
EU Countries Back Copyright Reforms Aimed at Google, Facebook - d0ne
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-eu-copyright/eu-countries-back-copyright-reforms-aimed-at-google-facebook-idUSKCN1Q91WO
======
beezischillin
This is sad and disgusting, our speech is being limited completely unfairly
and without our consent and we're being told that it's a good thing.

The fact that they're trying to package it as some sort of well-deserved
revenge against silicon valley big tech is just tasteless. The EU's big gripe
against these companies is their tax situation, if they really wanted to
change that then they'd be looking into a unified approach to taxing companies
within the EU borders, not hitting the final nail into the coffin of fair use
in Europe.

I really envy the US for its constitution sometimes.

~~~
flexie
Don't frame this as a free speech issue. Freedom of speech is as protected in
the EU as it is in the US, possibly more.

Freedom of speech in Europe is not just an EU question, but also - and mainly
- up to constitutions and legislation of the member states. So of course it
varies. But there is less surveillance in Europe on what citizens say online,
European media is less centralized than American, there are more parties with
opposing views in parliaments, much less political correctness in both
politics, business life, and social life. Most importantly, European courts is
most member states uphold the protection of the individuals' freedom of
speech.

This is legislation aimed at Google and Facebook, and other large companies,
yes. Go back 15-20 years, and nobody would have thought that Google would get
away with using the creations of content providers without paying a fair
share. I don't see anything wrong in Google or Facebook being forced to apply
filters. We have gotten used to what is truly an disgusting situation where
creators of music, journalism etc. don't get paid and their works are put out
on Youtube, Facebook etc. I would have liked to see a higher threshold so that
only truly large companies had to worry about filters, but again; these
filters will likely be easy to find in 10 different versions for free on
GitHub in a couple of years, and better ones you can license for a small fee.

But I agree, Europe should finally start to tax Facebook, Google, Amazon etc.

~~~
aikah
> Freedom of speech is as protected in the EU as it is in the US, possibly
> more

It is absolutely not. That's a preposterous assumption. If it was the case
then no European state could send people to prison or fine them for having an
opinion, yet look at France, where insulting the president is a crime and
denying "official" history has landed people in jail (I don't condone either
of these, it's just about principle).

There is absolutely no equivalent to the US first amendment anywhere else on
the planet.

~~~
craigsmansion
It absolutely is, depending on your p.o.v.

I know the U.S. is big on their "freedom of speech" since it's one of the few
things all citizens agree on, an All American Shibboleth, so to speak, but
National Security trumps everything.

There are plenty of things you can say at the border that will get you on the
next plane back home.

There may or may not be people being held in captivity without access to a
lawyer for their speech. We don't know because the proceedings are secret.

Someone who practiced his freedom of speech is currently in hiding in liberty-
loving Russia of all places. That's about treason, you might say, but with
enough restrictions any speech can be classified as treason.

Speech in the U.S. only seems to be free when it doesn't matter. If it matters
there are a lot of restrictions and there can be dire consequences.

~~~
HelloMcFly
This comment seems like an entirely disingenuous argument for me. I'm sorry if
it's not, truly, but it's an argument fit for a Fox News editorial.

> There are plenty of things you can say at the border that will get you on
> the next plane back home.

Do you mean there are things that non-citizens can say at the border of entry
to the US that might prohibit entry into the US? That does not seem like a
limitation of free speech within the US to US citizens to me.

> There may or may not be people being held in captivity without access to a
> lawyer for their speech. We don't know because the proceedings are secret.

What a convenient, non-falsifiable "rebuttal" that takes no position on the
matter.

> Someone who practiced his freedom of speech is currently in hiding in
> liberty-loving Russia of all places.

I'm a defender of Edward Snowden and think it's sad that he has to live in
Russia to avoid prosecution. And yet, this doesn't seem like an argument about
"free speech" made in good faith, particularly the relative merits of free
speech. Which country permits their citizens to disclose highly classified
information with not repercussions, however _unjust_ those repercussions may
ultimately be?

~~~
throwaway_9168
>> Which country permits their citizens to disclose highly classified
information with not repercussions, however unjust those repercussions may
ultimately be?

Yeah, its free speech, as long as it doesn't fall under some bullshit
definition of "classified" (how convenient that the classified information
also includes unilateral infringement of another country's rights, e.g. the
downright creepy snooping on the phones of world leaders who are supposed
allies). And of course, you should also understand that you _might_ die saying
certain things, but hey, otherwise its free speech. And finally, as long as
you understand the "relative" merits of the case (i.e. one rule for me,
another for you), we can all agree that free speech is what is being practiced
in the USA.

------
daxterspeed
The final vote hasn't happened yet as stated in the article. If you're an EU
citizen there's still time to contact your representatives to ensure they
understand the many issues with Article 11 (the link tax, though now it is now
more akin to a publisher controlled fee for showing snippets of articles) and
Article 13 (the copyright upload filter).

I've already e-mailed my representatives and have gotten responses stating
that they will not support Article 11 or Article 13 in the upcoming vote (and
they have in previous votes voted against this reform).

