383

Title

Mercis c.s. v. Punt.nl

Date

13/09/2011

Country

NETHERLANDS (Europe)

Judicial Body

Court of Appeal

Case number

200.054.943/01

Main themes

Apology of terrorism
Copyright
Image Rights
Right to Reputation
Trade Mark

Type of expression

Dark humor
Website

Decision direction

Expands expression

Outcome

Appeal dismissed.

Link to case

Link to analysis

Summary

This case stems from the use of images of the children’s book and toy character “Miffy the rabbit” or “Nijntje” in Dutch, created by Dick Bruna. “Nijntje” is a registered trademark. Mercis owns the Trademark and some distinctive figurative marks of the character.
Seven unauthorised images of Miffy were posted on three websites hosted by the platform punt.nl, one of the largest website hosting companies in the Netherlands. These images depicted Miffy as a criminal, drug user and terrorist. Mercis and Miffy creator Dick Bruna brought legal action against Punt.nl, claiming copyright and trademark rights infringement and Dick Bruna’s personal rights. They requested the removal of these images and that the platform desist from publishing future images.
Punt.nl argued that the copyright exception of parody, as per article 18b of the Dutch Copyright Act covered these uses. In 2009, the District Court of Amsterdam awarded an injunction to two out of the seven drawings accepting the parody defence in part. However the parody exception was rejected for two of the cartoons on the grounds that they affected the reputation of the trademarks by associating Miffy with drug use and terrorism. On appeal the decision was reversed, stating that all the cartoons could be considered parodies and therefore did not infringe any rights.
Appeal dismissed.