Talk:Directive on Copyright in the Digital Single Market/Archive 1

Electronic Frontier Foundation

 * Cory Doctorow just published (full disclosure: with a small amount of input from me) an analysis on the Electronic Frontier Foundation website:


 * The EU's Copyright Proposal is Extremely Bad News for Everyone, Even (Especially!) Wikipedia --Guy Macon (talk) 00:34, 8 June 2018 (UTC)

Timeline of the proposal
Here's a timeline of the proposals, per Guy's request on Jimbo's talk page (which seems to have disappeared?)

5 December 2013 - 5 March 2014: Outgoing European Commission holds a broad public consultation on the reform of EU copyright law, which attracts an unprecedented number of civil society responses: http://ec.europa.eu/internal_market/consultations/2013/copyright-rules/docs/contributions/consultation-report_en.pdf

Spring 2014: EPP Lead candidate for the Commission presidency Jean-Claude Juncker announces copyright reform as part of his no 1 priority in his election manifesto. The goal is to create a digital single market for consumers and businesses and to break down national silos in copyright law: http://juncker.epp.eu/my-priorities

2 July 2014: Outgoing Digital Commissioner Neelie Kroes makes a passionate appeal for copyright reform: “Today's world is a very different one to that of the 2001 EU Copyright Directive. With new expectations for consumers, new opportunities for creators. new tools from social media to big data.

Every day citizens here in the Netherlands and across the EU break the law just to do something commonplace. And who can blame them when those laws are so ill-adapted. Every day, startups, small businesses, scientists abandon innovative ideas because the legal fees are too great. Every day, people bypass the copyright system using alternatives like open source: something which can lead to huge creativity, innovation, and richness. Copyright risks becoming an irrelevance.” http://europa.eu/rapid/press-release_SPEECH-14-528_en.htm

15 July 2014: Juncker is elected Commission President by the European Parliament

22 July 2014: EU Commission releases its report on the public consultation showing broad public support for a progressive copyright reform, replacing the complicated national rules with one single European copyright law: http://ec.europa.eu/internal_market/consultations/2013/copyright-rules/docs/contributions/consultation-report_en.pdf

Reda's analysis: https://juliareda.eu/2014/08/the-european-copyright-divide/

10 September 2014: Commission President Juncker proposes German Commissioner-designate Günther Oettinger as new Commissioner for digital, a move that is met with wide criticism from the Parliament, as Oëttinger has no prior experience with digital topics, but close ties to industry, including publishers: https://juliareda.eu/2014/09/eu-commission-net-politics-appointments-misguided/

30 September 2014: Commissioner-designate Oettinger is heard before the European Parliament and offends MEPs by blaming victims of hacking iCloud accounts: https://juliareda.eu/2014/09/oettinger-to-celebrity-hacking-victims-youre-dumb/

22 October 2014: Despite serious doubts about Oettinger’s suitability as Digital Commissioner, the EU Commission is voted into office by the EU Parliament (There is no vote on the individual members, just on the Commission as a whole).

28 October 2014: Oëttinger announces his plan to introduce an EU-wide link tax in German newspaper Handelsblatt: https://juliareda.eu/2014/10/an-eu-wide-google-tax-in-the-making/

November 2014: Parliament announces appointment of Julia Reda as rapporteur for an own-initiative report reviewing the existing EU copyright law, the 2001 InfoSoc directive: https://juliareda.eu/2014/12/eu-copyright-evaluation/

18 November 2014: French cultural minister Fleur Pellerin harshly criticizes Julia Reda’s appointment and warns against a too ambitious EU copyright reform. https://www.contexte.com/article/propriete-intellectuelle-2/droit-dauteur_27208.html

11 December 2014: Google announces the shutdown of Google News in Spain, following the introduction of the Spanish link tax, known as CanonAEDE: https://europe.googleblog.com/2014/12/an-update-on-google-news-in-spain.html?m=1

12 December 2014: MEPs led by Julia Reda (Greens/EFA), Marietje Schaake (ALDE), Michał Boni (EPP) and Joe Weidenholzer (S&D) found the Digital Agenda Intergroup, the cross-party parliamentary caucus that will go on to lead the fight against the upload filter and link tax proposals. https://juliareda.eu/2014/12/meps-establish-intergroup-on-the-digital-agenda/

17 December 2014: Oettinger reiterates his plans for a link tax in front of Parliament working group on copyright: https://juliareda.eu/2014/12/eu-copyright-expansion-for-press-publishers/

19 January 2015: Julia Reda publishes her draft report on copyright, which finds that EU copyright rules are maladapted to cross-border cultural exchange on the web, calling for a simplification of rules that will strengthen users and authors against publishers and other intermediaries. It also fundamentally rejects the idea of a link tax. The report is opened for public comments and presented to the legal affairs committee on January 20: https://juliareda.eu/2015/01/report-eu-copyright-rules-maladapted-to-the-web/

