영상저작물에 관한 특례 개정에 대한 제언

This article analyzes the structural problems in the field of audiovisual works that prevent authors and performers from receiving fair remuneration, and proposes amendments to copyright law to address these issues. As illustrated by the cases of “Cloud Bread”, “Black Rubber Shoes”, and “Squid Game”, even when audiovisual works achieve substantial commercial success, their creators often receive only a one-time lump-sum payment and fail to share adequately in the resulting profits. The core causes of this phenomenon lie in the prevailing practice of lump-sum buyout contracts and in the current “special provisions on audiovisual works” under copyright law, which presume that, in the absence of a specific agreement to the contrary, the rights necessary for the exploitation of audiovisual works are comprehensively transferred to the audiovisual producer. From a comparative law perspective, the article reviews German copyright law and the European Union’s 2019 DSM Directive, both of which introduced the fair remuneration right and the additional remuneration right at an early stage in order to protect creators. It then briefly analyzes the copyright law amendment bills that have previously been submitted to the National Assembly in Korea. Notably, German and EU copyright law not only grant creators the right to claim fair remuneration at the time of contract formation, but also allow them, ex post, to claim additional remuneration where a dispro- portion arises between the remuneration received and the revenues generated from the exploitation of the work. By contrast, the copyright law amendment bills proposed in Korea to date have tended to introduce either fair remuneration or additional remuneration alone, and have been criticized for their limited effectiveness. In response, the author proposes revising the special provisions on audiovisual works to explicitly recognize a contractual fair remuner- ation right for authors and performers, and to establish a statutory right enabling them to claim additional remuneration directly from retrans- mission operators, OTT platforms, and online video service providers. The proposal further seeks to prohibit the waiver or transfer of the fair remuneration right, and to introduce mechanisms such as collective rights management through creators’ organizations and information disclosure obligations on the part of users of works, so as to ensure that the fair remuneration right functions effectively in practice. By ensuring that audiovisual creators receive fair compensation, the proposed amendment is significant in that it lays the groundwork for the sustainable development of the domestic audiovisual content industry.