International Conference in Bogota Promotes Importance of Copyright Protection and Collective Management
On 18 April, CISAC and Colombian authors’ society SAYCO organised the 2016 International Conference of Authors’ Rights and Collective Management in Bogota, Colombia. Over 150 participants from Latin America, the United States and Europe joined government officials and creative industries representatives including Head of the Copyright Office of Colombia and representative of the Colombian government Giancarlo Marcenaro, ICMP CEO Coco Carmona and IFPI Regional Director Javier Asencio.
Mr Marcenaro opened the conference by welcoming the decision by the region’s societies to meet in Bogota. The Government of Colombia expressed its commitment to the cooperation agreement signed with CISAC last December. This agreement recognizes the importance of cooperation between the public sector and organisations working on behalf of creators.
The opening remarks were followed by speeches by CISAC Director General Gadi Oron, Latin American Committee Chairman Victor Yunes and SAYCO Advisor Dr Rafaél Manjarrés Mendoza, who thanked CISAC for its support.
Mr Oron outlined the challenges facing collective management throughout the world, new regulatory frameworks and the increasing presence of new players playing the role of intermediaries in copyrighted content. He also referred to the particular challenges faced by SAYCO in Colombia while emphasizing the growth in collections in Latin America, noting, “Europe is by far the largest region for royalty collections, but Latin America is growing. Collections for this region rose from 520 million euros in 2013 to 530 million euros in 2014. This is a good sign for the region. Latin America & Caribbean societies contributed 6.7% of CISAC’s overall collections in 2014.”
Organised during the CCL meetings and keeping with tradition, the ICMP Latin American office concurrently held their annual meeting. All of ICMP’s members were invited to attend the International Conference on Collective Management.
The morning of this exceptional international conference included two roundtables focused on topics specific to Colombia. The first roundtable focused on reinforcing music rights management in Colombia. Panellists included SAYCO Legal Director Javier Donado, author Wilfrad Castillo, Dr Giancarlo Marcenaro and publisher Dr Adriana Restrepo.
Moderated by Fernando Zapata, prominent jurist and former National Director of the Office of Copyright, an agreement was reached during the panel on the need for joint efforts from all industries. This emphasized the call of Dr Restrepo to establish clear, focused objectives that Colombian rightsholders can aim to achieve. Fernando Zapata invited those involved in collective management, in government and with rights holders to act pragmatically.
The second roundtable explored the fair remuneration of audiovisual authors, coinciding with the launch of Writers & Directors Worldwide’s (W&DW) campaign brochure for The Audiovisual Campaign for Screenwriters and Directors. Speakers included W&DW President Yves Nilly, CISAC Vice President Marcelo Piñeyro and Oscar-nominated Director and DASC Chairman Mario Mitrotti as well as Alexandra Cardona Restrepo of REDES. The panel generated notable responses from the audience when audiovisual creators described their current situation. Alexandra Cardona Restrepo stated, "We do not want to remain invisible. Gradually, authors are gaining visibility thanks to CISAC and the sister societies that support us".
During the afternoon, attention moved to key licensing rights and collective management issues at a global and regional level. The first discussion addressed the global movement of visual artists for resale right recognition. This was followed by a panel titled “Online Processing of Multi-Territorial Licenses”. Mr Oron, Dr Eduardo de Freitas of AGADU-AGP and Colombian visual artist Antonio Caro Lopera shared their thoughts and experiences about weak protection of visual arts rights in Colombia. Following Mr. Oron’s presentation of the visual artists’ resale right campaign, music publisher representative Maria Victoria Oramas moderated a dialogue on visual, music and audiovisual rights among attendees.
Multi-territory, online licensing was discussed by Latinautor Executive Coordinator Solange Aubone, who shared the Latin American perspective, and Back office Music Services CEO Fernando Marcos. Moderated by CISAC’s Regional Director for Latin America and the Caribbean Santiago Schuster, the liveliest debate of the conference included speeches by regional music industry representatives, Google Play, users and society directors. Technical aspects of data processing of OSS Latinautor-Publishers were described in detail by panellists.
Mr Schuster concluded the international conference with closing remarks on the optimistic future for authors’ rights and collective management, nevertheless stressing the importance of global collaboration between societies and creators in order to offset new emerging challenges.