21 April 2015: Leaked Commission strategy document reveals plans to introduce obligations on online intermediaries to monitor user uploads for copyright infringement: https://juliareda.eu/2015/04/digital-single-market-patchy-and-timid/

6 May 2015: The strategy document is officially published: https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/?qid=1447773803386&uri=CELEX:52015DC0192

16 June 2015: Legal Affairs committee adopts “Reda report” on copyright with significant amendments. The general message of the report remains intact, the link tax is once again rejected. An amendment calling for the abolition of Freedom of Panorama causes controversy: https://juliareda.eu/2015/06/reda-report-adopted-a-turning-point-in-the-copyright-debate/

9 July 2015: European Parliament adopts Reda report with a broad majority. Yet another amendment to support the link tax is rejected. The amendment to restrict Freedom of Panorama is deleted. https://juliareda.eu/2015/07/eu-parliament-defends-freedom-of-panorama-calls-for-copyright-reform/

5 November 2015: A draft Commission communication on copyright reform leaked by the professional Intellectual Property blog IPKat reveals Commission’s plans to introduce the link tax - despite the Parliament’s repeated rejection of the idea. Julia Reda’s report of these plans makes international headlines: https://juliareda.eu/2015/07/eu-parliament-defends-freedom-of-panorama-calls-for-copyright-reform/ http://ipkitten.blogspot.com/2015/11/kat-exclusive-eu-commission-due-to.html?m=1

9 December 2015: Commission Communication in copyright reform is officially published: http://ec.europa.eu/newsroom/dae/document.cfm?action=display&doc_id=12526

17 December 2015: The Digital Agenda Intergroup publishes an open letter to the Commission, signed by 83 MEPs, rejecting the Commission’s plan to introduce an ancillary copyright (link tax): https://juliareda.eu/2015/12/ancillary-copyright-open-letter/

3 April 2016: An international consortium of journalists publishes the Panama Papers, which send shockwaves through international politics. The documents detail tax evasion practices by many public figures. They also implicate Maltese Prime Minister Joseph Muscat.

May/June 2016: European Commission announces another public consultation on copyright, namely on the introduction of ancillary copyright (link tax) and Freedom of Panorama, delaying the proposal of a new copyright law to the fall: https://ec.europa.eu/eusurvey/runner/Consultation_Copyright

12 May 2016: OpenMedia delivers Petition of over 10,000 people to save the link to Members of the Digital Agenda Intergroup: https://juliareda.eu/2016/05/save-the-link/

26 August 2016: Leak of the upcoming Directive on copyright in the Digital Single Market by Statewatch reveals that Commission is about to ignore the outcomes of its own consultation by introducing a link tax and upload filters, but failing to make Freedom of Panorama mandatory: http://statewatch.org/news/2016/aug/eu-com-copyright-draft.pdf

31 August 2016: Another version of the upcoming directive is leaked by IPKat: http://ipkitten.blogspot.com/2016/08/super-kat-exclusive-heres-draft.html?m=1

14 September 2016: Draft copyright directive is presented by the European Commission. On the same day, in his State of the Union speech, Commission President Juncker announces that publishers should be paid ‘whether [their content] is published via a copying machine or hyperlinked on the web.’ https://juliareda.eu/2016/09/attack-on-link/

5 December 2016: 37 UK copyright scholars sharply criticize the draft copyright directive: https://www.iposgoode.ca/wp-content/uploads/2016/12/IPOModernisingIPProfResponsePressPublishers.pdf

December 2016: The European Parliament’s own research service criticizes that the upload filter proposal introduces a general monitoring obligation that is illegal under EU law: http://www.europarl.europa.eu/RegData/etudes/BRIE/2016/593799/EPRS_BRI%282016%29593799_EN.pdf

December 2016/January 2017: Günther Oettinger is promoted to Budget Commissioner, despite widespread calls for his resignation over racist, sexist and homophobic statements. His portfolio is temporarily taken over by Commission Vice-President Andrus Ansip, and later by the newly appointed Bulgarian Commissioner Mariya Gabriel: https://juliareda.eu/2016/12/10-illegal-things/

11 January 2017: Digital Agenda Intergroup Starts cross-country and cross-party campaign #SaveTheLink: https://juliareda.eu/2017/01/save-the-link-2017/

24 January 2017: The European Copyright Society issues its negative opinion on the EU copyright reform plans: https://europeancopyrightsocietydotorg.files.wordpress.com/2015/12/ecs-opinion-on-eu-copyright-reform-def.pdf

22 February 2017: Lead European Copyright Research Centres slam EU copyright plans in an open letter: https://www.create.ac.uk//wp-content/uploads/2017/02/OpenLetter_EU_Copyright_Reform_22_02_2017.pdf