~~~
arghwhat
May I ask which country you are from?

~~~
daxterspeed
Sweden. Out of 20 Swedish representatives 18 are against and 2 have no track
record (neither clearly against or supporting):
[https://saveyourinternet.eu/se/](https://saveyourinternet.eu/se/)

You can see how representatives in other countries voted by navigating from
[https://saveyourinternet.eu/act/](https://saveyourinternet.eu/act/)

~~~
arghwhat
Unfortunately, out of the 13 Danish MEPs, only 2 are against with 1 having no
track record.

:(

------
josteink
Let’s be optimistic.

This will severely impact social media. It will be censored like never before,
and attacking opponents by “reporting” their posts will be more effective than
ever. Trolls will have a EU-sanctioned field-day.

And what real users are going to bother staying on a platform like that?

Maybe this will revitalize hosting of personal websites where there’s no
“platform” to censor your free speech?

~~~
oytis
Not gonna happen in Germany. In Germany if you own a website, you're obliged
to tell the world your home address. (That is, by the way, why everyone knows
where Lennart Poettering lives).

~~~
q3k
That's not true.

You need to provide an impression if your website has a commercial or
journalistic character. Yes, it's vague and up to the interpretation of a
court.

~~~
oytis
> Yes, it's vague and up to the interpretation of a court.

Exactly. Depends on how much risk you're eager to take. And as a non-lawyer
I'd prefer to take none. Most guides for laymen I've found stated that if it's
not just about your kittens or vacation, it's not "purely private" any more.

For instance, aforementioned Lennart who writes about his open source projects
preferred to provide this info.

I've also heard that the lawyers in this extortion business know some tricks
to make the case land on a judge with "correct" interpretations of the related
paragraphs. But that's not for sure, I've never been sued in Germany luckily.

------
izacus
Huh? If anything, the reform codifies systems like Content ID and makes it
horribly expensive to compete with Google and Facebook. And all that to cater
to US copyright industry - a fine example of EU shooting itself in the foot.

~~~
jillesvangurp
All we need now is an independent content id system that companies might use
to check content against. Doing nothing will leave this to the wrong parties
to implement and turn into a control point.

IMHO a simple open platform could allow content creators to register their
content. Anyone could then choose to check content id against such a platform.
In case of conflicts, that platform would be the place to resolve things with
escalation options and arbitration built into the platform. Basically getting
to a world where people register ownership of content they created would make
sharing that content safe.

IMHO this is a very sane solution to this problem. Right now the problem is
that we rely on content id based on databases provided by the media industry.
Any conflict in these systems means the wrong decisions get taken. With an
open platform, you could argue that you checked and in case of conflicts with
competing systems decide even document the outcome of any manual evaluation of
ownership.

IMHO this would be in the spirit of this law, protect content owners against
abuse of their content, and do so in a fair and transparent way where all
sides have a chance to get their rights respected. The only problem with the
current way of doing content id is that it is unfair and biased towards
whatever version of the truth big media companies push as the truth.

~~~
zanny
How about instead of spending billions of man hours and dollars on an
antiquated conception like intellectual property when the fundamental
assumptions of its premise have changed (primarily, that information was not
functionally free to store and transmit instantly to anyone, anywhere) you say
"hey, maybe it doesn't make sense to create artificial state run monopolies
for an imaginary incentives structure we have no evidence actually works and
could try something else, including nothing, and see how that goes".

