Electronic books should be treated just like physical books for the purposes of lending, an advisor to Europe’s top court has said.

Maciej Szpunar, advocate general to the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU), said that public libraries should be allowed to lend e-books so long as the author is fairly compensated.

A 2006 EU directive says that the exclusive right to authorise or prohibit rentals and loans belongs to the author of the work, however countries may opt out of this rule for the purposes of “public lending,” provided that authors obtain fair remuneration.