1 March 2017: Academic study commissioned by the Greens/EFA group shows that upload filter proposal violates fundamental rights: https://juliareda.eu/2017/03/study-article13-upload-surveillance/

8 March 2017: The Draft Report of the European Parliament rapporteur of the Directive on copyright in the Digital Single Market, Maltese EPP Member Therese Comodini Cachia, is leaked by Politico Europe. The draft lays out the proposed amendments to the Commission proposal. It recommends replacing the link tax with a less far-reaching presumption rule that would strengthen publishers’ standing in court, without introducing a new exclusive right for press publishers. It also seeks to bring the proposal on Article 13 in line with European law, removing the obligation to filter uploads. https://juliareda.eu/2017/03/comodini-report-copyright/

March 2017: The Comodini Draft report is officially published on the Parliament’s website (it now lists Axel Voss as the author, but it was written by Therese Comodini Cachia): http://www.europarl.europa.eu/sides/getDoc.do?pubRef=-%2f%2fEP%2f%2fNONSGML%2bCOMPARL%2bPE-601.094%2b01%2bDOC%2bPDF%2bV0%2f%2fEN

9 April 2017: Startups speak out against EU copyright reform in Parliament hearing: https://juliareda.eu/2017/04/copyright-reform-kills-eu-startups/

1 May 2017: Amid a growing corruption scandal revealed by the Panama Papers, Maltese Prime Minister Joseph Muscat (S&D) calls for snap elections. Therese Comodini Cachia (EPP) decides to stand in the national elections for the opposition.

May 2017: In the Parliament’s Internal Market and Consumer Protection (IMCO) committee, which is issuing an opinion on the copyright reform and has shared responsibility for Article 13, EPP member Pascal Arimont is seeking support for making the Commission proposal on upload filters even more extreme. This “alternative compromise” is published by Julia Reda on her blog and ultimately withdrawn: https://juliareda.eu/2017/05/alternative-compromise/

3 June 2017: Maltese Prime Minister Joseph Muscat’s Socialist Party wins the snap elections in Malta, despite the corruption scandal. Therese Comodini wins a seat in the Maltese National Parliament. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maltese_general_election,_2017

8 June 2017: The IMCO committee, led by its rapporteur Catherine Stihler (S&D), votes on its opinion, rejecting the idea of upload filters and somewhat increasing online platforms’ responsibility to license copyrighted works. Attempts to amend the link tax proposal end in a stalemate, none of the amendments reach a majority: http://www.europarl.europa.eu/sides/getDoc.do?pubRef=-%2f%2fEP%2f%2fNONSGML%2bCOMPARL%2bPE-599.682%2b02%2bDOC%2bPDF%2bV0%2f%2fEN

8 June 2017: After initial statements that she wants to continue to serve as an MEP, Therese Comodini Cachia gives up her seat in the European Parliament to take up her seat in the Maltese National Parliament, amid protests from Maltese voters: https://www.maltatoday.com.mt/news/election-2017/77969/comodini_cachia_flipflops_to_resign_as_mep_and_take_up_maltese_seat#.Wx47IxabHYU

15 June 2017: The EPP group announces that German MEP Axel Voss will take over as new copyright rapporteur following the departure of Therese Comodini: http://www.eppgroup.eu/news/Axel-Voss-appointed-new-Rapporteur-for-Copyright-Directive

5 July 2017: The EPP group presents its new position on copyright. It supports the link tax and the “general idea” of Article 13, stating that platforms should be responsible for the copyright infringements of their users, but that this responsibility should not lead to a general obligation to monitor: http://www.eppgroup.eu/news/Copyright-Directive%3A-EPP-Group-general-line

11 July 2017: The ITRE and CULT committees adopt their opinions on the copyright reform, mostly endorsing the Commission’s plans: http://www.europarl.europa.eu/sides/getDoc.do?pubRef=-%2f%2fEP%2f%2fNONSGML%2bCOMPARL%2bPE-592.363%2b03%2bDOC%2bPDF%2bV0%2f%2fEN (ITRE) http://www.europarl.europa.eu/sides/getDoc.do?pubRef=-%2f%2fEP%2f%2fNONSGML%2bCOMPARL%2bPE-595.591%2b03%2bDOC%2bPDF%2bV0%2f%2fEN (CULT)

13 July 2017: At the first Legal Affairs (JURI) committee debate on copyright with the new rapporteur Axel Voss, Voss comes out in support of the link tax and deviates from Comodini’s position on the upload filter proposal as well, despite assurances that he will continue working on the basis of her draft report: https://www.euractiv.com/section/digital/news/new-lead-mep-could-shift-talks-on-contentious-copyright-bill/

