EU Approves the EU Copyright Directive
March 26, 2019 7:32 AM   Subscribe

Long debated, the EU Copyright Directive is a mammoth piece of legislation revamping copyright law across the EU. Of particular concern to many activists, in addition to the general trend of tightening copyright restrictions and increasing penalties, are Article 11 and Article 13.
posted by sotonohito (25 comments total) 12 users marked this as a favorite
 
Copyright filters are coming. Google successfully got the EU to throw them into the briar patch; it'll cost them a few hundred million a year to implement, but be out of the reach of small contenders.

If the EU wanted to mitigate the risks of this, they'd establish a standard specification for a copyright-filtering service, and give out licences to those operating them. It'd be an open API, using web redirects or similar, where instead of users uploading user-generated content, their upload would go to a third party, where it'd be automatically scanned using state-of-the-art techniques against a database of copyrighted content; non-matches would be waved through with a cryptographic certificate indemnifying the host against prosecution for hosting them. Potential matches would be put aside for review, and either waved through, as before, if found to be a false positive, or the uploader would be notified and given the option of appealing. Perhaps the EU would operate it itself, or perhaps they would establish an open market of subsidised competitors. API client libraries for all the major stacks would be made available, and assistance would be provided if someone wants to port it to, say, Idris or Emacs Lisp or 68000 assembly language, on condition of open-sourcing their implementation.

Most importantly, this would be (a) free for sites and users (funded by general taxation or a levy on rightsholders/big internet companies/&c.), (b) anonymous (you don't need to identify yourself legally to upload content, and any appeal process would be handled using a one-time case ID), and (c) regulated with strict privacy controls (i.e., monetising it for ad targeting/surveillance-capitalism or similar would be a criminal offence).
posted by acb at 7:44 AM on March 26, 2019 [13 favorites]


Pretty bleak news, seems on par for the week so far. Disheartening that legislation nobody asked for or wanted get passed. Who did exactly buy this law and to what end? I know when you see a plot that doesn't make sense, it's wise to look who stands to benefit from this. Unfortunately I cannot tell, presumably somebody thinks this will make them more money but it's hard to see how.
posted by GoblinHoney at 7:45 AM on March 26, 2019 [6 favorites]


The old media industries (IFPI/MPAA, collection agencies, and such), who would benefit if the internet was sterilised somewhat and became more like cable TV or a shopping catalogue. Google and Facebook would also benefit in that this tide would annihilate any upcoming competitors who might disrupt their privileged incumbency.

We got old wealthy rock stars trotting out lines about how “taking on Google” will make creativity flourish, and even the Guardian's official report wrote this up as a defeat for Google lobbyists.
posted by acb at 7:48 AM on March 26, 2019 [9 favorites]


It sure took the wind out of this Remainer's sails this morning.

Julia Reda has tweeted the record of how MEPs voted on whether to consider amendments (which would have given an opportunity to remove Articles 11 or 13, if it hadn't been defeated) and on the final unamended directive. Also worth watching Reda's impassioned speech from earlier in the day.

Meanwhile, here's a take from the film industry, where many think this will all be just dandy.

Jim Felton has it.
posted by rory at 7:50 AM on March 26, 2019 [2 favorites]




In the UK, perhaps the providers of mandatory age verification for adult content could branch out into providing mandatory copyright filtering for user-generated content as well?
posted by acb at 7:58 AM on March 26, 2019 [1 favorite]


Mr Blobby GIFs could land you in trouble for entirely the wrong reasons.
posted by rory at 8:00 AM on March 26, 2019


You know, things are real real bad here Stateside, but honestly, compared to this...

I think I'm okay over here in the evil empire a little longer. At least I can still meme freely and whatnot.

Honestly, I'm very interested how this is going to legally affect all those torrent seedboxes hosted in places like France.

Do the individual seedboxes all need to implement upload filters? Or just forward facing websites? If your seedbox is only accessible via shell and a complex password, are you exempt?

Also, if I ever have a website of my own again, do I essentially have to learn how to do geoblocking to prevent Europeans from accessing my site? (even if it is hosted in my own country?)
posted by deadaluspark at 8:13 AM on March 26, 2019


When I first got into online fandom back in the 1990s, people who made fanvids passed them around on dvds and sometimes shared them via password-protected websites. When YouTube showed up, most of the older, more cautious fans held off, because they had a legitimate fear of copyright owners coming down on them. Not just the music industry, but media conglomerates like Paramount -- if you've seen Killa's vid Closer you might guess why.

Then over time a lot of vidders moved to Vimeo, and slowly to YouTube. Now many of the old-school fanvidders I know have their own YouTube channels, where they continue to post vids celebrating, parodying, and critiquing media.

These new rules are going to send everyone back to password-protected individual websites and download sites. Which is a real shame.
posted by suelac at 8:40 AM on March 26, 2019 [8 favorites]


These new rules are going to send everyone back to password-protected individual websites and download sites. Which is a real shame.

