A civil suit filed by conductor Liu Yu-yun (劉昱昀) demanding reparations from the Taipei City Orchestra for using one of his compositions without consent was dismissed by the Taipei District Court for exceeding the statute of limitations, the court said yesterday.
The ruling may be appealed, it added.
Liu initially filed a criminal complaint in June 2012, claiming that the orchestra violated the Copyright Act (著作權法), the court said.
The orchestra was not prosecuted, as the incident was ruled an administrative lapse and considered unintentional, the court added.
Earlier this year, Liu filed the civil lawsuit demanding NT$200,000 in compensation, reportedly after learning of a lawsuit by former conductor Wen Yi-ren (溫以仁) against the National Center for Traditional Arts in Yilan County.
Wen in 2009 sued the center for defamation after a judge on a panel reviewing his application for conductor allegedly told the Chinese-language Apple Daily that Wen had falsified his degree.
In 2013, the court ruled in favor of Wen, ordering the center to pay NT$500,000 in compensation.
In December 2013, the court ruled in Wen’s favor in a separate case against Apple Daily, ordering the newspaper to run a public apology and pay Wen NT$300,000 in compensation.
After a review, the court dismissed Liu’s case and sided with the orchestra, which argued that the statute of limitations had passed.
The orchestra agreed to pay compensation of NT$3,500 — the price Liu had posted online for a single performance.
A lawyer representing the Taipei City Orchestra said that it was unable to contact composers of individual pieces, as the group performs more than 60 international events each year.
The orchestra’s practice over the past decade has been to sign standardized authorization contracts with composers, the lawyer said.
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