First Chinese law on copyright indemnity promulgated

April 19, 2005
“Directive Opinion on Determination of Compensation Responsibility on Copyright Infringement Harm” promulgated in Beijing recently contains specific provisions on a series of problems concerning copyright infringement compensation, and is the first special rule in China on copyright compensation. “Directive Opinion on Determination of Compensation Responsibility on Copyright Infringement Harm” promulgated the other day contains 35 provisions, involving the principles and methods of determining the compensation responsibility and compensating the damage, and determination of spiritual harm compensation and common infringement compensation amount. The infringement compensation amount determined by the court shall be able to completely and fully compensate the plaintiff’s loss incurred by the infringement, namely to reflect the principle of “complete compensation”. It is the most basic compensation principle in modern civil law, and the compensation principle established in the General Principles of Civil Law of PR China, and the Intellectual Property Law of PR China. It is notable that in this directive opinion, the compensation on spiritual damage incurred by copyright infringement is provided for the first time, namely in case of severely infringing of the personal rights of the writer or performer, if the stop of infringement, elimination of influence and apology cannot sufficiently pacify the spiritual harm suffered by the plaintiff, the defendant shall be judged to pay spiritual harm consolation money to the plaintiff.

　

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