Chapter 2

Authorship and Ownership of Copyright

21. —In this Act, “author” means the person who creates a work and includes:

(a) in the case of a sound recording, the producer;

(b) in the case of a film, the producer and the principal director;

(c) in the case of a broadcast, the person making the broadcast or in the case of a broadcast which relays another broadcast by reception and immediate retransmission, without alteration, the person making that other broadcast;

(d) in the case of a cable programme, the person providing the cable programme service in which the programme is included;

(e) in the case of a typographical arrangement of a published edition, the publisher;

(f) in the case of a work which is computer-generated, the person by whom the arrangements necessary for the creation of the work are undertaken;

(g) in the case of an original database, the individual or group of individuals who made the database; and

(h) in the case of a photograph, the photographer.

22. —(1) In this Act, “a work of joint authorship” means a work produced by the collaboration of two or more authors in which the contribution of each author is not distinct from that of the other author or authors.

(2) A film shall be treated as a work of joint authorship unless the producer and the principal director are the same person.

(3) A broadcast shall be treated as a work of joint authorship if more than one person makes the broadcast and the contribution of each person is not distinct from that of any of the others involved in making that broadcast.

(4) References in this Act to the author of a work shall, unless otherwise provided, be construed, in relation to a work of joint authorship, as references to all of the authors of the work.

23. —(1) The author of a work shall be the first owner of the copyright unless—

(a) the work is made by an employee in the course of employment, in which case the employer is the first owner of any copyright in the work, subject to any agreement to the contrary,

(b) the work is the subject of Government or Oireachtas copyright,

(c) the work is the subject of the copyright of a prescribed international organisation, or

(d) the copyright in the work is conferred on some other person by an enactment.

(2) Where a work, other than a computer program, is made by an author in the course of employment by the proprietor of a newspaper or periodical, the author may use the work for any purpose, other than for the purposes of making available that work to newspapers or periodicals, without infringing the copyright in the work.