Combine this with crypto back-door mandates (like the one enacted in Australia, and proposed in the UK), and the authorities (which may be law-enforcement agencies like the City of London Police's PIPCU, or deputised private agencies) will have the authority to inspect all content in its plaintext form. If traffic analysis reveals access patterns to a private hosting instance consistent with potential copyright infringement, a warrant can be issued automatically.
posted by acb at 8:46 AM on March 26, 2019 [2 favorites]


You know what's funny to me is the utter pointlessness of this. Every time they crack down it's pushed pirating stuff further out but the tools have gotten *better*. In the past few years we got the automatic torrent streamers that basically work like hulu, and Kodi with all it's addons even my parents can use.

Even if they push everything into TOR or back to usenet, the scripts and interfaces for it will look like freaking apple tv within 3-6 months. This is going to take like, china firewall level tech to stop and i'm not convinced we'll ever get there *just* to stop piracy.

Now, getting there with piracy as one of the justifications for other rise of fascism reasons... maybe
posted by emptythought at 9:13 AM on March 26, 2019 [7 favorites]


shameless self-link ... while it still exists
posted by philip-random at 9:15 AM on March 26, 2019 [1 favorite]


Here’s the (now-closed) MeTa on the issue.
posted by chappell, ambrose at 9:17 AM on March 26, 2019


Julia Reda has tweeted the record of how MEPs voted on whether to consider amendments (which would have given an opportunity to remove Articles 11 or 13, if it hadn't been defeated) and on the final unamended directive.

That's crazy. There's even Greens who voted against considering amendments. It doesn't seem so evenly split among left/right lines.
posted by vacapinta at 9:18 AM on March 26, 2019 [1 favorite]


Apparently in Sweden, the main politicians who voted against article 13 are the Nazis. Which is awkward.
posted by acb at 9:29 AM on March 26, 2019 [3 favorites]


It sure took the wind out of this Remainer's sails this morning.

So, here's an idea. UK Remains, participates in elections and also vetos this monster. Everyone cheers. UK regains its reputation and as the EU-bureaucracy-slayer is loved again by everybody, no hard feelings. Yes?
I can hope.
posted by vacapinta at 9:38 AM on March 26, 2019 [7 favorites]


I don't think this is veto-able, I think it's in the area covered by qualified majority voting.
posted by TheophileEscargot at 10:01 AM on March 26, 2019


Some say this law is a victory against Google and Facebook; others say that this law means that the tech giants won. Ars technica thinks it's maddeningly vague. Are there any Mefites who can explain the whole thing to me?
posted by Termite at 12:33 PM on March 26, 2019 [4 favorites]


A Swedish friend of mine is insisting on Twitter that Article 13 only applies to companies above a certain threshhold who generate income from user-generated content, which would mean that fansub sites can move off YouTube onto their own site, and be entirely unencumbered by this legislation. Not sure if true.
posted by Merus at 2:32 PM on March 26, 2019


only applies to companies above a certain threshhold who generate income from user-generated content

I see nothing in the text of the law that indicates a specific threshold of income. The closest to that is:
in those cases where the administrative burden resulting from the obligation would be disproportionate in view of the revenues generated by the exploitation of the work or performance, Member States may adjust the obligation in paragraph 1, provided that the obligation remains effective...
Nations are allowed to adjust the requirements for different kinds of businesses; there is no lower limit to the law itself.

Article 11, the "link tax," doesn't apply to individual non-commercial use, but it also doesn't define "non-commercial" - does it include a blogger who gets ad revenue?
Article 13 doesn't relate to commercial activity, but to copyrights; there is no requirement that the uploads be intended for profit.
posted by ErisLordFreedom at 3:14 PM on March 26, 2019


That's the proposal from 3 years ago, the numbering and the text has changed in the approved one too.

The approved text is this one.

You can find in that text the exclusion for smaller platforms, open source companies, online encyclopedias, parody, reviews, "pastiche", etc...
posted by haemanu at 7:35 PM on March 26, 2019 [1 favorite]


Via Techdirt, "Enough MEPs Say They Mistakenly Voted For Articles 11 & 13 That The Vote Should Have Flipped; EU Parliament Says Too Bad":
Earlier today we wrote about the terrible vote by the EU Parliament to approve the Copyright Directive including the dangerous Articles 11 and 13. As we noted in the original post, the key vote was whether to allow amendments that could have deleted those two articles. That vote failed by just five votes, 317 to 312. Unfortunately, soon after the vote was finalized, a few of the MEPs who voted against the plan for amendments -- Peter Lundgren and Kristina Winberg -- said they voted incorrectly and meant to vote for the amendments in order to get rid of Articles 11 and 13. Apparently, someone changed the vote order which threw them off

[...]

A few hours later, the EU put out the official voting record which includes an astounding 13 MEPs who said they voted incorrectly. Ten of them said they meant to vote for amendments. Two of them said they wanted to vote against it. And one did not want to vote.
I mean... *shrug emoji*
posted by mhum at 9:54 PM on March 26, 2019 [4 favorites]


That's unbearable. Two years of arguments and dread while this is implemented, followed by a shitty outcome, and all because a handful of people were tricked into voting the wrong way. Brexit should be a warning, not a blueprint.
posted by rory at 12:03 AM on March 27, 2019 [5 favorites]






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