The performances, phonograms and the broadcasts are the object of related rights as stated in Article 1 of the Law "On copyright and related rights". In contrast to copyright legislation related rights do not enjoy lengthy history, for as far as a century ago there existed no methods of material fixation of musical or other performances. The legal practice was initiated by the Rome Convention of 1961 on the protection of the performers', phonogram producers' and broadcasters' rights. It was the first international record to recognize the rights of the subjects of related rights. But the Convention failed to fully protect the rights of sound-recording studios from unsanctioned copying of their products, for the 1960s saw a rise in audio piracy. To combat the tendency the Convention for the Protection of Performers, Producers of Phonograms and Broadcasting Organizations was adopted in Geneva on October, 29 1971. It is a document of major importance in the sphere of piracy-fighting, for 72 states acceded to it, including most developed countries, the Baltic states, Russia and Ukraine. For the first time in the history, the Geneva Convention exacts from the member-states securing of all the phonograms, including those recorded outside the country. It also binds the states to restrain the imports of the foreign infringing merchandise for distribution. The Rome Convention creates a national protection procedure for:

1. the performers in their home countries with respect to performing, broadcasting and first-time recording;

2. home phonogram producers - juridical persons with respect to the phonograms, recorded or published for the first time in its territory. There is no doubt that the adoption of the Geneva Convention and further accession to it of more states bring about some positive changes to the national markets of sound-recording, granting protection not only to the production of the home subjects, but also to that imported.

The convention came into force on April, 17 2003. Up to that date Belarus, according to the national legislation, protected only those phonograms,

1. whose authors are the citizens of the Republic of Belarus or the juridical persons, permanently residing in the Republic of Belarus;

2. whose authors are neither Belarusian citizens nor the juridical persons, permanently residing in the Republic of Belarus, but their phonograms are published for the first time in the Republic or are published in the territory of the Republic of Belarus within 30 days after its realise in some other state (p. 2 art. 30 of the Law). Belarus, in compliance with the obligations assumed, is to protect the foreign phonogram producers from making phonogram copies without producer's consent and from importing the copies of the phonograms released after April, 17 2003 in order to distribute them. One more significant, if not the most important international act in the realm of related rights is the WIPO Copyright Treaty, adopted by the Diplomatic Conference on copyright of the World Intellectual Property Organisation in Geneva on January, 20 1996. This agreement was the first international document to secure for the performers the non-property rights, which was not defined even in the Rome Convention. Some experts consider it to occupy the pivotal status in the sphere of international related rights, formerly held by the Rome Convention. In the territory of the Republic of Belarus the Treaty came into force on May, 20 2002.

In Belarus the phonogram protection is secured by the Civil Code and the Law "On Copyright and Related rights" in its 1998 version (further in the text – the Law). According to Article 4 of the latter, the producer of the phonogram is the physical or juridical person that takes the initiative and responsibility for the first sound recording of some performance or other sounds; if there are no proofs of the contrary, the performer of the phonogram is the person, whose name is on the phonogram. The phonogram producers are in most cases sound-recording studios, to whom the performers cede the exclusive right to employ the phonogram. The biggest companies, possessing about 90% of world music, are EMI, PolyGram, Sony Music Entertainment, Warner Music, BMG, MCA Music, constituting the International Federation of Phonogram Industry (IFPI). It was founded in 1960s in order to lobby the interests of the world music industry.

Out of "the Great Five’s" reach remain only India, where the national music companies are traditionally strong, and the African countries, where the phonogram manufacturers are devoid of chance to receive profit because of the region's economic instability.

A phonogram is defined in the Law as any purely sound record of performances, other sounds or their illustrations. The record of any sounds in an audiovisual work is not a phonogram (art. 4 of the Law). The concept of sound illustration is, in the sense given, the possibility of generating sounds with the help of digital technologies, while the sounds were fake. This can be made possible with the help of certain musical electronic instruments.

The employment of phonograms is profitable only if they are fabricated and distributed by approbation of the rightholder. In other cases such phonograms are considered to be infringing and bring profit only to the law-breaker. According to p. 2 art. 39 of the Law, the units of goods, recordings, phonograms, on-air and cable television programs, whose manufacturing, proliferation or other deployment entails the breaking of copyright and the related rights are infringing articles. They are commonly known as pirate copies, and piracy is consequently the unlawful employment of the objects, protected by copyright or related rights, generally the replication (manufacturing) and distribution (selling). Today, according to rough estimate, 80 % of the Belarusian market of audio and video production constitute pirated copies. The situation is promoted by the existence of common border with Russia – the country, which is, according to the International Federation of Gramophone Production Manufacturers, the world leader in pirated cassettes and discs manufacturing. Almost complete lack of governmental interest in working out the effective methods of the national market protection from pirated production, the absence of efficacious mechanisms of fighting the law-breakers exposes the national phonogram producers, performers and authors to pirates. The strife is rendered fruitless by the fact that only the rightholder, his representative or some other person granted exclusive rights of property under contract, is entitled to apply to court (art. 40 of the Law). In the latter case the organisations for the collective management of property rights are meant. In our country the Republican Unitary Enterprise on Intellectual Property (RUEIP) is such kind of organisation.

Let us define what the rights of phonogram producers are. Thus, according to art. 32 of the Law, the exclusive right for a phonogram employment means the right to exercise or to allow to exercise the following actions:

• to reproduce (either directly or indirectly) the phonogram;

• to remake or by any means alter the phonogram;

• to distribute the original version or the copies of the phonogram by selling them or other form of passing the right of property;

• to import the phonogram units to the site of distribution, including the units made under the consent of the author of the phonogram;

• to rent the original version or the phonogram units;

• to make available to the public the phonogram by wire or wireless means in such a way that public has access to them from a place and at a time individually chosen by them.

