The interface between copyright and contract: suggestions for the future

Abstract

The nature of the relationship of copyright law and contracts has long been overlooked . This article begins by outlining the two paradigms of contracts, namely the understanding that contracts can be used to either a) provide copyright style protection, or b) provide the basis of the relationships between authors, distributors and content recipients. The article argues that both types, in different ways, have undermined the existing copyright balance in the UK and US. The copyright balance can be restored by requiring that contracts which involve copyright works adhere to basic fundamental principles of the copyright balancing exercise. This can be achieved by utilising the arguments of Chief Justice Crabb in Pro CD, a case heard in the Western District of Wisconsin in the US during 1996.