Members of European Parliament have voted to pass changes to the controversial EU copyright laws, which critics argue could ‘ruin the internet’. MEPs cast their votes to approve amended versions of the directive’s most controversial parts at the European Parliament in Strasbourg, France. The proposal passed unchallenged, meaning that the proposed EU Copyright Directive can pass into law without the need for further amendments. The EU Copyright Directive will undergo a final vote in European Parliament in January. However, it seems unlikely following today’s vote that the amended proposal will not pass. MEPs voted 438 votes to 226 in favour of passing the amended EU Copyright Directive. The news will be welcomed by those in the entertainment industry. The changes were designed to update copyright laws for the digital age, helping to solve issues such as the illegal sharing of music and movies over the internet. Tech giants like Google, as well as internet pioneer Tim Berners-Lee, have previously argued against the proposal. Cause of the controversy: EU Article 11 and Article 13 An initial vote held in July saw the changes blocked following backlash from campaign groups and members of the public. This criticism has been aimed, in particular, at two particular parts of the proposal titled Article 11 and Article 13. Article 11 is frequently referred to as the ‘link tax’ by critics. Online services will be banned from linking to news outlets on their platforms unless they have a license which allows them to do so once this is implemented. The EU sees this as a way to force tech giants like Google and Facebook to redistribute some of their profits with the publications that they are profiting off of. However, this is concerning for smaller news outlets that may not be able to afford the additional costs. Article 13 proposes that digital companies should be responsible for removing copyrighted material from their platforms. Under the old laws, responsibility fell on the individual uploading the content to ensure that they weren’t breaching copyright laws. These laws are, in part, aimed at ensuring that tech giants take responsibility for content being shared on their platforms. However, like Article 11, there are concerns that this will put an unmanageable strain on smaller websites and services. Some have criticised the law changes as an attack on free speech. Marty P. Kamden, Chief Marketing Officer of private network provider NordVPN, said:<doc-sep>EU Parliament Approves Strong Article 13 Copyright Directive, Will End ‘Safe Harbor’ The EU Parliament voted overwhelmingly Wednesday to approve strong new copyright legislation. While some changes were made, the provisions, adopted by a vote of 438 to 226, include strong wording that makes YouTube, Facebook and others liable for material uploaded to their platform. Article 11, which includes a so-called 'link tax' was also approved. ____________________________________ In a move sought by a broad music industry coalition, the European Union Parliament overwhelmingly approved Articles 11 and 13 Wednesday. The legislation includes strong new copyright protections for all creators. Included is a new directive that will force popular sites like YouTube to 'filter' or pre-check material upload to its site and hold the companies liable if the content is not properly licensed. Google and other critics argue the law will severely limit the flow of creative content. The approved legislation reads: “Article 13 creates an obligation on information society service providers storing and giving access to large amounts of works and other subject-matter uploaded by their users to take appropriate and proportionate measures to ensure the functioning of agreements concluded with rightholders and to prevent the availability on their services of content identified by rightholders in cooperation with the service providers” EU and UK trade groups including IMPALA and the Music Publishers Association hailed the vote on Article 13 as "historic." [IMPALA Statement] European Parliament gives the thumbs up on copyright reform – Great result for Europe’s creators -> https://t.co/KUP6x7OMRc pic.twitter.com/PAF0LTrNFM — IMPALA (@IMPALAMusic) September 12, 2018 Article 11 is aimed primarily at newspaper and other publishers, giving them more control and potential compensation when companies like Google link to their stories. The legislation approved today still faces a final vote in the European Parliament in January. Given today's 438 to 226 vote it seems unlikely that it will be rejected. The #CopyrightDirective was adopted today! It’s a landslide win for European culture and democracy, with 438 votes in favor, 226 against and 39 abstentions! #EuropeForCreators #Europe #Culture https://t.co/bAJZ5rOnmt pic.twitter.com/CvzUMpe2jq — Europe For Creators (@EUForCreators) September 12, 2018 Share on:<doc-sep>The fight over EU copyright reform is not over yet. Today, members of the European Parliament (MEPs) will vote on amendments to the Copyright Directive, a piece of draft legislation that was intended to update copyright for the internet age but has been mired in controversy after the inclusion of two provisions: Articles 11 and 13, also known as the “link tax” and “upload filter.” Critics of the directive claim that these clauses threaten the internet as we know it. The link tax would require online platforms like Google and Facebook to pay media companies when linking to their articles, and the upload filter could force them to check all content uploaded to their sites to remove copyrighted material. Supporters of