Profit from Violation of Privacy through the European Tabloid Press
| Published date | 01 March 1999 |
| Date | 01 March 1999 |
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1177/1023263X9900600105 |
| Subject Matter | Article |
Ti lm an H op pe
Pr ofit from Vio lat ion o f Pri vacy thr ough th e European
Tab loid P ress
§ 1. I ntro duc tion
‘[0] ne ma n s hou ld no t b e
all ow ed to se ll ano ther
m an’s rep uta tion f o r p ro fi t’1
Many of the landmark decisions concerning protection of privacy stem from actions of
prominent people fighting the commercial exploitation of thei r privacy by the tabloid
press. Examples include the Soraya cases before the Bun desverfassungsger icht2 in 1973
and before the Cor te d i Ca ssa zion e3 in 1975, as well as the cases concerning Caroline
of M onaco before the Tr ibun al de G rande I nsta nce P ar is4 in 1977, and the B undes
ge rich tsho f 5 in 1994 and 1995. The reports in question mostly consist o f papa raz zi6
* Academic Assistant, Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin. The author wishes to express his sincere gratitude
to P rof. Peter Birks and the network ‘Common Principles of Euro pean Private Law (Training and
Mobility of Researchers) ’ sponsored by the Commission of the European Communities and coordinated
by Prof. Reiner Schulze, for making it possible for him to spend time at All Souls, Oxford. The
following universities participate in the network: Barcelona, Berlin (Humboldt), Lyon III, Münster,
Nijmegen, Oxford and Turin. The author also expresses thanks to Prof. Axel Flessner and to Dr.
Thomas Kadner, who inspired this project, to Prof. Mads Andenas and also to the graduates o f St.
Anne’s College, Oxford. The article is published in German in Ze its chr ift fi ir Eu rop äis che s P riv atr ech t
(1999), No. 4.
2. BVe rfG, Februar y 14, 1973, 26 Neu e Jur ist isc he Woc hen sch rift (1973), 1221 - Soraya.
3. C ass., Ma y 27, 1975, n. 2129, Giustizia civile (1975), I, 1686, 1696.
4. Tr ib. gr. inst. Paris, June 2, May 26, 1976, Rec ue il Da llo z (1977), jur isp ru de nce, 364, noted by
Raymond Lindon.
5. BGH, 48 N eu e J ur isti sc he W oc hen sch rift (1995), 861 - Mo nac o I ; BGH, 49 N eu e J ur isti sch e
Wo che ns chr ift 1 99 6 ,985-M o na co IP, BGH, 49 Ne ue Ju ri stis ch e W oc hen sch rift (1996), 1228 -Mo na co
IV.
6 MJ 1 (1999) 75
Profit from Violation of Privacy through the European Tabloid Press
pictures or fabricated ‘exclusive’ interviews. The press may make pr ofits in the
hundreds of thousands of pounds throug h commercializing such ‘sensations’. If the
rights of the person affected are violated, the press gains pr ofits at his expense. It can
be observed tha t European courts consider the profits of the press in their decisions and
give th ese profits to the plaintiffs in one way o r other.
§ 2 . T he Pr obl em o f P rof it-m ak ing
Since the first gossip magazines came out at the end of the 19th century, this ki nd o f
media has become a multi-million-dollar industry. Th e yellow press, which includes fo r
example the Sun and the Dail y Mir ror (England), Bunte and G ala (Germany), P aris
Match and I d Par is (France ), Chi (Italy) and H o lal (Spain), presents the sensations o f
celebrities’ private lives to a readership of millions. Th e wish of the readers to identify
with th e fate o f these more o r less mythical stars creates the demand for suc h stories.
From the time o f their reading they borrow experiences from a fictitious world 7 to
satisfy a des ire to live vicariously through the icon: ‘Princess Soraya: th e Emperor did
not w rite to me any more’. 8
A. The Market of Celebrities
‘Gossip [...] has b ecom e a tra de ’9
The cult of celebrit y in the media may be as old as the industrial re volutio n.10 When
people left th eir small towns and moved to anonymous cities to work, perhaps they
retained t heir yearning for personal identification that comes through gossiping about
other peop le’s private lives. It could be in response to this that newspapers created the
‘professional beauties’: society members who were famous for being famous and
photographing w ell.11 At the same time, the adoration of celebrities also helped to
6.- »
6. ‘A free-lance photo grapher who pursues celebrities to take their pictures’, The O xf ord En gli sh
Di ctionary , (Oxford University Press, 2nd edition, 1989). The word is deriv ed from a figu re in
Federico Fellini’s film ‘La D o lce Vita ' o f 1960.
7. See H. Wagner ‘Von d er Lust, in andere Welten zu wandern. Unterhaltung - sozialer Unterhalt’, in
L. Bosshart & W. Hoffmann-Riem (ed.), Med ien lu st a nd M ed ien nut z - Un terh altu ng a ls ö ffe ntl ich e
Ko mu nik ati on, (Ölschläger, 1994), 126; H. Tannenbaum , ‘Entertainment as vicarious emotional
experience ’, in Tannen baum (ed.), Th e en tert ain me nt fu nc tio ns o f tel ev isio n, (Hillsdale 1980), 107.
Kepplinger/Weiflbecker call it ‘borrowed ex periences’, 9 M edienps ych olo gie (1997), 57.
8. See BGH, Dec ember 8, 1964, 18 N eu e J ur isti sch e W oc hen sch rift (1965), 685 - Soraya.
9. Warr en / Brandeis, ‘The Right of Pri vacy’, 4 H ar var d L aw R evi ew (1890), 193, at 196: ‘The press
is overstepping in every direction the obvious bounds o f propriety and of decency. Gossip is no longer
the resourc e of the idle and of the vici ous, but has become a trade which is persued with industry as
well as affrontery.’
10. B. Seem ann, Pr om ine nz al s E ig ent um , (Nomos, 1996), 33
11. Int ern at ion al H era ld T ribu ne of Sept. 5, 1997, 8 (‘New York Times S ervice’).
76 6 MJ 1 (1999)
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