~~~
jillesvangurp
Good luck with that debate. In the real world copyright, trademarks, patents,
international treaties, etc. and the national laws of hundreds of countries
governing those are a reality. This stuff is super complicated. Within the
context of all of that, coming up with a pragmatic way forward is the only
debate worth having.

~~~
zanny
A pragmatic way forward is absolutely to ramp down the institution over time
as obsolete. When the car came out farriers did not lobby the government that
they needed their institution protected because that is just the way things
are.

Its the same argument that was constantly used in defense of segregation,
slavery, imperialism, colonialism, feudalism, the belief in the humors, the
prohibition of drugs, why housing prices are out of control, etc - its always
"thats the way things are and they cannot change". Which is total bollocks.

------
paglia_s
I have been searching for this but couldn't find any answer, let's say a
company has a generic public platform where people can upload text, images,
videos, audio, ... how are they supposed to be able to check for copyright
infringment against every single upload?

I know that Youtube has its own content id system, but for anyone without YT's
resouces, is ther any 3rd party service to which you can pass content and get
back a yes/no answer to "anyone copyrighted this thing?", if yes, what are the
costs? the effectiveness?

~~~
Filligree
> how are they supposed to be able to check for copyright infringment against
> every single upload?

They aren't. You can't. I'm not sure if this is an oversight, or deliberate --
the law was written by lots of people, so the truth is probably in-between --
but your best bet is to avoid the EU, or stick to major hosting providers like
YouTube.

~~~
salzig
i deeply hope, as a EU citizen, that reddit, youtube, and all other platforms
kill access by EU citizens the day this law takes effect.

Shouldn't take longer than a Week to get this rolled back.

------
levosmetalo
What a bullshit title. It is not aimed at Google and Facebook. Those are the
companies that have more than enough resources to be compliant. It's the small
and aspiring companies that are not yet established that would suffer the most
from this directive. Googles, Amazons and Facebooks would be just fine, safer
then ever since the barrier to entry is bigger and bigger with every new
directive.

~~~
Bartweiss
You're right about the consequences, and the title is misleading, but I think
the exact words are probably true.

This is _aimed at_ Google and Facebook, in the sense that the people voting
for it cite Google and Facebook as targets, and the companies advocating it
view Google as decreasing their profits. That's where publishers are hoping to
find new revenues, and where lawmakers are using public anger to garner
support.

Unfortunately, the people drafting the law have terrible aim, so it's going to
_hit_ primarily startups and not-for-profit sites, raising Facebook's staffing
costs slightly while crippling creativity and public access to information.
Presumably the people looking to profit on Google links simply don't care
about that, although I can't tell whether the lawmakers supporting this don't
care about the harms or are genuinely too incompetent to understand what
they're doing.

------
xorand
"‘online content sharing service provider’ means a provider of an information
society service whose main or one of the main purposes is to store and give
the public access to a large amount of copyright protected works or other
protected subject-matter uploaded by its users which it organises and promotes
for profit-making purposes. Providers of services such as not-for profit
online encyclopedias, not-for profit educational and scientific repositories,
open source software developing and sharing platforms, electronic
communication service providers as defined in Directive 2018/1972 establishing
the European Communications Code, online marketplaces and business-to business
cloud services and cloud services which allow users to upload content for
their own use shall not be considered online content sharing service providers
within the meaning of this Directive." [https://juliareda.eu/wp-
content/uploads/2019/02/Art_13_unoff...](https://juliareda.eu/wp-
content/uploads/2019/02/Art_13_unofficial.pdf)

------
phoe-krk
They are supposedly aimed at Google and Facebook but have enough range to burn
most of other services in the European Internet in the process.

~~~
DanTheManPR
This seems to me like it will have exactly the opposite intended effect, that
the large players are the only ones who will be able to operate under this new
regulatory burden.

~~~
microcolonel
> _...the large players are the only ones who will be able to operate under
> this new regulatory burden._

And even YouTube is pretty sure they'll struggle to comply, despite having the
most sophisticated and error-resistant rights management system on the market.

~~~
pojzon
Beside ML and AI hugely based on farms in Indonesia watching everything
reported... Its proven that its impossible to track whole content of ytb
because simply it is "too much of data and ppl always try to screw over your
detection system"

------
xorand
Create. Produce original content. Keep the copyright. Don't consume canned
content.

~~~
hannasanarion
Fair use exists. This law makes it illegal to use clips of a movie in
critiquing it, or cut snippets of images to form a collage, or point to
examples of art, film, and music in an educational setting.

