In recent years, case law has ruled on numerous occasions on the protectability, through copyright, of television program formats (not expressly covered by copyright law among the categories of protected intellectual works) and has clarified that, in order to be eligible for protection, the format must possess a sufficient degree of expressive completeness and not consist of a mere abstract idea.
In particular, it must be distinguished by a title, a basic narrative structure, a set design, and fixed characters, so as to present a repeatable explanatory structure of the program. As for the requirement of creativity, its existence has been recognized when the format presents some completely original elements that significantly characterize its entire structure, or when the combination of elements, even if known, is nevertheless new and unique.
In its ruling of November 10, 2025, the Court of Appeal of Turin ruled on the copyright protection and possible plagiarism of the format of a smartphone application designed to promote greater interaction between sports clubs and fans through an online quiz contest based on player performance, interesting facts, and soccer predictions.
After registering the project with the SIAE (Italian Society of Authors and Publishers), the app's creator contacted the sports club that was the potential recipient of the format, which initially showed interest but then stopped communicating after the project presentation was sent. Subsequently, the app's author discovered that an online quiz contest had been made available on the team's official website, containing features that seemed to largely coincide with those of his project. He therefore took legal action to ascertain the nature of his format's intellectual property and the resulting plagiarism by the sports club.
The Court of Appeal of Turin ruled that, in light of developments in the media, the protection afforded to television formats could also be extended to those broadcast online and, consequently, applied the criteria developed for television. However, it excluded copyright protection for the format in question due to a lack of creativity, since almost all of the distinctive elements indicated by the author were limited to referring, in general terms, to the theme of soccer predictions, which is a widespread practice in the relevant market and is applied in a number of well-known, established formats that are freely accessible to the public.
(Fabrizia Serpieri)
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