these measures, meanwhile, say their dangers are being exaggerated and that the legislation simply gives small players a way to reclaim the value of their work in an ecosystem monopolized by Silicon Valley. “If they don’t understand the rules, what hope the rest of us?” You might have thought these issues were settled already if you remembered that the legislation was rejected by EU politicians in July. However, that vote only sent the directive back to the drawing board, giving MEPs a chance to suggest amendments. (They did so with gusto, sending in hundreds.) Today, these amendments will be voted on. The result could be that the legislation carries on exactly as before (with Articles 11 and 13 intact); the articles might be removed; or any number of other changes introduced. EU watchers say it’s impossible to predict the outcome of today’s votes, and, whatever happens, we’re still a long way from actual legislation. Any amendments approved on Wednesday will be subject to further negotiations between politicians and member states in a closed-door process known as “trilogues.” Whatever emerges from those debates will be subject to a final vote by the EU Parliament in January. After that, it will still be up to individual member states to interpret the directive and turn it into law. In other words: you haven’t heard the last of the Copyright Directive yet. This seemingly endless back-and-forth (over legislation that was first introduced in 2016) is confusing even to those directly involved. “The system is so complicated that last Friday the [European Parliament] legal affairs committee tweeted an incorrect assessment of what’s happening,” Joe McNamee, executive director of digital rights association EDRi, told The Verge. “If they don’t understand the rules, what hope the rest of us?” What are we fighting about again? Leaving aside procedural vagaries, there’s the trickier issue of assessing the actual impact of the Copyright Directive. Much of the discussion online has focused on its destructive potential, with figures like Wikipedia founder Jimmy Wales and World Wide Web inventor Tim Berners-Lee warning that it could lead to the “death of the internet” by impeding the free flow of information. Article 13 is particularly controversial. Critics compare it to YouTube’s Content ID: the automated system that checks videos for copyright material like songs and blocks anything that hasn’t been licensed. Implementing such a system for the entire web would likely be a recipe for disaster: it would be a boon for copyright trolls, would block legitimate material by accident, and would be so difficult to implement that it would stop smaller platforms (like rivals of Google) from getting their foot in the door. “The Copyright Directive entrenches the power of dominant internet platforms, which are the only ones that can afford the automatic copyright filter,” Gus Rossi, global policy director of US nonprofit Public Knowledge, tells The Verge. “a loop of misinformation and scaremongering” But supporters of Article 13 (and other controversial parts of the directive) say this is an unfair caricature, pushed in part by the tech giants themselves. The UK’s Society of Authors, one of the many artist organizations that supports the Copyright Directive, notes that US companies have spent “millions of pounds lobbying against the Directive,” and says their campaign has been “characterized by a loop of misinformation and scaremongering.” The Society of Authors’ own gloss of the directive sounds much more reasonable. Its 12-point breakdown says the legislation is primarily about delivering fair pay to content creators, and it notes that a number of amendments have been added to the legislation (such as the safeguarding of parody content and memes as an exception to copyright claims) that neutralize critics’ most alarmist claims. The society concludes: “Not allowing creators to make a living from their work is the real threat to freedom of expression.” Speaking to the Financial Times today, the EU’s digital commissioner, Mariya Gabriel, makes a similar case, saying: “None of the positions now on the table will destroy the internet or prevent citizens from sharing hyperlinks, parodic images or their wedding memories. [...] Only big platforms will benefit from the absence of a copyright reform: not the creators, not the press, not the citizens.” It’s impossible not to see sense in both sides, but it’s equally impossible to say which is definitively correct. That’s partly because whatever version of the Copyright Directive passes will still have to be interpreted by individual member states. These deliberations could turn the directive into the threatened “censorship machines” or could return revenue to artists and creators usurped by the internet’s titans. They might even do both. After the vote, more talk Whatever happens in today’s vote, it won’t be the end. Once each amendment to the directive has been accepted or rejected, the resulting legislation will be subject to further debates. These are the so-called trilogues; behind-doors negotiations that will aim to find a compromise between the version of the Copyright Directive approved by the European Parliament, and the version approved earlier in the year by the European Council. These negotiations will be very influential, and will be led by the Copyright Directive’s rapporteur: an MEP named Axel Voss who is a strong supporter of Articles 11 and 13. EDRi’s McNamee describes Voss as a “copyright fundamentalist” and says his involvement means that politicians fighting to remove Articles 11 and 13 will