
Today, Europe Lost The Internet. Now, We Fight Back - DiabloD3
https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2018/09/today-europe-lost-internet-now-we-fight-back
======
westurner
Here's a quote from this excellent article:

> _An error rate of even one percent will still mean tens of millions of acts
> of arbitrary censorship, every day._

And a redundant -- positively defiant -- link _and_ page title:

"Today, Europe Lost The Internet. Now, We Fight Back."
[https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2018/09/today-europe-lost-
inte...](https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2018/09/today-europe-lost-internet-now-
we-fight-back)

Firms with 50 or less employees should stay that small, really.

VPN providers in North and South America FTW.

~~~
andmarios
This is not entirely accurate. One thing that doesn't seem to get much
publicity, is that this law also fixes the broken DMCA process.

Platforms are expected not only to avoid taking down the wrong content, but
they are obligated to have stuff (not computers) that rapidly examine any
complaints about unlawful take-downs and re-instate the content.

[http://www.europarl.europa.eu/news/en/press-
room/20180906IPR...](http://www.europarl.europa.eu/news/en/press-
room/20180906IPR12103/parliament-adopts-its-position-on-digital-copyright-
rules)

~~~
mcv
That link certainly seems to tell a completely different story. It's good that
there are exceptions for small platforms, wikipedia and github.

That doesn't change the fact that the upload filter in particular is something
that even Google can't seem to get right, so it's highly questionable what
they really expect from this.

~~~
andmarios
I guess what I hope about, is that right now the DMCA doesn't provide a good
incentive to tackle wrong take-downs. Maybe by making this into a law, the
process can get better. Companies will always do the absolute minimum required
—and as a shareholder, this would be what I would demand as well. So it's up
to us to set this minimum to an acceptable level.

Of course, I understand there are many ways this could go wrong. Law most of
the time plays catch-up...

------
QasimK
I was so excited over how the EU managed to get GDPR so _right_ , that I
couldn't believe that the EU would get something else about the internet so
_wrong_ immediately afterwards.

~~~
blfr
GDPR has been an UX disaster in practice. Now they're also going after
content.

~~~
pedrocr
It's only a UX disaster because it makes it obvious what horrible things you
now have to accept just to read some mildly interesting thing on some crappy
site. That may be bad UX for the site but it's actually good UX for the user.
Makes you consume less crap.

~~~
jeremyt
No it doesn't. It teaches you after about 20 times, that all sites are equally
bad and now I can just safely ignore these popup notices.

It promotes apathy.

~~~
anigbrowl
Speak for yourself, please. I like it and am happy not to waste my time any
more on sites that traffic heavily in clickbait.

------
shrewduser
This is an embarrassment and totally changes the colour of my view of brexit
in one fell swoop.

I would not want to be a member state of an organization that thinks this is
remotely ok either.

~~~
Someguywhatever
Lets build a gigantic bureaucracy and allow the most technologically
illiterate people to decide weighty matters they haven't the foggiest clue
about. What could go possibly go wrong?

~~~
nnain
May I use this everytime I describe the Politics+Tech situation in India!

------
commandlinefan
"It is insufficient to protect ourselves with laws; we need to protect
ourselves with mathematics. Encryption is too important to be left solely to
governments." \-- Bruce Schneier

------
bambax
> _In the meantime, there are upcoming EU elections, in which EU politicians
> will have to fight for their jobs. There aren 't many places where a
> prospective Member of the European Parliament can win an election by
> boasting about expansions of copyright, but there are lots of potential
> electoral opponents who will be too happy to campaign on "Vote for me, my
> opponent just broke the Internet."_

The problem is, in countries like France, EVERY elected official (and EVERY
political candidate) is in favor of this, and the public doesn't seem to care
at all...

~~~
nicolaslem
These last few days I was very surprise to hear repeatedly on France Info (big
national news radio) the side of the artists against Youtube and not once hear
about the consequences for the Internet.

~~~
servs
I am not surprised. I have been following copyright and "digital" law for
about two decades. Most people just haven't changed their minds on copyright,
wiretaps or many other things. If you want to convince people it has to be
better than "it ruins the Internet". Because a lot of people don't even like
the Internet that much. They already see it as run by large companies, trash
social media and various malicious things that may affect their kids or get
them scammed. A lot of people that are "pro" Internet just haven't given it
much thought, they are mainly accepting their own chosen status quo. And that
is getting worse every year. All these things we are talking about like
remixing, encryption and social media have been studied and talked about in
the past. Unfortunately few people care about a solution, they are happy if
they read Reddit, watch some porn and "fight" by clicking some links every
couple of years. I guess that sound cynical, but if one side is saying what is
in-line with the rest of society and the other doesn't really have a story
then it is going to be what it is.

------
macspoofing
Europe, oh brother.

Hysterics are always directed towards America, but time and time again it is
Europe that falls flat on its face.

~~~
Mahn
You are getting downvoted, but it's true, as an European it's appalling to see
Europe constantly sabotaging itself when it comes to tech.

~~~
singularity2001
Interesting: Is foreign judicial sabotage a thing in intelligence circles?

------
panzagl
Between GPDR and the copyright law it seems like the Internet is effectively
read-only for European citizens and companies, at least below a certain size.

------
nine_k
It's curious how Internet regulations in EU end up with effects rather similar
to those achieved bu regulations in Russia, or Turkey, or some other not-
quite-free country — though the intentions are allegedly different.

~~~
liftbigweights
Why is it curious? Russia modeled their censorship regime off of germany's
censorship regime.

Reporters Without Borders had a nice write-up about it.

[https://rsf.org/en/news/russian-bill-copy-and-paste-
germanys...](https://rsf.org/en/news/russian-bill-copy-and-paste-germanys-
hate-speech-law)

For some odd reason, we think that europe ( which gave us nazism, fascism and
communism ) is some bastion of freedom. It's not. It's never been. And it
looks like it never will be.

It's not europe catching up to russia, china or turkey when it comes to
censorship or surveillance. It's actually russia, china and turkey catching up
to europe.

~~~
singularity2001
The second part is too harsh, unless you go back 80 years.

------
peterwwillis
Looks like Europeans can no longer hang over our American heads that our
politicians are crazy. Turns out theirs are crazy too.

~~~
rcarmo
On average, ours have less nuclear options.

~~~
randie63
well USA has many nuclear weapons all over the Europe

------
petre
Is there a list with EU MPs and how they voted on this issue? I want to
consider it when voting in the next EU Parliament election.

~~~
keth
I believe you are looking for this:
[http://www.europarl.europa.eu/sides/getDoc.do?pubRef=-%2f%2f...](http://www.europarl.europa.eu/sides/getDoc.do?pubRef=-%2f%2fEP%2f%2fNONSGML%2bPV%2b20180912%2bRES-
RCV%2bDOC%2bPDF%2bV0%2f%2fEN&language=EN)

Additionaly there is also this picture from Julia Reda:
[https://pbs.twimg.com/media/Dm5kGq5X0AANQZs.jpg](https://pbs.twimg.com/media/Dm5kGq5X0AANQZs.jpg)

Source:
[https://twitter.com/Senficon/status/1039881088078958592](https://twitter.com/Senficon/status/1039881088078958592)

------
Mefis
Tech giants must pay for work of artists and journalists which they use Small
and micro platforms excluded from directive’s scope Hyperlinks, “accompanied
by “individual words” can be shared freely Journalists must get a share of any
copyright-related remuneration obtained by their publishing house

Doesn't sound so bad...

[http://www.europarl.europa.eu/news/en/press-
room/20180906IPR...](http://www.europarl.europa.eu/news/en/press-
room/20180906IPR12103/parliament-adopts-its-position-on-digital-copyright-
rules)

------
hutzlibu
I don't like this law, but I don't think that the ones who made it are as
stupid as most people here think it is.

They are just ignorant of all the fallout and they care much more about, that
this is directed against the "tech-giants", who happen to be mostly US
companys. "We maybe cannot compete on internet technology, but we can regulate
you". Plus, there is also allmost a economy war going on right now ...

And of course to set up censorship in general. To start to fight hate speech,
fake news, terror propaganda ... and whatever else might be inconvinient.

~~~
singularity2001
> stupid as most people here think … They are just ignorant

two words, one similar meaning

~~~
hutzlibu
Out of context.

Ignorant of some negative sides when you want something else is not
necessarily stupid.

------
pier25
So would these laws apply only to servers physically in Europe?

~~~
philpem
Or companies based in Europe... so move your server farm and HQ to the US,
stick up a handy "451 Unavailable for Legal Reasons" linking to a "find your
MSP and email them about this" page... and you're done.

~~~
pier25
Or maybe move the servers to Switzerland :)

------
lossolo
Please weight your words. Europe didn't lose its Internet today.

As to the content of this article:

> Article 13: the Copyright Filters. All but the smallest platforms will have
> to defensively adopt copyright filters that examine everything you post and
> censor anything judged to be a copyright infringement.

It's worth to mention what is _smallest_.

Annex to Commission Recommendation 2003/361/EC Article 2.2 states:

 _Within the SME category, a small enterprise is defined as an enterprise
which employs fewer than 50 persons and whose annual turnover and /or annual
balance sheet total does not exceed EUR 10 million._ [4]

They will not _censor_ anything that is not copyrighted material and you have
right to dispute that censoring (it's also in article 13) in case you have
copyright to material posted/it's not copyrighted material. In which case they
can't stop you posting that based on this law.

Any action taken by platforms to check that uploads do not breach copyright
rules must be designed in such a way as to avoid catching non-infringing
works. As stated in

Article 13.2a: _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._ [1]

These platforms will moreover be required to establish rapid redress systems
(operated by the platform’s staff, not algorithms) through which complaints
can be lodged when an upload is wrongly taken down.

As stated in article 13.2b: _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_ [1]

> Article 11: Linking to the news using more than one word from the article is
> prohibited unless you're using a service that bought a license from the news
> site you want to link to.

This is wrong unless you make money of what you do, which point 1a clearly
states:

Article 11.1a: _The rights referred to in paragraph 1 shall not prevent
legitimate private and non-commercial use of press publications by individual
users._ [1]

Additionally if you make money of it you can link to the article and include
individual words:

Article 11.2a: _The rights referred to in paragraph 1 shall not extend to mere
hyperlinks which are accompanied by individual words._ [1]

> Article 12a: No posting your own photos or videos of sports matches. Only
> the "organisers" of sports matches will have the right to publicly post any
> kind of record of the match. No posting your selfies, or short videos of
> exciting plays. You are the audience, your job is to sit where you're told,
> passively watch the game and go home.

You know that exactly the same law applies to artists on concerts? You can
legally record that and make selfies for your personal use but you can't share
recordings publicly without consent? Most artists/copyright holders ignore
that, this is why you see recordings on social media, youtube etc. But if they
wanted to they could sue you.

But sports at the moment is different. Some EU countries introduce protection
of sports events on national level but not all.