30 August 2017: Copyright negotiations advance in Council. The Estonian Council presidency releases a proposal for amendments that would reinforce the upload filters. Regarding press publishers it presents two alternative proposals, either to introduce a new right as proposed by the Commission, or to introduce a presumption rule as proposed by former copyright rapporteur Therese Comodini: http://www.statewatch.org/news/2017/aug/eu-council-copyright-directive-estonian-compromises-11783-17.pdf

5 September 2017: A leak by Statewatch reveals that the Estonian Council presidency ignored the concerns of six national governments that the upload filter proposal could be in violation of EU law, including the charter of fundamental rights: http://statewatch.org/news/2017/sep/eu-copyright-ms-questions.htm

20 September 2017: A Freedom of Information request by Julia Reda reveals that the European Commission withheld a study commissioned to prepare the copyright reform, which contradicts the need for the introduction of Article 13: https://juliareda.eu/2017/09/secret-copyright-infringement-study/

11 October 2017: A study commissioned by the European Parliament’s JURI committee finds that the neighbouring right is counter-productive and recommends to introduce the presumption rule instead: http://www.europarl.europa.eu/RegData/etudes/STUD/2017/596810/IPOL_STU%282017%29596810_EN.pdf

26 October 2017: Statewatch leaks plans by France, Portugal and Spain to make the upload filter proposal in Article 13 more extreme during Council negotiations: http://statewatch.org/news/2017/oct/eu-copyright-fr-pt-es.htm

20 November 2017: As the last committee to issue an opinion to the lead JURI committee, the LIBE committee adopts its opinion written by its rapporteur Michał Boni (EPP). The position on Article 13 is the same as in the IMCO committee: a clear rejection of upload filters: http://www.europarl.europa.eu/sides/getDoc.do?pubRef=-%2f%2fEP%2f%2fNONSGML%2bCOMPARL%2bPE-604.830%2b02%2bDOC%2bPDF%2bV0%2f%2fEN

7 December 2017: The JURI committee holds a public hearing on the link tax. The organizers of the hearing hand-pick speakers to discredit the results of the Parliament’s independent study that rejected the link tax. Among them is Thomas Höppner, a lawyer of the German press publisher Axel Springer, who is presented as an independent expert: https://juliareda.eu/2017/12/extra-news-copyright-confusion/

22 December 2017: Another Freedom of Information request by Julia Reda reveals that the European Commission has suppressed a study by its own Joint Research Centre that concludes that the link tax is commercially unviable: https://juliareda.eu/2017/12/jrc-paper-copyright/

22 January 2018: The Digital Agenda Intergroup starts a campaign to “stop censorship machines”. https://juliareda.eu/2018/01/censorship-machines/

29 January 2018: The Bulgarian Council Presidency, which has taken over from Estonia on January 1, drops the idea of a presumption rule and rallies a majority of Member States behind the link tax. At this point, there is still a blocking minority of countries opposed to the proposal: https://juliareda.eu/2018/01/copyright-bulgarian-presidency/

21 February 2018: Copyright rapporteur Axel Voss issues the first version of his compromise on Article 13, maintaining and strengthening the obligation for upload filters. The compromise proposal is published on Julia Reda’s blog. Over the next few months, Axel Voss will issue 8 new versions of the compromise, maintaining its basic features: https://juliareda.eu/wp-content/uploads/2018/02/20180221-Draft-CA-on-Article-13_v1.pdf

28 March 2018: Axel Voss issues his proposal for a compromise on the link tax, severely extending the scope of the original Commission proposal. The most controversial change is to make the ancillary copyright inalienable, which means that publishers would have to charge for links to their articles, whether they want to or not, similar to the CanonAEDE in Spain. Subsequent versions of the draft compromise water down this most controversial element of the proposal, but the basic principle of the link tax remains intact: https://juliareda.eu/wp-content/uploads/2018/03/voss11.pdf

25 May 2018: After several Member States have changed their position and come out in support of the link tax, Council agrees on a joint negotiating mandate on the copyright proposal, against the votes of Germany, Hungary, Belgium, Finland, Netherlands and Slovenia. The Council position maintains both the upload filters and the link tax: http://www.consilium.europa.eu/en/press/press-releases/2018/05/25/copyright-rules-for-the-digital-environment-council-agrees-its-position/ https://juliareda.eu/2018/05/censorship-machines-link-tax-finish-line/

11 June 2018 (today): The European Parliament rapporteur Axel Voss will convene the last shadow meeting to finalize the compromise amendments that will be put to the vote in the JURI committee on June 20.

12 June 2018: Deadline for political groups to table “alternative compromises” that can be put to the vote against Mr. Voss’ compromises.

