Earlier this summer the Internet breathed a sigh of relief: the European Parliament voted down a new Copyright Directive that would have required Internet sites to proactively filter uploaded content for copyright violations (the so-called “meme ban”), as well as obtain a license to include any text from linked sites (the “link tax”).
Alas, the victory was short-lived. From EUbusiness:
This exception, along with the removal of an explicit call for filtering (that will still be necessary in practice), was enough to get the Copyright Directive passed. This doesn’t mean it is law: the final form of the Directive needs to be negotiated by the EU Parliament, European Commission, and the Council of the Europe Union (which represents national governments), and then implemented via national laws in each EU country (that’s why it is a Directive).
Still, this is hardly the only piece of evidence that EU policy makers have yet to come to grips with the nature of the Internet: there is also the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), which came into effect early this year. Much like the Copyright Directive, the GDPR is targeted at Google and Facebook, but as is always the case when you fundamentally misunderstand what you are fighting, the net effect is to in fact strengthen their moats. After all, who is better equipped to navigate complex regulation than the biggest companies of all, and who needs less outside data than those that collect the most?
In fact, examining where it is that the EU’s new Copyright Directive goes wrong — not just in terms of policy, but also for the industries it seeks to protect — hints at a new way to regulate, one that works with the fundamental forces unleashed by the Internet, instead of against them.
Alas, the victory was short-lived. From EUbusiness:
Internet tech giants including Google and Facebook could be made to monitor, filter and block internet uploads under amendments to the draft Copyright Directive approved by the EU Parliament Wednesday. At their plenary session, MEPs adopted amendments to the Commission’s draft EU Copyright Directive following from their previous rejection, adding safeguards to protect small firms and freedom of expression…
Parliament’s position toughens the Commission’s proposed plans to make online platforms and aggregators liable for copyright infringements. This would also apply to snippets, where only a small part of a news publisher’s text is displayed. In practice, this liability requires these parties to pay right holders for copyrighted material that they make available.
At the same time, in an attempt to encourage start-ups and innovation, the text now exempts small and micro platforms from the directive.I chose this rather obscure source to quote from for a reason: should Stratechery ever have more than either 50 employees or €10 million in revenue, under this legislation I would likely need to compensate EUbusiness for that excerpt. Fortunately (well, unfortunately!), this won’t be the case anytime soon; I appreciate the European Parliament giving me a chance to start-up and innovate.
This exception, along with the removal of an explicit call for filtering (that will still be necessary in practice), was enough to get the Copyright Directive passed. This doesn’t mean it is law: the final form of the Directive needs to be negotiated by the EU Parliament, European Commission, and the Council of the Europe Union (which represents national governments), and then implemented via national laws in each EU country (that’s why it is a Directive).
Still, this is hardly the only piece of evidence that EU policy makers have yet to come to grips with the nature of the Internet: there is also the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), which came into effect early this year. Much like the Copyright Directive, the GDPR is targeted at Google and Facebook, but as is always the case when you fundamentally misunderstand what you are fighting, the net effect is to in fact strengthen their moats. After all, who is better equipped to navigate complex regulation than the biggest companies of all, and who needs less outside data than those that collect the most?
In fact, examining where it is that the EU’s new Copyright Directive goes wrong — not just in terms of policy, but also for the industries it seeks to protect — hints at a new way to regulate, one that works with the fundamental forces unleashed by the Internet, instead of against them.
by Ben Thompson, Stratechery | Read more:
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[ed. A Big Deal (and complex). Important.]
