Following a prolonged court battle, on 23 July 2013 Sofia City Court sitting as a court of first instance announced its decision rejecting the BGN 100 000 copyright infringement claim filed by the producer of the notorious TV talk show “Slavi Trifonov’s show” against the producer of the famous comic show “Gospodari na efira”.
The court sustained the defence arguments of producer Global Vision, represented by Kambourov & Partners, and broadcaster Nova TV, and established that the use of the parodied excerpts, subject to the dispute, qualifies as fair use of quotes for the purposes of criticism and review allowed under both Bulgarian copyright law and the Copyright directive 2001/29/EC.
The case in question is one of three separate, yet conceptually related copyright infringement cases between the same parties, pending at different levels of the judicial system. All cases concern the free use of parodied excerpts of “Slavi Trifonov’s show” in the comic TV show “Gospodari na efira”.