How can I prevent the revised copyright law directive draft imposing a link tax from being approved?

by Matt May

In addition to Article 11 ( Link Tax ) where copyright royalty occurs by merely attaching a link, the proposed amendment of the EU 's Copyright Law Directive includes Article 13, which imposes obligation on copyright filters on content platforms such as SNS, It obliges strict copyright protection. Finally negotiations for the agreement of the final document ended and voting for actual approval was done.

Julia Reda - Breaking: The text of Article 13 and the EU Copyright Directive has just finalized
https://juliareda.eu/2019/02/eu-copyright-final-text/

The EU 's revised copyright law draft directive, which obliges too strict copyright protection, has received many objections, such as " destroying the Internet " and " forcing companies to create magical wand ". Nevertheless, the European Parliament and the Council of Europe agreed on the final document of the revised copyright law directive, and finally it is expected that the final vote will be given for approval at last.

Article 11 stipulates the license fee for websites such as search engines and news aggregators to refer URLs by quoting news articles more than "single words" or "very short excerpts". This is also true for individuals, small businesses and websites operated by startups, and Google has suggested withdrawal from Google News from Europe, and in Article which is currently under consideration Article 11 of the revised copyright law directive Analysis that at least 45% of the traffic to the news site will be reduced if it goes into effect.

Still, Article 13 introduces an upload filter to the content platform to prevent copyright infringement beforehand, or to purchase licenses of all copyrighted contents all over the world that the user may upload It will impose "maximum effort" to do. If it is judged that the platform does not fulfill the effort obligation sufficiently, the responsibility of copyright infringement is said to be on the platform side. However, criticism that "firms are forced to produce magical wand" is also made, and other lawmakers who agree with are condemned not to perceive any technical problems at all.

The EU amendment of the revised copyright directive pointed out that "companies are forced to produce magical wand" - GIGAZINE

Julia Reda , a German politician and a member of the European Parliament, is one of the people who strongly oppose the draft amended copyright law directive, pointed out the danger that freedom of speech will be restricted by the revised copyright law directive It is. However, Mr. Reda insisted that he can "stop the approval of the revised copyright law directive yet" and stated that the vote to be held after the final document agreement is the last chance.

First of all, the European Parliament will obtain approval from the Legal Affairs Committee on February 18 regarding the final document of the amended copyright law directive. Thereafter voting by the EU member states took place at the European Council where at least 13 members of the Member State expressed opposition or the population of the Member States that opposed it accounted for more than 35% of the population of the Member States In this case, it is possible to block the proposed revised copyright law directive at this point. At the last European Council, the eight countries opposed the revised copyright law directive, and the population ratio was 27%. There is a possibility that Germany and other small countries oppose it in the future, but the possibility that the revised copyright law directive will be blocked by the member states' government is not so high.

What Mr. Reda hopes most is the final ballot made by 751 European legislators. In the final vote held from March 25 to 28, 2019 April 4, April 4, 2019 or April 15 to 18, if more than half of the lawmakers express opposition, the revised copyright law draft directive is the It will not pass through, including Article 11 and Article 13. In fact, in the vote held in July 2018, we succeeded in voting against opposition . If it is rejected, either reject the revised copyright law directive completely or pass it without Article 11 and 13 which is problematic or to shelve until the election of the European Parliamentarians held in May 2019 You will be asked to choose whether to do.

The final vote by the European Parliamentarians will be held just a few weeks before the elections of the European Parliament in May 2019 and Mr. Reda said that "all the lawmakers and parties are seeking re-election" I will. Because the election of the European Parliament is elected by direct election, if the voters declare their intentions to oppose Article 11 and Article 13, the possibility that lawmakers seeking re-election will oppose opposing the voter's will Mr. Reda asserted when it got higher.

by Element 5 Digital