The UK Copyright Licensing Agency (CLA) has withdrawn its application to the UK Intellectual Property Office (IPO) for a license to operate an Extended Collective Licensing (ECL) scheme that would have included all written works by US writers.
The NWU had opposed this application as likely to interfere with the revenues of US writers from rights to digital copying and distribution of our work, and our ability to control how our work is made avaialable. This application would have enabled the online distribution from the UK of digital versions of the entirety of the Hyman Archive, much of which consists of magazines published in the US and to which rights are held by US writers, graphic artists, and photographers.
The NWU welcomes CLA’s decision to withdraw this application. We continue to regret that foreign writers were not consulted earlier in this process by both CLA and the IPO. We have been in discussions with CLA since the orginal ECL application was submitted, and we look forward to working with CLA and the IPO to make sure that the rights and interests of US and other non-UK writers are taken into consideration in developing and evaluating any new ECL application.
NWU is the sole provider of IFJ Press Passes to freelance journalists in the U.S.