20 June 2018, afternoon: Vote on copyright reform in the lead JURI committee

Doctorow (talk) 12:19, 11 June 2018 (UTC)

Suggested content
See Net neutrality in the United States and Net neutrality in the United States for the sort of thing that I would like to see in this article. --Guy Macon (talk) 15:50, 5 June 2018 (UTC)


 * I just stated section that list supporters/opponents. The lists need to be expanded, the most prominent supporters and opponents moved to the top, and eventually when the lists get to big the least notable entries should be trimmed. Please help! --Guy Macon (talk) 22:06, 5 June 2018 (UTC)


 * I think that framing article like a TV debate with supporters and opponents is rarely helpful to make a good encyclopedia article. --Nemo 11:48, 6 June 2018 (UTC)


 * It seemed to work well in the Net Neutrality article. Do you have an alternative structure that you would like to suggest? --Guy Macon (talk) 17:43, 6 June 2018 (UTC)


 * Yes. Only focus on objective facts theme by theme. Article 11 is already covered in Ancillary copyright for press publishers aka link tax though. --Nemo 08:33, 9 June 2018 (UTC)


 * Sounds good to me. I want a good article, and don't really care if my initial effort at expanding the stub gets nuked and replaced with something better. --Guy Macon (talk) 01:17, 10 June 2018 (UTC)


 * I disagree, Nemo. From a good encyclopedia article about a proposal, the reader should learn who's supporting it and who's opposing it.  Those facts are relevant to the history of the dispute.  They do not, of course, replace thorough reporting of objective facts, but the facts we report include facts about important opinions. JamesMLane t c 16:53, 19 June 2018 (UTC)


 * Thanks for your sterling work so far. Adding a human element – the sort of people and work that will be affected (from bloggers and social media users to search engine operators), counterbalanced by those in favour – might be useful. Regards,  Esowteric + Talk  09:41, 17 June 2018 (UTC)

On the digital single market
The article is naturally focused on the latest developments, but someone might get curious about the mention of DSM in the title of the proposal. At some point it might be worth discussing the original intent of the discussion (as established by the Juncker programme), with some academic source. For now I've found https://oadoi.org/10.1017/S0020589317000240 which discusses the issue beyond copyright as well: "This article has critically discussed how the general rules of EU private international law address the particular difficulties of internet cases. It started with the observation that the two distinctive features of internet communication are its ubiquity and virtuality, which lead to a multiplication of increasingly tenuous connections to physical places in internet cases. When applying the rules of EU private international law to internet cases, the ECJ has repeatedly allowed jurisdiction and the application of substantive laws to be based, at least for a territorially limited part of the action, on these tenuous connections, following the so-called mosaic approach; in addition, it has created an additional ground of jurisdiction for online violations of personality rights at the claimant’s centre of interests. It has been shown that both of these approaches, although somewhat balanced at the level of choice of law by Article 3(2) e-Commerce Directive, generally give an undue advantage to the potential claimants in internet cases. They also conflict with several paradigms of EU private international law, including the principles of legal certainty (because they make it hard to foresee for potential defendants where they may be sued), proximity (because jurisdiction and the applicable law can often be based on a very weak connection to a Member State), and the sound administration of justice (because they create a risk of multiple lawsuits over small parts of an overall action). Based on these observations, an alternative approach to claims against information society service providers established in the EU has been proposed. It has been argued that a combination of the country-of-origin principle and a targeting-based exception in the style of Article 18 Brussels Ia and Article 6 Rome I would increase legal certainty and the jurisdictional"

--Nemo 17:12, 22 June 2018 (UTC)

New references?
Here are some references that I have found regarding article 13. I hope that some of them may be useful and deemed appropriate/notable:

https://news.sky.com/story/memes-will-be-banned-under-new-eu-copyright-law-warn-campaigners-11398577

https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-44412025

https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2018/06/internet-luminaries-ring-alarm-eu-copyright-filtering-proposal

https://gizmodo.com/the-founding-fathers-of-the-internet-plead-with-eu-to-s-1826792360

https://www.siliconrepublic.com/enterprise/eu-copyright-proposal-letter

http://www.alphr.com/politics/1009470/article-13-EU-what-is-it-copyright

https://newint.org/features/web-exclusive/2018/06/11/eu-copyright-law

https://boingboing.net/2018/06/07/thanks-axel-voss.html

https://boingboing.net/2018/06/15/contact-your-mep-3.html

http://www.gp.se/nyheter/karlsten-en-av-v%C3%A5r-generations-st%C3%B6rsta-politiska-%C3%B6desfr%C3%A5gor-1.6466700

https://nyheteridag.se/nytt-eu-lagforslag-hotar-censurera-internet-kommer-att-skapa-en-robocop-regim/

http://infojustice.org/archives/40044

https://saveyourinternet.eu/

David A (talk) 17:05, 15 June 2018 (UTC)


