The European Parliament has voted against a controversial proposed new copyright law that critics warned could imperil a free and open internet. The Copyright Directive, which contained the particularly concerning Article 13, was rejected by 318 votes to 278, with 31 abstentions. The EU's proposed copyright reforms will now be debated again in September, giving policymakers more time to discuss and refine the crucial dossier.
Wikipedia co-founder Jimmy Wales told the BBC he hoped that the music industry could find a way to compromise before the September debate.
Don't think about filtering everything everyone uploads to the internet. Instead, he added, they should look to renegotiating deals with platforms such as YouTube to get "fairer remuneration".
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Andres Guadamuz has written a blog post analyzing why last Thursday's vote by the JURI Committee to reject fast-tracking the proposal concerning "harmonization" of copyright in the EU went as it did. The rejection of fast-tracking means that the issue will still come up for a general vote in parliament in September but the interesting part is that for the first time in Europe a wide coalition has managed to defeat powerful media lobbies, at least for now. He goes into how this was possible and what needs to happen in September.
The main result of this change from a political standpoint is that now we have two lobbying sides in the debate, which makes all the difference when it comes to this type of legislation. In the past, policymakers could ignore experts and digital rights advocates because they never had the potential to reach them, letters and articles by academics were not taken into account, or given lip service during some obscure committee discussion just to be hidden away. Tech giants such as Google have provided lobbying access in Brussels, which has at least levelled the playing field when it comes to presenting evidence to legislators.
Earlier on SN:
The EU's Dodgy Article 13 Copyright Directive has Been Rejected (2018)
EU Committee Approves Controversial Copyright Directive (2018)
Censorship Machines Are Coming: It’s Time for the Free Software Community to Use its Political Clout (2018)
Mulled EU Copyright Shakeup Will Turn Us Into Robo-Censors (2018)
EU Study Finds Even Publishers Oppose the "Link Tax" (2017)
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Runaway1956 on Friday July 06 2018, @07:57AM (10 children)
It seems the EU makes a good decision, then counters it soon with a bad decision. In this case, I say "good". The world needs for the internet to be made simpler, easier, and more secure. It DOES NOT NEED complicated bullshit to confuse users, administrators, and anyone and everyone who passes by. Article 13 was a real suckass bit of nonesense.
Given a choice between a better internet, and the music industry just drying up and blowing away, I say "Hasta la vista, BABEEEE!"
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 06 2018, @08:33AM (2 children)
By music industry, do you mean music labels? Because music industry seems to be just fine.
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 06 2018, @08:57AM
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-streaming-labels/independent-record-labels-get-boost-from-streaming-music-services-idUSKBN1JO0DH [reuters.com]
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Friday July 06 2018, @12:29PM
By "industry" I mean every entity that contributes to unjust copyright laws, and those that prosecute over meaningless bullshit such as fair use.
Individuals and groups who make a living by ENTERTAINING other people aren't necessarily part of the "industry".
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Friday July 06 2018, @09:04AM (3 children)
Better still, they blew up the entire law proposal, not only the Art 13.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 5, Interesting) by zocalo on Friday July 06 2018, @10:01AM (2 children)
UNIX? They're not even circumcised! Savages!
(Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 06 2018, @10:37AM
Article 11
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Article 13
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(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 06 2018, @06:00PM
that's exactly what these vermin will do. slink back into their rat holes, weasel up the wording and try to wait until no one is looking to try to sneak their abominable shit through again. they need to be live streamed while they burn alive.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 06 2018, @12:37PM (2 children)
Wouldn't that make it two good ones in a row?
First we got the "keep your grubby palms out of our personal lives" GDPR, and now they reject the "everyone who runs a server must throw a Googol Euros at building a content recognition AI" law.
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Friday July 06 2018, @01:00PM (1 child)
The year isn't over, though.
If you flip a quarter several times a day, for a year, you'll have runs of heads, and runs of tails. I suppose we could do the math, but you might get twenty heads in a row. But, over time it averages out to 50% unless you have a cheat.
(Score: 4, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 06 2018, @02:28PM
The problem is, as always, bad laws like this only need to pass once. It can be rejected hundreds of thousands of times. This is why a LOT of shitty laws in the US (especially) get passed. It'll get introduced, it gets leaked, there's a wide publicity made about it on the internet (while official news sources completely ignore it) and it (possibly) gets struck down - to be reviewed again at a later date. That gets repeated again. Then again. Then again. Each time the opposition to it becomes more and more exhausted at having to be enraged over the bad law to be. And finally it gets snuck under the radar and passed into law. Normally even worse, somehow, than the original law proposial.
Note that this law is not struck down. It's on hold until SEPTEMBER when it will be reviewed again. You know, while everyone is busy with the start of school, or perhaps over the long labour day weekend.