Regarding Norway’s accession to the Bern Convention, Ove Rode writes in Poltiken, among other things:

“We stand before the consummate reality – Norway has joined the Convention, and we are left on the outside – and it is worth considering how this might develop in the future. From this moment on, since Norway has accepted the international copyright principles, books published in Norway will enjoy a legal protection against unlawful exploitation in all countries who are signatories to the convention. This means that Norwegian (and Danish) authors who publish their books through Norwegian publishers will have control over the fate of their books in, among others, the most important countries in Europe: Germany, France, and England. They will be able to prevent the defacement of their work by incompetent translators and share in a fair part of the profits of their intellectual labour.

Writers in Denmark, however, are left to the arbitrary whims of foreign countries. It is evident that the Danish book trade, under these circumstances, will face great hardships. That they themselves are aware of this is evident and transpires from the appeal made to the Parliament in 1894 by all the leading publishers in Copenhagen, in view of Norway’s potential accession to the Convention, requesting that Denmark also join [the Convention]. It would not be difficult to conceive that an entrepreneurial person, who is not particular about his means, might establish a two-part business, one part of which would be based in Kristiania, for the publication of internationally protected Nordic original works, and one in Copenhagen, for stolen translations. The possibility of such a double enterprise shows how utterly meaningless it is for these two countries not to follow each other in this matter. Such companies would probably bring Denmark into international disrepute in a way that is not sustainable in the long run. But nothing guarantees that such an enterprising man will not be created from the situation – unless we try to get out of this situation as soon as possible.