuan has passed the first level of review of the amendments to the Copyright Act and the Copyright Intermediary Organizations Act. There are still have two levels of reviews to be completed. In the future, shops such as supermarkets and restaurants can pay royalties via a unitary window for the use of copyrighted music without having to worry about being criminally charged for playing copyrighted programs illegally in their shops.

Also, copyright owners who do not belong to a particular intermediary group are no longer permitted to bring criminal complaints against the users of copyrighted music as a means to pressure such users for damages. The owners can only seek compensation from users through a civil action.

The main problem faced by shop owners is the lack of channels to pay royalties for the use of certain copyrighted music in their shops. Generally, certain shop owners will connect their speakers to radio stations or TV stations so that songs and programs can be played in their shops. However, as these shop owners cannot control the songs or programs played by the radio or TV stations, and given that the songs or programs played are often copyrighted products, shop owners are required to pay royalties. However, these copyrighted products are often owned by different intermediary groups, which are difficult to identify, and this difficulty has resulted in the shop owners being unable to pay royalties to the right parties. Some shop owners may also face criminal charges for illegal public broadcasting of copyrighted music or programs.

Taiwan’s Intellectual Property Office (TIPO) stated that in order to solve the chaotic situation with respect to royalty payments for copyrighted products, a unitary window for payments is needed and the intermediary group should synchronize methods for charging royalties. TIPO explained that in the future there will be two methods of payment: (i) for the users who use copyrighted products where the owner of the copyrighted product has joined an intermediary group, royalties will be paid through a unitary window; and (ii) the other method is for the use of copyrighted products of owners who have not joined an intermediary group, payments will be made individually to the copyright owners upon a claim made by the copyright owners. These methods will prevent criminal charges from being raised.

However, establishing a synchronized payment method for royalties requires an evaluation of the amount or portion of the copyrighted products used and the market share. As there are no agreements with respect to the unitary window at this point, TIPO estimates that it will take approximately two (2) years to develop the abovesaid synchronized payment methods. As such, users will not be liable under civil or criminal prosecution before these payment methods are developed.