This thesis discusses the subject of protection for works of applied art and industrial design. These works combine elements of aesthetics and functionality and thus can be the subject of copyright and design protection, but in practice there is often an overlap depending on the type of protection acquired. In general, simultaneous and sequential protection leads to excessive protection, as there is an extension of protection for the copyright rightholder of one such work. This is why intellectual property law plays an important role in regulating creation of works and their use.
The decisions made by national courts and the Court of Justice of the European Union play important roles in understanding the legal protection for works of applied art. The doctrine of physical and conceptual separation was established in the United States, where the aesthetic element of the subject is of particular importance in assessing whether works can be protected by copyright as a work of applied art, as opposed to recent EU case law which rejects aesthetic judgment when assessing those same types of works.
The aim of this thesis is to demonstrate the differences between copyright protection and design rights and their role in the protection of works of applied art and industrial design, and the effects of when such protections overlap. International and European laws, as well as the national regulations of Slovenia, Germany, Portugal and the United States for works of applied art are also presented.
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