Copyright was never intended to be pervasive and absolute. Copyright is
supposed to protect the commercial potential of the original work by keeping
people from making copies that supplant the market for the original, ie,
piracy. Content filters and link taxes are a bastardization of Copyright.

~~~
Dahoon
No it does not. This is the GDPR discussion all over again. "This will kill
the internet" and "All sites will be subscription only" etc. I'm not for the
proposed law but it does not does not block fair use.

~~~
adrianN
The law doesn't block fair use, but the only way for content platforms to be
compliant is rampant overfiltering which will kill fair use.

~~~
xorand
>rampant overfiltering which will kill fair use

True! However, according to the draft of the Article 13, this may happen in
the case of providers "of an information society service whose main or one of
the main purposes is to store and give the public access to a large amount of
copyright protected works or other protected subject-matter uploaded by its
users which it organises and promotes for profit-making purposes." [1]

This is not an argument in favor of upload filters. Maybe we should push for
legislation about the obligation to make any upload filter completely
transparent (program source).

[1] definition from the top of the document [https://juliareda.eu/wp-
content/uploads/2019/02/Art_13_unoff...](https://juliareda.eu/wp-
content/uploads/2019/02/Art_13_unofficial.pdf)

~~~
_ph_
It is impossible to write a program that distinguishes between legit and
illegit uploads. Basically everything created in the last 90 years is
copyrighted. Be it video, picture or writing. How should an upload filter
identify an uploader als the legit copyright owner?

------
AndyMcConachie
Does anyone have a link to the actual law? All I can find are news stories
with too little information.

~~~
ocdtrekkie
Nobody complaining about the law has actually _read the law_. Julia Reda
doesn't want you to read the law she's opposed to, she wants you to be opposed
to it based on the "link tax" and "upload filter" nicknames that have been
coined for it.

~~~
AsyncAwait
> Julia Reda doesn't want you to read the law she's opposed to, she wants you
> to be opposed to it

I've skimmed the relevant passages and it didn't seem to me like she's
claiming anything that's not true. You can play the word game of if that
particular phrase was there or not, but the _intent_ is clear for anyone,
except perhaps those with vested interest in having this passed.

~~~
ocdtrekkie
The narrative of focusing on "those with vested interest in having this
passed" is ignoring those with a vested interest in it _not_ being passed.
Julia's meeting list on her website is a Who's Who is Google and organizations
Google is a part of or funding.

I would argue I have a vested interest in having this passed: I want an
Internet which isn't predominantly controlled by one corporation which steals
content from everyone else and passes it off as their own. I have no employer
or funding source based on this, I don't work for anyone in the movie, music,
news, or tech industry, I just want a better Internet, and the EU both in
antitrust and copyright reform, seems to be delivering it.

~~~
AsyncAwait
> Who's Who is Google and organizations Google is a part of or funding. I
> would argue I have a vested interest in having this passed: I want an
> Internet which isn't predominantly controlled by one corporation which
> steals content from everyone else and passes it off as their own. I have no
> employer or funding source based on this, I don't work for anyone in the
> movie, music, news, or tech industry, I just want a better Internet, and the
> EU both in antitrust and copyright reform, seems to be delivering it.

I am sorry, but this seem misguided. Corporations like Google may very well be
the only ones capable of handling this and even offer a service to scan
everyone's files, meaning smaller businesses will let Google know about every
single upload they receive, making Google even stronger and effectively
banning zero-knowledge, privacy focused providers.

This is like internet 'fast lanes'. It isn't Google who would not be able to
pay.

Certainly makes me re-think my Mastodon instance strategy and future plans to
set up business in the EU.

I am someone who is on what many would call the 'far-left' and not at all
against good regulation, but this simply isn't one of them.

~~~
ocdtrekkie
This is a common refrain of big tech: That regulation and consumer protection
designed to reign in their abuses won't be a problem for them, and will hurt
the little guy. It's interesting how loud they plead that they won't be hurt
by regulation aimed at them. (Or that they're still opposed to it, if it will
actually eliminate the competition.)

The answer is that that line of argument is bull---- and always has been.
Small outfits using reasonable moderation practices will never have a problem
with any sort of copyright regulation. The issue crops up when massive
companies have made copyright abuse a major component of their largely
automated platform, and done everything possible to avoid moderating content
because legitimate, quality moderation does not scale. And as tech giants,
they want to avoid things that don't scale.

The interesting thing is that the so-called "upload filter" law, that everyone
says YouTube will already be fine with because of Content ID, will not be
satisfied with Content ID. Because a real, human person must be handling
appeals, rather than the little automatic deny that Google currently does. It
will cost YouTube a massive amount of money to adopt this on it's scale, but
will cost small websites or platforms nothing: They already have humans that
read their email.

