Constitutional justices entering the courtroom for the judicial review hearing of the Copyright Law to hear the Petitioners’ witnesses, Monday (10/30/2023). Photo by MKRI/Ilham W.M.

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JAKARTA (MKRI) — The Constitutional Court (MK) held another judicial review hearing of Law No. 28 of 2014 on Copyright on Monday, October 30, 2023 in the plenary courtroom. The Case No. 84/PUU-XXI/2023 was filed by PT Aquarius Pustaka Musik, PT Aquarius Musikindo, and singer Melly Goeslaw.

The agenda of today’s hearing was to hear the testimony of the Petitioners’ witnesses. However, the constitutional justices stated that the hearing was postponed because a list of new witnesses had just been received by the Registrar’s Office on Friday October 27.

“The witness list was just received on Friday, October 27, 2023 at 17:27 WIB. Therefore, this hearing cannot be continued and will be adjourned until Monday, November 16, 2023 at 10:00 WIB with the same agenda, to hear the testimony of three witnesses for the Petitioner,” Chief Justice Anwar Usman said.

In response, the Petitioners’ legal counsel conveyed that more than three witnesses would be present. “Is it allowed to add more witnesses in the next hearing, Your Honor?” Ignatius Supriayadi asked.

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PT Aquarius Pustaka Musik, PT Aquarius Musikindo, and singer Melly Goeslaw challenge provisions on the prohibition imposed on managers of places of commerce against allowing the sale and/or duplication of goods resulting from infringement of copyright and/or relevant rights at the places they manage in Articles 10 and 114 of Law No. 28 of 2014 on Copyright. The Petition was registered with Case No. 84/PUU-XXI/2023

The Petitioners revealed a concrete case in which social media platforms broadcast songs or master recordings belonging to the Petitioners without their permission. However, the Copyright Law has not regulated the accountability of digital service providers, especially ones that have user-generated content (UGC).

The Petitioners sued one of platform providers over the prevalence of contents that violated the Petitioners’ copyright of their songs or masters, but it claimed that based on statutory regulations, platform providers are not liable for contents uploaded by users nor for taking down those contents upon objections by the copyright holders.

The Petitioner believes the Copyright Law has not regulated such things so Articles 10 and 114 of the Copyright Law are the chief harbor of prohibition against any place of commerce allowing services or duplication of contents that infringe on copyrights. However, those articles have not accommodated current phenomena such as UCG-based social media.

As such, in the petitum, the Petitioners request that the Court declare Articles 10 and 114 of the Copyright Law conditionally unconstitutional and not legally binding.

Author       : Utami Argawati
Editor        : Lulu Anjarsari P.
PR            : Tiara Agustina
Translator  : Tahlitha Laela/Yuniar Widiastuti (NL)

Disclaimer: The original version of the news is in Indonesian. In case of any differences between the English and the Indonesian versions, the Indonesian version will prevail.

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