Legal protection for digital property: copyright aspects

Abstract

The author examines legal attempts to regulate digital property. By 'digital property' any valuable that is usable or available in electronic form is understood, including computer programs, databases, digital audio and video, etc. Due to authors' own expertise, legal protection of digital property is represented through issues on legal protection of computer programed First part of the assignment accomplished by this article deals with copyright protection of digital property. The article surveys most important international legislation and caee law, ae well as academic opinions on legal regulation of digital property. The significant transformations and differences from traditional principles of Intellectual property law that took place with the rise of digital property are emphasized, together with the challenges brought by digital technology. It is further argued that for the newly established national legal systems, such as Lithuanian, a simple extension of the existing Intellectual property legislation, or mechanical Implantation of foreign laws is not adequate, while the risks are crucial. Careful national approach may be needed in order to achieve socially desirable results and not to prevent establishment of national information economy. The article is conducted ae a result of the research done by the author during the research visit to Donald berman laboratory for Information Technology and Law with the La Trobe University, Bundoora, VIC, Australia. The author wishes to express his gratitude to Dr. Andrew Stranieri, whose views and thoughts inspired this article, and Dr. John Zeleznikow, whose efforts have made possible this research visit.