have an “uphill battle.” Negotiations will continue long after today’s vote “Even if we get reasonable amendments adopted [on Wednesday], unless they’re very, very, very good, Voss will be negotiating behind closed doors for the next two or three months to reach a compromise with the council,” says McNamee. Following those negotiations, a final version of the Copyright Directive will be subject to approval by the European Parliament, a vote that will likely happen in January. The timing is notable, as it’s just before European parliamentary elections in May, meaning that MEPs seeking reelection will be eager to keep on the good side of any vocal constituents. What happens next is still anyone’s guess. “It’s hard to know,” says Public Knowledge’s Rossi. “My best guess scenario would be a rejection of Article 11 and Article 13. But the EU Parliament is a body of compromise, and I think everybody feels there has to be an Article 11 and Article 13 in some form.”<doc-sep>
YouTube's logo is seen against the flag of the European Union. Omar Marques | SOPA Images | LightRocket | Getty Images European parliamentarians are set to vote on a controversial copyright law that some critics believe could stop people from sharing memes and articles online. Lawmakers in Strasbourg, France, will cast their votes on the European Union's new copyright directive on Wednesday. The result of that vote could determine whether large tech companies including Facebook, Twitter and Google are forced to use filtering systems that block copyrighted content. Such firms may also be required to pay news organizations for the rights to share articles and other copyright-protected content like scientific papers, something that critics have dubbed a "link tax." The proposed law has ignited a fierce debate, luring high-profile figures from both the tech and media industries. On the tech side, voices arguing against the legislation include internet pioneer Tim Berners-Lee and Wikipedia founder Jimmy Wales. Big names within the media sector, who are mostly for the reforms, range from former Beatle Paul McCartney to French DJ David Guetta. The European Parliament had initially voted to delay the proposed law in July, rejecting a closed-door debate that would have sped up the process of passing it into law. Why is it so controversial? Two particular parts of the directive have attracted the most criticism from pro-internet freedom activists. One is Article 13. This section calls on internet giants to take "appropriate and proportionate" measures to prevent user-generated content that infringes a rightsholder's copyright. This part of the law has come under heavy criticism over concerns that tech giants could end up using automated content filtering systems. The law states that "effective content recognition systems" should be put in place by digital companies to prevent copyrighted materials from being distributed on their platforms. Campaigners have scrutinized this part of the legislation over concerns that it could amount to censorship, and argue that the use of copyright-protected material by way of commentary or parody should be permitted under the doctrine of "fair use." Particular attention has been paid to the status of "memes," which often rely on copyright protected images or pieces of video, and whether they could be censored as a result. "This plan for 'robo-copyright' would target memes, parodies and clips of people cheering at football matches," Jim Killock, executive director of anti-censorship organization Open Rights Group, told CNBC in an email Tuesday. "Copyright is important, but so is free speech." He added: "Machines can't judge human culture. When they can, we'll have bigger issues to think through than copyright enforcement." But Axel Voss, a European parliamentarian and key proponent of the law, has said it won't lead to the censorship of memes. "If we are looking to memes, the legitimate use of memes is not a question of Article 13, it is of copyright," Voss told CNBC in July. "This is nothing new." Another controversial section is Article 11, which would grant news outlets a claim to copyright over the sharing of their content online. Opponents of the law, like Julia Reda, a European lawmaker and German Pirate Party politician, see this as an effective "link tax." But proponents, like Voss, say hyperlinks aren't under threat. Why does it matter? It's important to remember that internet giants such as Google are opposed to the law as it would impact their business model. The company has been accused of lobbying aggressively to prevent the directive from being passed into law. Many tech platforms, like Google's YouTube, rely on a model of user-generated content, where people often share images, music and snippets from films. In most cases, where a copyright infringement has taken place, content is taken down following a request from a publisher. But the new legal framework would place the onus of removal on internet giants. Such a shift in the law could force many of these firms to rethink that model. YouTube has said it is opposed to the law on the basis it could stifle the creative freedom of video makers and impact negatively on their subscriber bases and incomes. "We've always believed there's a better way than this, and that innovation and partnership are the keys to successful, diverse and sustainable news and creative sectors in the EU," the company said in an emailed statement. "For both European creators and consumers, it's vital to preserve the principles of linking, sharing and creativity on which so much of the web's success is built."