Authorship of a copyright work and (first or initial) ownership of the copyright in such a work have long been considered straightforward issues. The rules concerning these issues were hardly ever discussed in great detail. This hides complex issues, even at a national level. These issues can no longer be ignored, especially at an international or transnational level, and a reference to the concept of territoriality will not be sufficient to solve all the problems involved. In order to deal effectively with complex cases such as cross-border infringement of copyright or cases in which rights need to be cleared for more than one country, as well as in order to answer the (apparently) simple question whether one is the owner of the copyright in a work in a number of jurisdictions, vital issues arise in terms of applicable law. Which law will determine who is the author and who is the owner of the copyright in a work? Copyright law may not have straight answers to these questions, but this article will attempt to set out the alternatives.
Paul Torremans (Sat,) studied this question.