Chapter 12: License Contracts, Free Software and Creative Commons in the Hungarian Law

Abstract

The Hungarian Copyright Act (HCA) includes a separate chapter on the terms of license (“use”) contracts. The provisions of the HCA serve as lex specialis against the background of general and special rules of contract law codified by the Hungarian Civil Code (HCC). From a historical point of view, the birth of software as a new type of protected work encouraged the reform of copyright contract rules. Nevertheless, the HCA does not contain specific rules on FOSS and CC licenses. It has certain rules on non-written (oral) contracts, introduced especially for these types of licenses entering into Hungarian legal practice. Both pieces of legislation mentioned above apply in relation to FOSS and CC licenses.