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European Copyright Law Could Soon Get Worse

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Re: European Copyright Law Could Soon Get Worse

#41

Post by henrikschroder »

nannePOPI wrote: post #5
mattsfrey wrote: post #2

"The biggest and most worrisome changes are to the "link tax" proposal, which would establish a special copyright-like fee to be paid by websites to news publishers, in exchange for the privilege of using short snippets of quoted text as part of a link to the original news article. Voss's latest amendments would make the link tax an inalienable right, that news publishers cannot waive even if they choose to." "...tha…

[flagged]

> globalists

Did you mean actual globalists, or were you just using a racist dog-whistle to imply Jews?

Re: European Copyright Law Could Soon Get Worse

#42

Post by GW150914 »

ryanwaggoner wrote: post #40
NegativeLatency wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We’ll have to se how it plays out, but I suspect if you operate a small site outside of the EU you won’t be impacted.

Of course you won’t be impacted, but your protection is via selective enforcement. You won’t be in compliance with the law, but the government will lack the resources or determination to punish you. Until that changes. This is fundamentally dangerous. Once we are all lawbreakers all the time, it creates a powerful tool for oppression and using the law to harass and silence political opponents.

It’s not that slippery slopes don’t exist, but when the only argument against something is the supposed harm that it may lead to via a slippery slope, it’s suspicious and unconvincing. This thread is full of people saying that this is a step on the road to tyranny, and may end there, that’s true, but the arguments don’t seem to really support the claims.

If this really matters to you, and you care about doing more than signaling to others of your ideological persuasion, you need to offer more and better. Slippery slope is too often the lazy fallacy, and not a real case against something. How does this law as written and likely enforced do all of the bad things claimed here?

Re: European Copyright Law Could Soon Get Worse

#43

Post by sykh »

nannePOPI wrote: post #20
sykh wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

With this proposal they want to impede freedom of information while at the same time get some of that sweet tax money in the pockets of their allies. This sounds plausible but do you have evidence that it is actually true? An equally plausible reason for the proposed change is that European leaders see what media consolidation leads too. Too many people relying on too few sources for information. Perhaps this legisla…

These kind of laws make it much more difficult to spread content and therefore they consolidate informations in few player, often loved by the governments and their puppeteers. We used to be able to put a website online, gather emails to send newsletters, offer services to our users, etc without any help from the government. Now, every time I put a new website online I have to fill pages of pages with stupid policies…

That may be a consequence of such laws but do you have evidence that this is the consequence that the people making this law want? What evidence do you have for the motivations for the people making this law.

Re: European Copyright Law Could Soon Get Worse

#44

Post by dahauns »

IAmEveryone wrote: post #39
mattsfrey wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The way I look at it is it will constrain the ability to deliver news to those who can afford to produce original content, which will be larger outlets with more resources. This allows a vastly smaller group to control the narrative. How will this effect google or facebook at all? Anyone with a blog looking to quote a news outlet and provide commentary is now mandatorily taxed? How do you NOT see this as bad? What go…

> How will this effect google or facebook at all? Google and Facebook show titles and quotes of linked articles. This legislation is specifically aimed at them. Noncommercial actors (bloggers etc) are supposed to be exempt. > How do you NOT see this as bad? It is extremely frustrating how people on HN apparently have no ability to acknowledge a valid argument for a position they oppose. Read the last two paragraphs o…

>Noncommercial actors (bloggers etc) are supposed to be exempt.

Looking at EU's history of jurisdiction in these matters, this usually means almost no one is considered "noncommercial". You better believe this is going to hit small bloggers hard. C&D-happy lawyers are going to have a field day.

Re: European Copyright Law Could Soon Get Worse

#45

Post by disconnected »

nannePOPI wrote: post #25
ggm wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

GDPR is not about stopping the spread of free information. its about personal data. You are completely mis-characterising the nature of the GDPR legislation. Regulators are not enemies. Regulators are the enemies of established companies, and operate in favour of civil society as civil servants: they are subject to oversight, and are imposed to create oversight over entities who are not equilibriating in favour of wi…

You must have a really short memory to say that "regulators are not enemies". Just look at any history book, tell me what you find. Since English is not my first language, it tires me to write in it, so I'll give a little example that will destroy the "GDPR protects privacy" once and for all. If I make a website with a comment system, or maybe a forum, I need to reveal to the world my identity otherwise the EU will g…

> Instead now I need to write a stupid page where I say "[MY NAME] will manage your data this and this way".

Are you referring to the Data Protection Officer (DPO) requirement?

I believe this is the relevant article: https://gdpr-info.eu/art-37-gdpr/

If I understand correctly, you only need to appoint a DPO in cases where you are either a public entity (you are not) or in cases where your site requires "regular and systematic monitoring of data subjects on a large scale", or in a couple of other special cases where you process extremely sensitive data.

Presumably you aren't doing that on "your" forum/webpage, so you don't need to appoint a DPO.

