Abstract: The anti-unfair competition law can't fully regulate the network piracy of sports event programs due to its inherent limitations, so it is still necessary to protect them through copyright law. However, the nature of protecting sports events programs through copyright law is yet to be made clear. Comparing the programs with documentaries, we can find that the artistic creativity of sports events programs is not sufficient, therefore, they can not be classified as art works like films. The expression of sports events programs has to follow a fixed pattern, thus lacking novelty, therefore, they don't have the originality necessary for art works. They don't belong to the art works as stipulated by the copyright law, but only recordings.

Key words: sports events program, legal nature, art works, recordings, copyright low, anti-wrfair competition law