Buenos Aires Convention

Buenos Aires Convention
Convention on Literary and Artistic Copyright

{{{image_alt}}}

Signatories to the Buenos Aires Convention are indicated in blue
Type multilateral
Signed 11 August 1910 (1910-08-11)
Location Buenos Aires, Argentina
Parties 18
Depositary Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Argentine Republic
Languages Spanish, English, Portuguese and French
Buenos Aires Convention at Wikisource

The Buenos Aires Convention is a copyright treaty signed at Buenos Aires, Argentina, on 11 August 1910, providing mutual recognition of copyrights where the work carries a notice containing a statement of reservation of rights (Art. 3). This was commonly done with the phrase "All rights reserved" (Spanish "Todos los derechos reservados", Portuguese "Todos os direitos reservados") next to the copyright notice. This implementation varied as US law only required the author and year of publishing. Copyright protection under the Convention is granted for the shorter of the terms of the protecting country and the source country of the work ("rule of the shorter term", Arts. 6, 7). The rather vague nature of the requirement for a statement of reservation led to the development of longer and more legalistic wordings, which have persisted despite the developments in international copyright law.

The Convention is specifically retained by the Universal Copyright Convention (UCC) of 6 September 1952 (Art. 18 Geneva Act), with the most recent formulation taking precedence in case of conflict. As the Buenos Aires Convention was not modified, the presence of a simple copyright notice was sufficient to ensure mutual recognition of copyright between countries which became parties to the UCC (which only Honduras never did). As of 23 August 2000, all parties to the Buenos Aires Convention are also parties to the Berne Convention for the Protection of Literary and Artistic Works, which provides for mutual recognition of copyright without any formalities whatsoever (Art. 5.2 Berne).

The Buenos Aires Convention became a "special agreement" in the terms of Article 20 of the Berne Convention. It remains in force, notably for determining the source country of a work and hence the term of protection which is applicable in countries which apply the "rule of the shorter term": when a work is simultaneously published in a Convention State and a non-Convention State, the Convention State will be taken to be the source country regardless of the term of protection in the non-Convention State.

Country Buenos Aires Convention UCC Berne
Argentina 19 April 1950 13 February 1958 10 June 1967
Bolivia 15 May 1914 22 March 1990 4 November 1993
Brazil 31 August 1915 13 January 1960 9 February 1922
Chile 14 June 1955 16 September 1955 5 June 1970
Colombia 23 December 1936 18 June 1976 7 March 1988
Costa Rica 30 November 1916 16 September 1955 10 June 1978
Dominican Republic 31 October 1912 8 May 1983 24 December 1997
Ecuador 27 April 1914 5 June 1957 9 October 1991
Guatemala 28 March 1913 28 October 1964 11 January 1997
Haiti 27 November 1919 16 September 1955 11 January 1996
Honduras 27 April 1914 — 25 January 1990
Mexico 24 April 1964 12 May 1957 11 June 1967
Nicaragua 15 December 1913 16 August 1961 23 August 2000
Panama 25 November 1913 17 October 1962 8 June 1996
Paraguay 20 September 1917 11 March 1962 2 January 1992
Peru 30 April 1920 16 October 1963 20 August 1988
United States 1 August 1911 16 September 1955 1 March 1989
Uruguay 11 May 1919 12 April 1993 10 July 1967

Sources: U.S. Copyright Office, UNESCO, WIPO

References

  1. ^ Geneva Act of the Universal Copyright Convention, done at Geneva, 1952-09-06.
  2. ^ Berne Convention for the Protection of Literary and Artistic Works (Paris Act), as amended on 1979-09-28.
  3. ^ The United States has never applied the rule of the shorter term: all copyright works are protected for the normal U.S. term of copyright.
  4. ^ The United States deposited its Instruments of Ratification with the Government of Argentina on 1911-05-01, and hence the treaty came into force with respect to the other parties three months after that date (Art. 16). The treaty was not proclaimed in the United States until 1914-07-13.
  5. ^ "International Copyright Relations of the United States", U.S. Copyright Office Circular No. 38a, August 2003.
  6. ^ Parties to the Geneva Act of the Universal Copyright Convention as of 2000-01-01: the dates given in the document are dates of ratification, not dates of coming into force. The Geneva Act came into force on 1955-09-16 for the first twelve to have ratified (which included four non-members of the Berne Union as required by Art. 9.1), or three months after ratification for other countries.
  7. ^ Parties to the Berne Convention for the Protection of Literary and Artistic Works as of 2006-05-30.
Wikisource has original text related to this article:
This article is issued from Wikipedia. The text is licensed under Creative Commons - Attribution - Sharealike. Additional terms may apply for the media files.