~~~
AsyncAwait
> That regulation and consumer protection designed to reign in their abuses
> won't be a problem for them, and will hurt the little guy. It's interesting
> how loud they plead that they won't be hurt by regulation aimed at them.

If this is really aimed so squarely at them, it could be worded more precisely
to just target say "multinational corporations with monopolies in on-demand
media distribution", but it's not. This is because the aim is to yes, extract
as much money from Google etc. as possible, but also to make sure there's
nothing that could ever replace YT because it would be handicapped from the
get go.

> The answer is that that line of argument is bull---- and always has been.
> Small outfits using reasonable moderation practices will never have a
> problem with any sort of copyright regulation.

Again, it could have been made very explicit that that's the case, in fact
amendments in that direction have been proposed and rejected.

> Because a real, human person must be handling appeals, rather than the
> little automatic deny that Google currently does. It will cost YouTube a
> massive amount of money to adopt this on it's scale

As problematic as YT is, I highly doubt this is an attempt to promote the
adoption of PeerTube etc. Rather, it is likely to be an attempt to crush an
outlet where almost anyone can become big without a publisher.

> but will cost small websites or platforms nothing: They already have humans
> that read their email.

Email? Huh? I don't think "John's Portfolio Website" is the concern here. The
concern is a small business that is a platform, say a new Reddit, or even a
YouTube alternative. Say this does displace YouTube. How is an alternative
with 5 employees going to deal with this?

Also, you didn't address the privacy question. What about platforms that
perhaps want to offer zero-knowledge file storage/upload? Are we fine with
this being just dead now, or what?

P.S. Also, it's not always the case that because something may inconvenience a
monopoly, (Google), that it is automatically beneficial to everyone else.
Article 13 is specifically NOT worded to target JUST Google-size businesses.

------
factsaresacred
To get an idea of how the European Commission thinks, you really need to read
their retracted Medium post:
[http://archive.fo/cZa14](http://archive.fo/cZa14)

It oozes contempt, is filled with strawman arguments, and makes no effort to
disguise its disdain for "the big Californian companies".

Some highlights:

 _> Good journalism costs money and without a free press there is no
democracy.

> Because if creative people don’t get paid, they can’t afford to be creative.
> No Mon = No Fun

> At the moment the balance of power in who gets paid for such royalties
> resides overwhelmingly with the big Californian companies — who are worth
> around $1 Trillion.

> Are we in a world where ordinary people side with the fire breathing dragon
> against the knight with a blue and yellow shield? _

------
Jyaif
The response is to offer Google News in europe with snippets from newspapers
from Québec, Mexico, Brasil, Saint-Marin...

------
yarrel
Hahahahahahaha.

No.

------
porpoisely
This is what I despise about "news". If this was china or russia or venezuela,
etc, the headline would be "China tightens grip on their people" or
"International community concerned as China becomes more authoritarian" or
"Pro freedom activists protest against China's draconian censorship". It would
be spun as something more ominous than "reform". But reuters being reuters and
also a major supporter of censorship, of course spins it in a pro-censorship
manner. Also, considering that google and facebook support these "reforms",
how are they "aiming" it at them? These laws will entrench google and facebook
and secure their monopoly positions. The biggest beneficiaries of these laws
are google and facebook and of course large media companies, like reuters.

I wonder what the headline would be if reuters and the news industry was
against these "reforms".

~~~
judge2020
Take this with a grain of salt since it's their own website, but Youtube
themselves say they wouldn't be able to let any content on their platform stay
up even if it slightly resembled copyrighted content. Think the current
Content ID system times 10.

[https://www.youtube.com/saveyourinternet/](https://www.youtube.com/saveyourinternet/)

[https://youtube-creators.googleblog.com/2018/10/a-final-
upda...](https://youtube-creators.googleblog.com/2018/10/a-final-update-on-
our-priorities-for.html)

~~~
kretor
The webpage you linked is from last year I think. Article 13 has since been
updated

~~~
ddebernardy
It has been updated to something worse:

[https://juliareda.eu/2019/02/eu-copyright-final-
text/](https://juliareda.eu/2019/02/eu-copyright-final-text/)

------
lbj
Who is John Galt? The man who decided to stop the engine of the world, and
did. I think he's about to make an appearance.