 * So far we've not added campaign websites. Personally I'm only adding references which back some actual addition to content. I see nyheteridag.se and gp.se are in top #250 Alexa for Sweden so they could be a source for that country. Maybe we need a new paragraph for "regional" information like "Feature articles critical of the proposal have been published by major national papers in Spain [ref El Pais], Sweden [those two], ...".
 * BoingBoing, Gizmodo etc. could be used as source for "what the IT press says". Newint's article is good but seems redundant with EFF.
 * (How comes I'm the only one handling talk page suggestions? I didn't even want to edit this article. :) Please help!) --Nemo 07:03, 17 June 2018 (UTC)
 * Okay. Thank you for the reply. David A (talk) 08:29, 17 June 2018 (UTC)
 * I'd advise against Nyheter Idag as it is a far-right news source of questionable reliability. GP is fine though, and Karlsten has written on these things for a long time. Ratatosk Jones (talk) 11:17, 17 June 2018 (UTC)
 * I have never noticed any social-Darwinist opinions in Nyheter Idag, which is what far right really means, but that is irrelevant to this context. I am happy if some of the sources are included. David A (talk) 14:18, 17 June 2018 (UTC)
 * Looks like we have a consensus at least for GP.se, so go ahead. --Nemo 19:28, 17 June 2018 (UTC)
 * I am not very competent at editing Wikipedia pages myself. At least not with the limited time that I have available. David A (talk) 02:55, 18 June 2018 (UTC)
 * Well, I'm not so competent with Swedish either! Meanwhile, there's Spiegel for Germany --Nemo 13:51, 18 June 2018 (UTC)
 * Perhaps you could use the English references instead? David A (talk) 17:40, 18 June 2018 (UTC)

Here are more articles:

http://www.wired.co.uk/article/eu-meme-war-article-13-regulation

https://boingboing.net/2018/06/18/asymmetric-information-war.html

https://boingboing.net/2018/06/18/licensing-news.html

https://www.theregister.co.uk/2018/06/16/article_13_rapporteur/

David A (talk) 17:48, 18 June 2018 (UTC)

Given that this law will eliminate fair use, remove much of the online freedom of speech across Europe via automatic content filters, threatens to destroy Wikipedia itself, given the massive costs that it will have to pay for all the reference links, and is most likely clubbed into effect today, should somebody contact an administrator to possibly make this a highlighted article (via the news section or otherwise)? David A (talk) 05:01, 20 June 2018 (UTC)


 * I have posted a nomination: David A (talk) 06:39, 20 June 2018 (UTC)
 * I was told to wait until if this law is passed in the final vote in July. Then somebody can nominate it again. David A (talk) 17:17, 20 June 2018 (UTC)

Another 2: https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2018/jun/20/eu-votes-for-copyright-law-that-would-make-internet-a-tool-for-control

"'Disastrous' copyright bill vote approved": https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-44546620

 Esowteric + Talk  12:08, 20 June 2018 (UTC)


 * Since nobody else did, I added some of the references discussed here and in . --Nemo 22:59, 22 June 2018 (UTC)
 * It's probably pointless to summarise all those articles beyond a handful words, but I wonder what description would be most neutral. We can't hide that the press is largely negative, that would be non-neutral. Maybe the sentence could be a simple "These views [mentioned in the previous paragraph] were echoed by...". --Nemo 11:42, 23 June 2018 (UTC)
 * That seems fine to me. David A (talk) 18:35, 30 June 2018 (UTC)

CentralNotice link
Note that users across Europe are now seeing banners linking to this article. Semi-protecting might be a good idea if there's a lot of vandalism. --Yair rand (talk) 08:45, 3 July 2018 (UTC)

