Euromonitor and Wilmington have raised various concerns with the Intellectual Property Office (IPO) over the detail of amendments being put forward by the IPO through draft Statutory Instruments (SI), with particular reference to exceptions in the areas of text and data mining.
The companies added their voices to the PPA’s own official consultation response, lodged with the IPO ahead of the August 2 deadline, which underlined the need for robust copyright protection to ensure PPA members are able to secure an economic and commercial return on their investment in content creation.
Neil Smith, Chief Operating Officer of Wilmington Group plc and Chairman of the PPA Business Government & Regulatory Affairs Committee (GRAC), said: “It appears that these SIs have been drafted too hastily and with insufficient clarity and precision. The adoption as currently drafted would result in huge damage to business publishers in the UK. It is, therefore, critical that the language in the SIs is amended to remove all ambiguity and uncertainty.”
Trevor Fenwick, Managing Director of Euromonitor, added: “It would appear that the IPO is ignorant of the size and importance of business information and data publishers to the UK information economy and has failed to consider the implications of its Modernising Copyright agenda for this important, successful and growing part of the UK economy.”
This recent consultation response is the latest milestone in the ongoing review of the UK’s copyright system that was instigated following the publication of the Hargreaves Report.
The report’s author, Professor Ian Hargreaves, took questions on the changing intellectual property landscape from PPA members at a recent meeting of the PPA Business GRAC.
About PPA
The PPA says: “The PPA promotes and protects the interests of print and online publishers of consumer and business media in the UK. The PPA has around 200 publishing companies in its membership, which collectively produce more than 2,500 consumer and business magazines and journals as well as digital media, data products and events.”
