The SAA works on a wide variety of policy issues affecting the rights of audiovisual authors. These range from copyright and culture to media and digital policies. You can view our key areas of work here.
Being granted authorship on their works is the first step screenwriters and directors need. Authors’ rights are about recognising their role and talent in the creative process, as well as their moral and economic rights.
To create, authors must have the right to control how their work is used and be remunerated for it. AI systems that use their works must be transparent and comply with existing copyright rules. However, the implementation measures enabling authors to enforce their rights do not fulfil the promises of the 2024 AI Act.
The AVMS Directive obliges on-demand media service providers in the EU to include at least 30% European content in their catalogues and ensure its prominence. EU countries may also require media service providers to contribute financially to the production of European works.
Authors become members of a collective management organisation (CMO) to ensure that they are paid for uses that they would not be in a position to enforce against users themselves. CMOs facilitate the dissemination of audiovisual works and the distribution of royalties to authors.
Gender equality, non-discrimination and cultural diversity are fundamental EU values and drivers of economic growth. They need to be promoted in political leadership, in decision-making, on the labour market and in society at large. The audiovisual sector is no exception.