Only the producer of the phonogram enjoys the right to determine the number of copies to be made and the way it should be employed. However,Though p. 3 art. 32 provides a list of conditions, under which the privilege to distribute the product no more belongs to the rightholder (the exhaustion of rights). Thus, if the units of a lawfully published phonogram are put by approbation of the performer and the distributor into circulation by selling or other means of right cession, further distribution of these phonograms on the territory of the Republic of Belarus is permitted without the performer's and distributor's consent and any payment to them. Still, the performer and distributor retain the right of rental regardless of their having the property right. That is why when the phonogram producer concludes an agreement with a firm, dealing with the realization of audio and video products, such firm has the right to make deals for wholesale and retail selling of the recordings on its own accord. But one should not forget that the issue is the lapse of the property right for the material object, not for the creative work as an object of intellectual property. That's why all the subjects of this potential chain of sellers-buyers are empowered to re-sale rather than reproduce the recordings.

Let us inquire now into the the reproduction right of the phonogram producer. Reproduction is the production of one or more copies of a work or an object of the related rights in any material form, including permanent or temporary conservation in the digital form in an electronic appliance. According to the agreement, adopted at the Diplomatic Conference, the placing of a phonogram in a digital form into an electronic appliance should also be considered as reproduction. That means that if a person possessing a copy of a phonogram places it as a combination of ones and zeros on the Internet, he/she reproduces it. And for the exclusive reproduction right rests with producer of the phonogram, so in order to place the music files on the Internet, one needs to ask for the permission of the producer. In other words, such a person violates copyright and related rights and is to suffer a punishment in accordance with the law. From the other side, one places phonograms on the Internet in order to make them available to the public, which is permissible without the producer's consent, but with a compulsory payment to the rightholder. The term of “making available” is used here (as it is in the Law itself) in the sense of a way of comunication to the public via placing the work in the digital form (on the Internet), the right for doing so is laid down in art. 33 of the Law. Besides, the above mentioned agreement does not have the power of a Convention, that's why in such cases one should abide by art. 33 and place the phonograms on the Internet only after paying a remuneration to the rightholder. In this relation, one may consider the case of Mr. Fiodar Karalenka, the author and the co-ordinator of the non-official web-site www.pesnuary.com, who placed there a hyperlink to the music files, resting on other servers. The defendant was called to administrative responsibility and had to pay a fine of 3 basic values. Thus, Belarus became the first country where a person was trialled for placing on the Internet not even the music files, but the links to the sites they were placed in. The respondent did not seem to commit any action that would come under the list of the exclusive property rights of the plaintiff. Thus, he did not breach anyone's rights, but the court's decision was different.

The case of the Napster company, an engine for mp-3 music files search and exchange, was among the cases renowned abroad. Napster-like networks are designated for on-line exchange of music files. A great many suits were brought by phonogram producers and performers all over the world against such kind of sites, with a lately growing tendency to sue the immediate users of such resource, who are easily detected by IP-addresses, especially if court is engaged in the case. The companies under trial contended that what they did was not the distribution of musical files, but only the provision of mediatory facility. This argument failed to save Napster from closure.

Thus, it should be mentioned that the legal basis in copyright sphere is not sufficiently elaborated. Even the lawyers themselves do not at times realize the evident peculiarities of the World Wide Web, along with it being different from other copyright and related rights’ objects. The application of copyright law to the objects in digital form, not realizing their peculiar essence, without the required knowledge in IT-sphere, makes the trial on the authors' and subjects' related rights protection absurd.

It seems relevant now to touch upon the confines of the phonogram usage by the consumers. It is stated in p. 2 art. 36 of the Law that any physical person is entitled to reproduce a phonogram privately without the performer's and producer's consent. The consumer has a right to listen to/watch the copyright or the related rights’ object in the company of his/her family or close relations. This is normally inscribed on the very material object or stated in some other form (for instance, in order to install a computer game the user is to accept a license agreement).

Such reproduction must not bring any profit, that's why listening to or screening of licensed production in public places, such as shops or restaurants aimed at attracting clients is considered to be an indirect way of profit earning; this activity is to be accompanied by paying remuneration to the rightholder. In Belarus the collection and payment of remuneration for public performance of the phonograms and for making them publicly known to procure commercial advantage is exercised by RUEIP.

Naturally, one is amenable for breaking one of the enlisted rightholder's rights. A juridical or a physical person not to comply with the provisions of the Law is considered to be copyright and related rights’ law breaker (p. 1 art. 39). An offence is any action of a person accomplished without the rightholder's permit; just like any intellectual property object is accepted as infringing if it is manufactured without the author's or the related rights holder's permit.

The offender is called to account under the Criminal Code, the Code of Administrative Offence, the actions provided by the Law are also taken to him. According to art. 9.21 of the Code of Administrative Offence, a fine is levied for the unlawful distribution or any other illegal employment of copyright and related rights' objects. For the same offence enacted within a year after the fine imposition, a person is liable to p. 2 art. 201 of the Criminal Code. The criminal proceedings against an official, as well as for the one committed by a group of people or at the rate of 500 or more basic values, are instituted according to p. 3 of art. 201 without any administrative preclusion. The measures, provided by the Criminal Code and the Code of Administrative Offence are implemented as a penalty for the offenders. Along with it, the Law on copyright and related rights involves a substantial list of measures, aimed at copyright protection. According to p. 2 art. 40 the rightholder can demand the execution of the following acts: