
European Court Strikes Down Law Allowing Users to Rip Their Own CDs - panarky
https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2015/06/european-copyright-madness-court-strikes-down-law-allowing-users-rip-their-own-cds
======
alextgordon

        > THE QUEEN on the application of
        > (1) BRITISH ACADEMY OF SONGWRITERS, COMPOSERS AND AUTHORS
        > (2) MUSICIANS’ UNION
        > (3) UK MUSIC 2009 LIMITED
    

Perhaps, as a token of defiance, we should compile a list of the people at the
top of these organisations, and forbid them from using our software.

There's a time and a place for spite, and this is it.

~~~
npongratz
The BipCot NoGov license [0] might provide a template, replacing "government"
with "[leaders of] media organizations" (or whatever), as applicable.

But if you're looking for something with teeth, this probably won't meet your
needs -- as they say, "It is not copyright-based, it is entirely shame-based."

[0] [http://bipcot.org](http://bipcot.org)

------
rsto
European Copyright legislative is an inconsistent mess.

Right now, in Austria, the government is up to demand 6% of the price of any
digital storage device, to compensate copyright holders when the legit
consumers of their work _execute their right to make a private copy_.

So the European Court apparently just has settled that in one country of the
EU, consumers do not have the right to make private copies, while in others
consumers just got a new tax to do so. AFAIK the Austrian model follows German
legislative.

What a mess.

~~~
pparkkin
From the linked text.

 _The government 's choices are now to remove the private copying
exception—making personal copying illegal again, or to supply additional
evidence that copyright owners suffer no or minimal “harm” from personal
copying, or else to begin imposing a new tax on users to compensate the
industry for that “harm”._

Which sounds to me like UK has the option to start collecting a similar
surcharge to compensate for the right to make private copies of works. They
are not required to ban private copying completely.

~~~
rsto
Thanks, I read the article but this sentence must have slipped my attention. I
really would like to see them to supply evidence that _copyright owners suffer
no or minimal harm from personal copying_ but guess they won't even bother
attempting.

------
anigbrowl
_Seizing on the opportunity to use this supranational directive to overturn a
democratically-enacted law_

The directive exists pursuant to action of the European Parliament* which is
also a democratic institution, as someone with Jeremy Malcolm's outstanding
education is surely aware.

* [http://eur-lex.europa.eu/LexUriServ/LexUriServ.do?uri=CELEX:...](http://eur-lex.europa.eu/LexUriServ/LexUriServ.do?uri=CELEX:32001L0029:EN:HTML)

I'm not expressing an opinion on the merits of European copyright law; I'm not
familiar with this case or the details of EU regulations, and I'm not
suggesting the EFF is wrong to oppose this provision of EU law. I just get
irritated as a citizen of the EU when people dismiss anything that comes out
of Brussels as 'undemocractic'. Why does the EFF keep pandering to lowest
common denominator like this? If I want xenophobic arguments I'll buy a
tabloid newspaper.

~~~
comboy
Well, I'm from Europe and I don't like most of the things that come out of
Brussels. In fact, when polls are made it would seem majority share my view.
Maybe then 'undemocratic' is not such a bad name for it?

It's tons of bureaucracy with very little democracy.

~~~
tonyedgecombe
I think the majority don't have a clue what laws come out of the EU versus
their own parliament.

The EU has about 33 thousand employees, this is hardly tons of bureaucracy,
just UK local government has 2.3 million employees.

~~~
DanBC
A lot of local government are not strictly bureaucrats but are people
providing services.

~~~
psykovsky
Bureaucracy services, mostly.

~~~
DanBC
Teaching? Libraries? Rubbish collection? Street cleaning? Public health?
Social care; adult social services, child protection social services?

Most of that isn't what people think when they hear bureaucracy.

~~~
psykovsky
All those services are surrounded by huge bureaucratic machines. As is any
private company who wishes to make business.

------
istvan__
Good old greed. The speed CDs and the music industry is disappearing probably
will solve this issue going forward. Music is getting more and more fragmented
and smaller and smaller styles show up that are very specific to a particular
location. This will help to dismantle the music industry lobby probably.

~~~
bhrgunatha
I hear this argument very often but I don't see any strong evidence that it is
happening in the majority case, nor will happen. The music/entertainment
industries have been relatively slow to react to digitisation, the internet
and technological advances, but their lobbying prowess is frightening. Just
look at their power and handywork at the national level instigating ridiculous
and oppressive laws and at the international level at the trade agreements
being instigated. Just like in the linked article.

I __do __agree that small scale /localised success - the long tail as it used
to be referred to - is a positive force too. It looks like we all just have to
learn to live with both camps (and many more besides) being given scope to
thrive. Hopefully that's the best outcome, but this type of out of touch and
obtuse legislation is not helping.

~~~
istvan__
"In early 2015, Bandcamp released an announcement that artists using the
website had officially gotten $100 million in total from music sale"

Total music industry is 15B (afaik). It is 1/150th of the entire music
industry and that is just one site. I think the artist make more on Bandcamp
and other music distribution platforms than on big labels, that might be the
reason why Bandcamp is greatly successful.

~~~
bhrgunatha
Well that's incredibly positive and I wasn't aware of that. I'm used to seeing
more of the news that artists get almost no money through Spotify and similar
channels or that consumer websites like Pandora getting legally harassed.

~~~
thirdsun
Bandcamp is very different though - you buy and own your music there. An album
bought is worth much more to an artist than fractions of a cent per stream.

I'm not surprised that Bandcamp has been doing that well for a long time now.
In contrast to all those streaming services it's a business model that seems
to be sustainable.

------
jkot
This is just UK. I dont think it will fly in Spain, Czech rep or other parts
of EU.

For start there is author tax to compensate authors for fair use, it is
collected as VAT on empty mediums and printers. With this law many powerful
people would loose money. I would welcome it, since it means cheaper hardware.

And secondly: YES! More stupid laws like this, more DRM and people will turn
to free music under Creative-Commons like license.

~~~
psykovsky
Minor correction, the authors tax charged on printers and copy mediums is in
addition to VAT, not the same as VAT.

~~~
hrbrtglm
Minor correction, depends on the eu countries, but in France, the authors tax
charged on copy mediums is in addition to the product price without VAT, and
then VAT is applied to the whole. So you pay VAT on the authors tax. To be
clear you pay tax on tax, a french speciality.

~~~
jacquesm
In NL you pay VAT on the special taxes added to fuel and there are a couple of
other cases like this. Tax on tax is unfortunately not just a French thing.

------
Trombone12
The same story as reported by Ars technica[1] paints the EU law as the hero
that produced some slight advances in copyright regulations based on
essentially a completely reversed causuality than reported by the eff.

"The UK's music industry has successfully landed a significant judgement from
the UK's High Court, countering a copyright exception that was brought in by
the UK government last year. Since last October, there was a law that allowed
you to make private copies of your own music; now the future of that law is
uncertain."

"The UK government brought in the new copyright exception under a European
Union directive that gives national governments that power, but which requires
compensation to be paid to artists unless the harm caused to them by the
change in copyright law is minimal."

It is also fun to contrast the position on the rights holders between the eff:

"Neither can we fully absolve the rightsholders from blame;"

and Arstechnica:

"The refusal to accept gracefully legislative changes is not new for the
copyright industry. Perhaps the most egregious example of its dog-in-the-
manger attitude [snip]"

[1]: [http://arstechnica.co.uk/tech-policy/2015/06/music-
industry-...](http://arstechnica.co.uk/tech-policy/2015/06/music-industry-
wins-against-uk-government-over-private-copying-of-music/)

------
jwildeboer
The teaser is wrong. It's a UK court, deciding for the UK. Not on the European
level.

~~~
calibwam
While not wrong, as the UK is in Europe, it is a misleading title.

------
batou
Lets be realistic here.

So I'm going to go and delete 90% of my mp3s and go and purchase a CD player
this afternoon.

Actually nope, I'm going to continue to steal all my music out of a
combination of apathy and disdain for the system.

Oh and continue to go to the odd gig.

~~~
guard-of-terra
You and some other commenters miss the point completely.

Now the "rights holders" will have right to tax every storage medium you buy.
n% of what you pay for your HDD goes to them. (And I don't know who is that,
since everybody I lisen to won't get a cent)

~~~
batou
I'll have to steal more then to get my money's worth...

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beedogs
This idiotic decision will not stop one single CD from being ripped in Europe.

~~~
JadeNB
I don't think that any but the most naïve lawmaker believes that these laws
will stop the behaviour they criminalise. Rather, they simply further the "3
felonies a day" state of being
([http://www.harveysilverglate.com/Books/ThreeFeloniesaDay.asp...](http://www.harveysilverglate.com/Books/ThreeFeloniesaDay.aspx\)—and)
I will set aside (because I honestly don't know what I believe) whether that
is an intended or unintended effect.

~~~
spiritplumber
I'm in favor of anything that degrades the respect for the rule of law qua
law.

We'll have direct democracy on this stuff yet! Look at the Swiss.

~~~
JadeNB
> We'll have direct democracy on this stuff yet! Look at the Swiss.

Sorry, I'm not sufficiently up to date on this stuff to know at what about the
Swiss to look. Could you elaborate?

------
makeitsuckless
In other news: not single person who rips their own CDs in all of Europe will
give a crap.

Also, the only people still buying CDs don't rip them, and the rest of us have
ripped their last CD over a decade ago.

The actual impact of this decision is close to zero, and therefor not a strong
argument for copyright reform. Many countries still have outdated laws on the
books nobody bothers with, making noise about this just gives the impression
copyright reform isn't urgent.

~~~
dmoo
Exactly, I'm old enough to have many hundreds of CDs, cassettes and vinyl,
it's quicker to download an album that I own than to go and look for it around
the house let alone including the time to rip it.

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pmontra
"UK court". Reading "European court" made me think it was a ruling by an EU
level court. That would have a different fallout.

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colomon
I'm curious. This is phrased as a ruling on CDs. But doesn't the logic used
suggest that if I buy an album on MP3, I cannot copy those files to my server
and phone? It would be really weird if (US prices here, maybe UK is
different?) I spend $15 on a CD I can only listen to the music using the
original CD in a CD player, but if I spend $9 on an MP3 album, I can copy it
to all my devices.

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MatthewWilkes
I think the EFF needs to send its people on a copywriting course, this article
is so poorly written it's almost unreadable.

