Proprietary Aspects of Commercial Remote-Sensing Imagery

This remote-sensing imagery copyright issue will be addressed in two parts: First, the specific aspects of remote-sensing imagery will be assessed in terms of international protection as compared to other space activities having a literary or intellectual content, with a direct and immediate commercial impact. Second, the specific copyright provisions of several bilateral agreements will be scrutinized in a comparative approach and the merits of each of them will be assessed against those of the others. The terms pictures and signals will be used indistinc- tively in order to identify the same physical elements, i.e. the bits or information elements transmitted by the satellite towards relay stations, either in outer space or on the ground in foreign countries