Neutrality and encyclopedic tone
Just adding this section following ViperSnake151's addition of templates to the top of the article.  Esowteric + Talk  16:45, 21 June 2018 (UTC)
 * Yeah. Some of the statements contain unsubstantiated criticism. There needs to be a balance between justification and criticism per NPOV. ViperSnake151   Talk  16:50, 21 June 2018 (UTC)
 * AFAICT all the reported passages have now been fixed. Let's avoid mentioning hundreds of articles on the topic and stick to the best source available for each issue. --Nemo 16:56, 22 June 2018 (UTC)
 * We must present all prominent opinions presented by reliable sources. You also removed the Reception section, which separates facts from opinion for the purposes of NPOV, thus reintroducing the problem instead of fixing it. ViperSnake151   Talk  18:07, 22 June 2018 (UTC)
 * We don't have to present all opinions, that would be undue weight. We previously agreed on this talk page to present the information by topic i.e. article rather than other talk-show-style subdivisions. Of course it's possible to change the structure, but it would be better to discuss first.
 * Also, your edit artificially classified some interpretations as "fact" and some others as "opinions", while transforming the article in a collage of competing political flyers. Let's please stick to the reliable sources and avoid cherry-picking from the primary sources. --Nemo 20:37, 22 June 2018 (UTC)
 * Undue weight means putting too much weight on minority viewpoints. That's what I meant by prominent opinions. You state that there was an "agreement" to use this format (which deviates from established examples such as General Data Protection Regulation), but you were the one who proposed it and I do not see any true consensus beyond a single remark of support from a single editor, followed by one who objected, and one complimenting you in general. Your edit also replaced meaningful explanations of individual passages (i.e. Article 3) with meaningless touts and speculation based on legal blogs (i.e. "which could establish a new standard across the EU."), and includes specificity that makes the text difficult to parse. Overall, your actions may constitute ownership of the article, which is not considered to be appropriate editing practice. Could you please substantiate all of the individual issues with my version? ViperSnake151   Talk  21:02, 22 June 2018 (UTC)
 * Sure. I hit an edit conflict, can you please reinstated your edits one by one with an appropriate edit summary so that it's possible to understand them? --Nemo 22:21, 22 June 2018 (UTC)
 * Thanks for reapplying your edits separately. I've tagged some problematic passages. --Nemo 22:57, 22 June 2018 (UTC)

On June 29, 2018, Wikimedia Foundation, owner of Wikipedia, publicly came out in opposition to the EU Copyright Directive. I fear this may lead some supporters of the directive to question the neutrality of our article. Accordingly, I have added a {POV-check} template to encourage editors to carefully review this page, and any future additions, for neutrality. KalHolmann (talk) 16:37, 1 July 2018 (UTC)
 * That is not a valid reason for POV tagging the article. You need to supply actual evidence of a NPOV violation, with diffs to back up your assertion. I have removed the tag. --Guy Macon (talk) 10:23, 3 July 2018 (UTC)
 * Have looked for details on both those who support and those who oppose the directive. If we have further sources on those who support and why would be happy to see them added. Doc James  (talk · contribs · email) 00:38, 2 July 2018 (UTC)

Section break
I object to your assessment that presenting reception separate from history represents an "[artificial separation of] the events in the legislative bodies from [..] their own studies." There should be a clear separation between discussions of legislative activity, discussions of its contents, and discussion of its reception and impact in order to provide clarity and the correct context. The reader should not, besides the lead, have to see explanation of criticism before objective discussions of the actual contents of this proposed directive. This is a format used on GDPR and is effective. In addition, I've been told not to use excessive numbers of citations to drive a point across; we go by quality of the citations, not necessarily by quantity. ViperSnake151  Talk  22:43, 22 June 2018 (UTC)
 * Indeed, I'm fine with reducing the sources so that we make sure we only use the best ones for each topic. The problem is that you've removed reliable sources while adding original research. Have you even read the sources which you have moved, for instance the EC-commissioned studies on the text and the various academic studies which were used to draft amendments? As for the order, I think the studies about each article could be moved to the respective sections. The history section might be moved to the end but then it might become very hard to understand what's the context of the directive and what was its purpose. --Nemo 22:57, 22 June 2018 (UTC)
 * So "studies" and self-published sources being passed off as "academic" override anything a legal text says? My quote unquote original research is literally a paraphrasing of Article 13(5). ViperSnake151   Talk  23:04, 22 June 2018 (UTC)
 * Are you qualified for legal paraphrasing? Can you first publish your paraphrasing on a peer review journal, if you want to override the summary of legal scholars? What self-published sources do you have in mind? We could certainly remove some of those. I just removed some articles. --Nemo 23:30, 22 June 2018 (UTC)
 * Are you trying to tell me and I should not be summarizing the texts of legislation without proper qualification? ViperSnake151   Talk  03:55, 1 July 2018 (UTC)

"Those in support claim more than 32,000 signatures"
The petition cited is at [ http://makeinternetfair.eu/ ]. I just tested it, and there is zero attempt to verify signatures, and thus I can easily write a script that adds another 10,000 or 100,000 signatures. And the source we cite is The Industry Observer ("Helping record labels, artist managers, peak industry bodies and rights-holders navigate the local and international markets"), which is owned by Australia’s largest music media publisher. I do not believe that this meets our standards for inclusion. --Guy Macon (talk) 10:45, 3 July 2018 (UTC)
 * Thus the word "claim"... Doc James  (talk · contribs · email) 10:56, 3 July 2018 (UTC)
 * But should we give any WP:WEIGHT to a claim that is so likely to be completely bogus? --Guy Macon (talk) 14:25, 3 July 2018 (UTC)
 * It is interesting to know which groups are pushing for this legislation IMO. We could add more qualifiers. Doc James  (talk · contribs · email) 14:48, 3 July 2018 (UTC)

Introduction
The following sentence: " UK Member of parliament Stephen Doughty also wants to see similar upload filters used to prevent "extremist material" on the Internet" seems like disconnected from the paragraph. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 84.88.67.123 (talk) 15:27, 3 July 2018 (UTC)

Consequences for Wikipedia
I notice that there is no section called Consequences for Wikipedia. Indeed there are only a few sentences that mention Wikipedia. Is this because we don't know what the consequences for Wikipedia will be? Mobile mundo (talk) 15:53, 3 July 2018 (UTC)
 * Well, we need independent reliable sources detailing these consequences.--Ymblanter (talk) 16:07, 3 July 2018 (UTC)


 * The claim in the current article...


