Copyright Act 1968

Subject to this section, a reference in this Act to performance shall:

be read as including a reference to any mode of visual or aural presentation, whether the presentation is by the use of reception equipment, by the exhibition of a cinematograph film, by the use of a record or by any other means; and

in relation to a lecture, address, speech or sermon—be read as including a reference to delivery;

For the purposes of this Act, the communication of a work or other subject‑matter to the public does not constitute:

performance; or

causing visual images to be seen or sounds to be heard.

Where visual images or sounds are displayed or emitted by any reception equipment to which they are communicated, the operation of any equipment by which the images or sounds are communicated, directly or indirectly, to the reception equipment shall be deemed not to constitute performance or to constitute causing visual images to be seen or sounds to be heard but, in so far as the display or emission of the images or sounds constitutes a performance, or causes the images to be seen or the sounds to be heard, the performance, or the causing of the images to be seen or sounds to be heard, as the case may be, shall be deemed to be effected by the operation of the reception equipment.

Without prejudice to the last two preceding subsections, where a work or an adaptation of a work is performed or visual images are caused to be seen or sounds to be heard by the operation of any equipment referred to in the last preceding subsection or of any equipment for reproducing sounds by the use of a record, being equipment provided by or with the consent of the occupier of the premises where the equipment is situated, the occupier of those premises shall, for the purposes of this Act, be deemed to be the person giving the performance or causing the images to be seen or the sounds to be heard, whether he or she is the person operating the equipment or not.

This section does not apply to a performance within the meaning of Part XIA.