I think you are making a bit of a storm in a teacup here.

Re: European Copyright Law Could Soon Get Worse

#47

Post by briandear »

IAmEveryone wrote: post #31
mattsfrey wrote: post #2

"The biggest and most worrisome changes are to the "link tax" proposal, which would establish a special copyright-like fee to be paid by websites to news publishers, in exchange for the privilege of using short snippets of quoted text as part of a link to the original news article. Voss's latest amendments would make the link tax an inalienable right, that news publishers cannot waive even if they choose to." "...tha…

That's a strange interpretation, and I say it doesn't seem like you're trying too hard to assume good faith. The EU is worried about publishers both big and small. Currently, investing half a year's worth of a journalist's work into investigations is a rather bad business decision, because everyone can freely reuse the facts you uncovered: spend a year finding corruption, write it up in a day, 10 minutes later it's o…

> it doesn't seem like you're trying too hard to assume good faith

The same EU that regulated the shape of cucumbers? They regulated shapes of bananas. The EU also launched a kettle and toaster crackdown after the Brexit vote. [1] -- but hid those plans until after the vote.

This is also the EU that hid plans to ban high powered kettles and toasters until after the Brexit vote so they wouldn't fuel the Leave campaign. So the EU says, "Let's keep this unpopular stuff a secret so we don't piss off the British and cause the vote to swing to Leave."

The same EU that banned effective, powerful vacuum cleaners because of climate change? [2] The EU that would have people living in straw huts if it meant a 0.001% decline in CO2?

This manipulative, vindictive EU that hid their intentions from the British public because they knew those intentions would be unpopular?

To assume "good faith" on the part of the EU for any reason, is, itself, an act of faith and more likely, an act of delusion.

[1] https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2016/05/10/eu-to-launch-ket... [2] https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/eu/1104712...

Re: European Copyright Law Could Soon Get Worse

#48

Post by nannePOPI »

disconnected wrote: post #45
nannePOPI wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You must have a really short memory to say that "regulators are not enemies". Just look at any history book, tell me what you find. Since English is not my first language, it tires me to write in it, so I'll give a little example that will destroy the "GDPR protects privacy" once and for all. If I make a website with a comment system, or maybe a forum, I need to reveal to the world my identity otherwise the EU will g…

> Instead now I need to write a stupid page where I say "[MY NAME] will manage your data this and this way". Are you referring to the Data Protection Officer (DPO) requirement? I believe this is the relevant article: https://gdpr-info.eu/art-37-gdpr/ If I understand correctly, you only need to appoint a DPO in cases where you are either a public entity (you are not) or in cases where your site requires "regular and s…

You need to reveal who is managing the data in any case, which is separate from the DPO.

Re: European Copyright Law Could Soon Get Worse

#49

Post by briandear »

IAmEveryone wrote: post #39
mattsfrey wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The way I look at it is it will constrain the ability to deliver news to those who can afford to produce original content, which will be larger outlets with more resources. This allows a vastly smaller group to control the narrative. How will this effect google or facebook at all? Anyone with a blog looking to quote a news outlet and provide commentary is now mandatorily taxed? How do you NOT see this as bad? What go…

> How will this effect google or facebook at all? Google and Facebook show titles and quotes of linked articles. This legislation is specifically aimed at them. Noncommercial actors (bloggers etc) are supposed to be exempt. > How do you NOT see this as bad? It is extremely frustrating how people on HN apparently have no ability to acknowledge a valid argument for a position they oppose. Read the last two paragraphs o…

> The latter is fundamental for a functioning democracy.

But if distributors have to pay to link to such content, then such content will not contribute to a functioning democracy because nobody will be able to discover this content.

And, it's funny you mention "functioning democracy" -- tell me how Brussels is part of a functioning democracy? The European Commission President and commissioners aren't elected are they? The Commission has the sole right to propose EU legislation -- which is binding on all member states.

So a Commission that isn't elected gets to force it's will on otherwise democratic countries?

How is that "functioning democracy?" A bit ironic that an undemocratic institution's actions are being defended as protecting something fundamental to a functioning democracy.

It's funny to me as an American living in Europe that many people criticize the US Electoral College system to elect the US president, yet see no problem with accepting the regime of the European Commission, despite not getting a vote on the the Commission President or Commissioners.

Re: European Copyright Law Could Soon Get Worse

#50

Post by brazzledazzle »

nannePOPI wrote: post #34
lagadu wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That would require that you provide a service within the EU and that you store personal data, neither of which you do in your example.

if I have a forum I store the email of the users so they can recover the password. Same thing if I put up a simple newsletter to contact my users, I have their emails (newsletters may not be fashionable but they're much more effective than using a facebook page or other systems, since you own the email list of people who want to hear from you). So, even in the boring world of small websites, you have to comply.

What I’ve read indicates that if you’re not targeting EU users (via ads or as customers), especially if you aren’t commercial, you don’t have to do anything. Is that not true?
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