The law around ownership of the copyright subsisting in
databases where two independent parties contributed to the final
work.
In the recent case of Philanthropic Collection (Pty) Ltd v
Girls & Boys South Africa the Johannesburg High Court
("the Court") had to decide, among other
things, whether the transacting parties shared joint ownership in
the copyright subsisting in the database of donors for
Philanthropic Collection's 2015 SleepOut charity event.
A summary of the facts of the case are as follows: Philanthropic
Collection (Pty) Ltd ("Philanthropic")
learned that Girls & Boys SA ("G &
B"), which was the sole beneficiary of the 2015
SleepOut charity event (an event owned, organized and promoted by
Philanthropic), was using the database of donors of the SleepOut
event to solicit donations for an unrelated fund raising campaign
of its own, as it was not a beneficiary for the years of 2016 and
2017.
