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The EU Commission’s wording could land social media users in legal hot water.
The European Commission created a legal minefield for billions of internet users with a well-intentioned but poorly worded proposed law to help struggling publishers guard against digital attrition by Google and other news aggregators.
As people read the fine print in plans released last month to strengthen publishers' rights over their articles, they discovered the Commission may have accidentally exposed tweeters, facebookers and even LinkedIn users to the whims of the world's most powerful media organizations.
Under the Commission's proposal, copyright lawyers could chase down citizens for sharing sentences or snippets of articles on social media.
"Users would be breaking the law if they use snippets of articles whether it is enforced or not," said Julia Reda, a Member of the European Parliament. The law is intended to help traditional publishers survive the digital age but, she said, "it applies to everyone, and if we pass this legislation, it will be in the hands of the publishers to decide whether they want to enforce it."
The check's in the mail...
Source: http://www.politico.eu/article/copyright-conundrum-tweeting-this-may-cost-you/
(Score: 4, Insightful) by Bot on Monday October 31 2016, @12:12AM
Title: Fuck the EU Commission.
Text: Unless I am mistaken, this law is not constitutional because it is not humanly possible to know what speech is not infringing, so all speech is banned.
I hereby put the article above in the Public Domain, to be on the safe side I suggest you to cite the source when you cite the title.
Account abandoned.
(Score: 4, Interesting) by Scruffy Beard 2 on Monday October 31 2016, @02:04AM
That is why copyright law traditionally has exemptions like "fair use" or "fair dealing".
Copyright is literally censorship (ostensibly for a limited time). The only thing preventing copyright law from being unconstitutional are those exemptions.
The copyright maximallists may have made an error here: unconstitutional laws get struck down by courts.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by AnonymousCowardNoMore on Monday October 31 2016, @05:08PM
The copyright maximallists may have made an error here: unconstitutional laws get struck down by courts.
Unconstitutional laws are sometimes struck down, sometimes not. Your masters lose nothing by throwing new laws at the wall until one sticks.
(Score: 3, Informative) by KiloByte on Monday October 31 2016, @04:31AM
We have two bodies: the European Commission and European Parliament. Only the latter is elected, and while like any such legislative body, corrupt and so on, it is surprisingly often a force for good. The Commission, though, is predominantly evil.
Ceterum censeo systemd esse delendam.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday October 31 2016, @07:20PM
As a fellow EU citizen this is very much my experience as well. Actually there are plenty of major EU bodies (7 according to some count) and it's all highly byzantine to keep us little people persistently in the dark...
(Score: 3, Informative) by maxwell demon on Monday October 31 2016, @06:32AM
The EU does not have a constitution.
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday October 31 2016, @11:33PM
Poland has a constitution.
(Score: 2) by Bot on Tuesday November 01 2016, @11:32PM
It is article n. 21 in Italian constitution.
Account abandoned.
(Score: 2) by Capt. Obvious on Monday October 31 2016, @06:11PM
(1) The US Constitution doesn't apply in the EU
(2) I don't know why the law would be unconstitutionality under your argument. Free speech never allowed you to violate copyright
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday November 01 2016, @10:09AM
(2) I don't know why the law would be unconstitutionality under your argument. Free speech never allowed you to violate copyright
Not according to the courts, but a logical reading of the Constitution and an understanding that constitutional amendments override things that come before them will lead you to the conclusion that copyright censorship is unconstitutional. Sadly, the courts are playing the 'I like copyright and believe that Bad Things would result without it; therefore, it is constitutional.' game like they do with so many things.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday November 01 2016, @10:11AM
Not according to the courts
According to the courts...