A Study On The Copyright Protection Of "Three - Dimensional Works"

The clause of “Three-dimensional Work” was introduced in the protocol of Chinese new Copyright law during the period of the third amendment of Chinese Copyright Law, in order to replace “Model Work” clause in Paragraph 7, Article 3 of current Chinese Copyright Law. According to the protocol, “Three-dimensional Work” is defined as three-dimensional creation in order to produce products, display the knowledge of geography, or demonstrate the principle or the structure of the things.Chinese copyright law started to protect the two-dimensional and model works, created in order to display the knowledge of geography, or demonstrate the principle or the structure of the things since 1991. However, the drafter misunderstood the definition and the sauce of the word “model” in the first amendment of Chinese copyright law. Thus, the definition of “model work” in the current copyright law is irregular. This definition violates the basic principle of copyright law, and leads to more misunderstanding about this type of work.For the reasons above, during the period of the third amendment of Chinese Copyright Law, the drafter tried to introduce the new clause of “Three-dimensional Work” to replace the irregular “Model Work” clause in the current copyright law. However, there is not any research on this new “Three-dimensional Work” clause. The sauce and the definition of the clause are still not clear. It is still in question if this new clause is irregular or not. Therefore, this article will try to reflect the definition and the structure of the “Three-dimensional work”, through the analysis of the history of Chinese copyright law and relative international treaties, the cases in China and foreign countries.In the first part of this Article, the writer will demonstrate the history of Chinese “Three-dimensional Work” copyright protection, analysis the reason of the introduction of the new “Three-dimensional Work” clause. The conclusion of this analysis is that the new clause is introduced to replace “Model Work” clause in current Chinese Copyright Law and continue the relative clause in the old version of Regulations the Implementation of the Copyright Law of the People’s Republic of China in 1991.In the second part of this Article, the writer will demonstrate the irregularity of the current “model work” clause, in order to prove the necessity of the introduction of the new “Three-dimensional Work” clause, through the analysis of basic principle of copyright law and legal practice. At the same time, the writer will point out that the current clause is irregular, due to the misunderstanding of the Paragraph 7, Article 2 in the Berne Convention.In the third part of this Article, the writer will prove that the new “Three-dimensional Work” is introduced to complete obligation in the Berne Convention. In this part, the writer will demonstrate the history, definition and virtue of the “Three-dimensional Work” clause in the Berne convention. At the same time, the writer will analyze the relationship between the “Three-dimensional Work” and other types of works, in order to demonstrate the nature of “Three-dimensional Work” and the structure of the clause in the Berne Convention, as an important reference for the amendment of Chinese copyright lawIn the fourth part of this article, the writer will analyze the different types of “Three-dimensional Work” regulated in the protocol or Berne Convention, to prove that “Three-dimensional Work” created to produce products should not be protected by copyright law. At the same time, the writer suggests that it is better to formulate two new clauses, which are “scientific work” and “technical drawing” to protect all the works in the the “Three-dimensional Work” and “graphic work” clause of the protocol.