
European Parliament Approves Controversial “Meme Ban” - onoj
https://futurism.com/the-eu-agreed-on-the-final-text-of-a-meme-ban
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tomp
Fake news (or at least fake/clickbait title). EP approved the _text_ of the
law, but didn't yet vote on the law.

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Thriptic
I must be misunderstanding this. People are supposed to pay for the privilege
of potentially driving traffic to a site that features ads? Is the reasoning
that aggregators could just summarize the content and negate the need to go to
the original provider?

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Thorrez
AIUI, the phrase "link tax" isn't really correct, because it doesn't apply if
you just link. It applies if you copy the headline or a snippet.

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ocdtrekkie
Exactly. They're going after companies which scrape all of the value out of a
website to move revenue to their own websites:
[https://theoutline.com/post/1399/how-google-ate-
celebritynet...](https://theoutline.com/post/1399/how-google-ate-
celebritynetworth-com?zd=1&zi=3bsyuo4t)

Knowledge Graph is the target here, not sites which actually drive revenue to
the actual site owners. The EU is looking to protect the Internet by ensuring
independent websites have protection and legal recourse from abuse by big
tech.

~~~
luma
They're going after the companies that actually drive the traffic. If Google
News, Hacker News, Reddit, etc isn't linking me to your site... I'm never ever
ever going to see your site. You still get the page views, ad revenue, etc
when someone else sends me to your site, so what's the beef?

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vivekd
I have a pet peeve about articles that post about a legislation, but don't
bother posting or linking to the actual wording of the legislation and don't
bother calling a lawyer or legal expert to ask what the legislation means.

 __ _Article 11:_ __

> 1\. Member States shall provide publishers of press publications with the
> rights provided for in Article 2 and Article 3(2) of Directive 2001/29/EC so
> that they may obtain fair and proportionate remuneration for the digital use
> of their press publications by information society service providers.

>1a. The rights referred to in paragraph 1 shall not prevent legitimate
private and non-commercial use of press publications by individual users.

>2\. The rights referred to in paragraph 1 shall leave intact and shall in no
way affect any rights provided for in Union law to authors and other
rightholders, in respect of the works and other subject-matter incorporated in
a press publication. Such rights may not be invoked against those authors and
other rightholders and, in particular, may not deprive them of their right to
exploit their works and other subject-matter independently from the press
publication in which they are incorporated.

>2a. The rights referred to in paragraph 1 shall not extend to mere hyperlinks
which are accompanied by individual words.

>3\. Articles 5 to 8 of Directive 2001/29/EC and Directive 2012/28/EU shall
apply mutatis mutandis in respect of the rights referred to in paragraph 1.

>4\. The rights referred to in paragraph 1 shall expire 5 years after the
publication of the press publication. This term shall be calculated from the
first day of January of the year following the date of publication. The right
referred to in paragraph 1 shall not apply with retroactive effect.

>4a. Member States shall ensure that authors receive an appropriate share of
the additional revenues press publishers receive for the use of a press
publication by information society service providers

 __ _Article 13_ __

> 1\. Without prejudice to Article 3(1) and (2) of Directive 2001/29/EC,
> online content sharing service providers perform an act of communication to
> the public. They shall therefore conclude fair and appropriate licensing
> agreements with right holders.

>2\. Licensing agreements which are concluded by online content sharing
service providers with right holders for the acts of communication referred to
in paragraph 1, shall cover the liability for works uploaded by the users of
such online content sharing services in line with the terms and conditions set
out in the licensing agreement, provided that such users do not act for
commercial purposes.

>2a. Member States shall provide that where right holders do not wish to
conclude licensing agreements, online content sharing service providers and
right holders shall cooperate in good faith in order to ensure that
unauthorised protected works or other subject matter are not available on
their services. Cooperation between online content service providers and right
holders shall not lead to preventing the availability of non-infringing works
or other protected subject matter, including those covered by an exception or
limitation to copyright.

>2b. Members States shall ensure that online content sharing service providers
referred to in paragraph 1 put in place effective and expeditious complaints
and redress mechanisms that are available to users in case the cooperation
referred to in paragraph 2a leads to unjustified removals of their content.
Any complaint filed under such mechanisms shall be processed without undue
delay and be subject to human review. Right holders shall reasonably justify
their decisions to avoid arbitrary dismissal of complaints. Moreover, in
accordance with Directive 95/46/EC, Directive 2002/58/EC and the General Data
Protection Regulation, the cooperation shall not lead to any identification of
individual users nor the processing of their personal data. Member States
shall also ensure that users have access to an independent body for the
resolution of disputes as well as to a court or another relevant judicial
authority to assert the use of an exception or limitation to copyright rules.

>3\. As of [date of entry into force of this directive], the Commission and
the Member States shall organise dialogues between stakeholders to harmonise
and to define best practices and issue guidance to ensure the functioning of
licensing agreements and on cooperation between online content sharing service
providers and right holders for the use of their works or other subject matter
within the meaning of this Directive. When defining best practices, special
account shall be taken of fundamental rights, the use of exceptions and
limitations as well as ensuring that the burden on SMEs remains appropriate
and that automated blocking of content is avoided

 __ _What the article gets wrong_ __

So under Article 11 you can still link to news sites and provide a summary of
them (see 2a) so services like google news are in no way affected despite what
the article says.

Nothing in the wording of section 13 requires providers like youtube to filter
every upload for copyright infringement. It merely says that content sharing
providers like youtube have to work with copyright holders to prevent
copyright infringement. Which they already do. Under 2b it actually increases
people's protection by requiring fast and effective human review when your
content is unjustifiably removed.

If people have problems with this legislation fine. That said, let's make sure
that the criticism is based on the facts, and the wording of the legislation
rather than hysteria and speculation.

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deogeo
> don't bother calling a lawyer or legal expert to ask what the legislation
> means

You would do well to take your own advice. Explanation on how those articles
effectively mandate filters and a link tax: [https://juliareda.eu/2019/02/eu-
copyright-final-text/](https://juliareda.eu/2019/02/eu-copyright-final-text/)

~~~
kough
The website you link to doesn't explain anything with evidence either. All I
see are assertions. For example

> In addition, all but very few sites (those both tiny and very new) will need
> to do everything in their power to prevent anything from ever going online
> that may be an unauthorised copy of a work that a rightsholder has
> registered with the platform. They will have no choice but to deploy upload
> filters, which are by their nature both expensive and error-prone.

Why will they have no choice but to deploy upload filters? Why are new/tiny
sites exempt?

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tspike
Article correction: Berners-Lee invented the world wide web, not the internet.

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gdhbcc
I support these articles, not because they are a good idea, but because i hope
the backlash against them will go to the root of the issue, the concept of
intelectual property

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tomp
I want to agree with you... but... what if it won't?

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ocdtrekkie
I'm amazed that this is neither a "link tax" nor a "meme ban", but marketing
in reframing regulating big tech abuses as some sort of attack on everyday
users, so effectively that people refer to it as such.

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Mirioron
The entire thing reads like its sole purpose is to protect the business model
of organizations such as the MPAA and other similar middle-man organizations.

It pretty directly says that platforms must enter into agreements with rights
holder organizations if they want to be absolved of liability.

