THE TERM OF COPYRIGHT APPLIED TO DURAN DURAN'S CASE. PART III: CONCLUSIONS.

The two previous articles dealt with Duran Duran's recent legal battle for the recovery of their copyright. This article will introduce a few suggestions that, after studying both the case and the resolution, could smooth future procedures.

If you´re going to sign a music publishing agreement, first and foremost make sure you have an agent, or whomever who has access to the legal knowledge needed to protect your interests.

If you have already signed a similar agreement to Duran Duran´s and you´re not pressed by the limits of the temporal window under Section 203 of the US Copyright Act (within five years beginning at the end of thirty-five years from the date of signing the contract), my advice is to wait and see, unless you want to test those troubled and already bloody waters first, and pay for it. You could instead join forces with other artists through collective iniciatives in order to defend your interests in all instances and, again, get the best advice available. It should come from a lawyer with a deep knoweledge of international private law and international jurisdiction in intellectual property disputes. Consider you could even move your residence in order to avoid UK jurisdiction, since Article 2 of the Brussels I Regulation provides for a general jurisdiction rule according to which people domiciled in a Member State shall be sued in the courts of that Member State.

Finally, if my way of living absolutely depended on getting my US copyrights back I´d seriously consider moving my residence to America, where I can get my rights back with no negative consequences, at least within that country.