Look at ECJ (European Court of Justice) decision in _Premier League v QC
Leisure_ [2] in which court stated that sports events as such (notably
football games) do not qualify as protected subject matter under EU copyright
law. The Court explained that in order to be classified as a “work of
authorship” the subject-matter concerned would have to be original in the
sense of the author’s own intellectual creation. However, sporting events
cannot be regarded as intellectual creations within the meaning of the EU
Information Society Directive. This applies in particular to football matches,
which are subject to rules of the game which leave no room for creative
expressive freedom. The Court went even further and stated that sports events
are not protected by European Union law on any other basis in the field of
intellectual property, excluding therefore neighbouring or related rights to
copyright (including database suigeneris rights) as well. [3]

Terms and conditions of access attached to sport event tickets have nowadays
developed into quite lengthy lists of contractual obligations, which can vary
depending on the type of event and on its commercial relevance. By way of
illustration, together with the prohibition to carry into the stadium items
considered dangerous or otherwise inappropriate, the use of recording and
broadcasting equipment, the unauthorized transmission and/or recording through
mobile phones or other recording devices, and sometimes even flash photography
are explicitly forbidden. These rules are purely contractual. Therefore, in
the case in which a spectator has, without authorization, succeeded in
recording the match on a personal device such as a smartphone and has uploaded
the video on an online platform, a third party acting in good faith (such as
the online platform) will not be bound by that contractual agreement. It
follows that the platform operator, as well as any other third party, cannot
be forced merely on this contractual basis to take down the content from the
platform. Whereas it has been argued that amateur recordings do not really
pose serious commercial threats to sports organisers (and in any case they
still represent a breach of contract), the gap in the “house right” based
legal protection of sports organisers is in the absence of third-party
effects. [3]

This is the reason why article 12.a was introduced, not someone personal
selfies. Context is really important when commenting on law.

[1]
[http://www.europarl.europa.eu/sides/getDoc.do?pubRef=-//EP//...](http://www.europarl.europa.eu/sides/getDoc.do?pubRef=-//EP//NONSGML+TA+P8-TA-2018-0337+0+DOC+PDF+V0//EN)

[2] 403/08 and 429/08 Football Association Premier League Ltd and others v QC
Leisure and others and Karen Murphy v Media Protection Services Ltd (2011)
ECR-I-9083.

[3] Margoni, T. (2016) The protection of sports events in the EU:
Property,intellectual property, unfair competition and special forms of
protection.

[4] [https://eur-
lex.europa.eu/LexUriServ/LexUriServ.do?uri=OJ:L:...](https://eur-
lex.europa.eu/LexUriServ/LexUriServ.do?uri=OJ:L:2003:124:0036:0041:EN:PDF)

------
dvh
>Linking to the news using more than one word from the article is prohibited

What if someone write app that rewrite article using most common synonyms not
present in the article?

------
brightball
Gotta say, I wonder what the Brexit reaction to this will be?

~~~
jacquesm
To make a UK version of the law.

~~~
timrichard
Rubbish. Both major parties would be sensitive to the backlash, as neither is
in a particularly strong position. 'U-turn' is an integral part of the UK
political lexicon.

That's the benefit of a working democracy where decisions are taken within the
reach of the people.

When legislation like this is steamrollered through the EU, it's obvious that
resistance is futile.

------
tempz
It is far from 'clear' or 'obvious' that the Directive is a bad deal for
content producers. Read it yourself - especially Articles 11 and 13.

The narrative funded through GOOGL (and its affiliate EFF) and other big
platforms is that this is evil doing of big content distribution monopolies.

What is missing in this picture is that this Directive gives affordable
enforcement muscle to _all_ content producers, including the smallest ones.

This Directive is the death knell for these platforms, which peddle content
produced by 'nobodies' (their users) without any remuneration. There is
nothing natural, just or given about it.

~~~
specializeded
What is missing in this picture is that this Directive gives affordable
enforcement muscle to all copyright owners*, including the smallest ones.

~~~
AllegedAlec
It promises that muscle over the backs of people creating platforms, though.
How is a small company going to ever create an upload filter that has little
to none false positives and false negatives when even the FAANGs are not able
to do this?

------
sunstone
It's awkward when government decisions are not subject to persuasive lobbying.

------
jimnotgym
Just to be clear, as bad as this is, passing the European Parliament stage
does not make it law. Now the national governments get their say. Plenty to
fight for yet.

