Extended Collective License

- The Nordic solution

Reprographic and other forms of reproduction generally requires the permission of the copyright holder. In 1979 the so-called extended collective licence system for reprography in education was introduced into Norwegian law. When the Norwegian Copyright Act was revised in 1995 the same system was introduced for public administration, businesses and organisations.

The system functions because the rightsholders' associations have acquired certain individual rights, for instance reprographic rights, from their individual members. The associations in turn assign these rights to a Reproduction Rights Organisation. In the case of reprography this enables Kopinor to conclude blanket agreements with users in all areas of society. Thus the user does not have to seek permission to photocopy from each individual rightsholder.

When a licensing agreement has been concluded, it is by law given an extended effect, allowing the user also to copy works of national and foreign authors and publishers who are not represented by Kopinor. The licensing scheme must, however, fulfil certain conditions:

• Kopinor must through one of its member organisations represent the reprographic rights of a substantial part of the creators of the category of works in question.
• Also, when fees are distributed, rightsholders not represented by Kopinor must be given equal treatment to those who are directly represented within the scheme. The law also gives them the right to claim individual remuneration.

The four other Nordic countries have similar legislation.

Here you will find the contents of a Nordic leaflet from 1991, explaining the system.