 * "Wikipedia in Italian, Wikipedia in Spanish and Wikipedia in Estonian were the only one among the Wikipedia encyclopedias (either national or global) which temporarily blocked their usage, since the French Wikipedia, the German Wikipedia as well as all the European and worldwide Wikipedia portals continued to provide the encyclopedia services without interruption."


 * is misleading when you consider Village pump (proposals), which says...


 * "Banner is up now."


 * ...(posted by a member of the WMF board), and...


 * "Note, a banner was added as meta:Special:CentralNotice by WMF staffer User:Seddon (WMF):. It is targeting viewers in the following countries: AT, BE, BG, CY, CZ, DE, DK, EE, ES, FI, FR, GB, GR, HR, HU, IE, IT, LT, LU, LV, MT, NL, PL, PT, RO, SE, SI and SK.  This banner is currently set to expire on 2018-07-04 23:59."


 * ...(posted by a bureaucrat).


 * A banner is not a blackout, but it isn't nothing either, and should be mentioned. Not sure how to cite the above, though. --Guy Macon (talk) 10:30, 4 July 2018 (UTC)

"To all our readers in Hungary"
link directs here. I think, about 0.1% of us understand this text in English. Me I speak English for 40 years, I work in English, with British and Dutch costumers, and this text I don't understand. I understand the words, and still I practically understand nothing. The invitation seems to be useless. No one understands legal text. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 37.76.119.116 (talk) 12:09, 4 July 2018 (UTC)

Banner?
"English Wikipedia added a banner asking the readers to contact their representatives in the European parliament." - Did it? I haven't seen one. --Espoo (talk) 21:05, 4 July 2018 (UTC)


 * On 3 July 2018 at 04:05 (UTC) the Wikimedia Fundation placed a banner on the English Wikipedia to run until 4 July 2018 23:59. The banner is displayed to readers in the following countries: Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Croatia, Cypress, Czechia, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta, Netherlands, Poland, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, and the United Kingdom. The banner reads


 * "To all our readers in [name of country], we need your help. On 5 July 2018, the European Parliament will vote on a new copyright directive. If approved, these changes threaten to disrupt the open Internet that Wikipedia is a part of. You have time to act. Join the discussion. Thank you."
 * with links to "Contact your MEP" and "Read about it on Wikipedia" --Guy Macon (talk) 21:16, 4 July 2018 (UTC)


 * I'm in Finland but didn't see it. And i can't get your links (contact your MEP and read about it) to work. --Espoo (talk) 21:32, 4 July 2018 (UTC)


 * I didn't include any links. I just went here and extracted the text. I know that the "read about it" links to this article. Could someone who can see the banner (it doen't display in California so I cannot see it) please post the "contact your MEP" link, if any? --Guy Macon (talk) 22:12, 4 July 2018 (UTC)


 * Here is the link: https://changecopyright.org — Preceding unsigned comment added by 81.100.41.119 (talk) 23:47, 4 July 2018 (UTC)

Related: --Guy Macon (talk) 03:48, 5 July 2018 (UTC)
 * Wikipedia Italy Blocks All Articles in Protest of EU's Ruinous Copyright Proposals
 * Wikipedia down in several countries in EU law protest
 * Hours before a critical EU vote on mass internet censorship, European Wikipedia projects go dark
 * The banner was only shown to users who are logged out. I am in the Netherlands, and I was yesterday using two browsers, I was logged in on one of them and not logged in on another one. The browser where I was not logged in showed me the banner.--Ymblanter (talk) 12:04, 5 July 2018 (UTC)
 * Looks like a bug. The fact that the banner was set to expire on midnight of the 4th instead of after the vote was a specification bug - because of the rush we never specified how long we wanted it to run. This sort of thing becomes far less likely if the banner/blackout/whatever is not rushed. This is going to come up again before the next EU vote. Next time, we need to decide what to do well ahead of time so that the WMF can put up a test page and let us test it and discover bugs before it goes live. --Guy Macon (talk) 17:06, 5 July 2018 (UTC)

Introductory criticism
I fully understand the reluctance to use silly factoids like "link tax" and "meme ban" in the intro, but I don't agree with it. These are very prominent terms that readers will have heard of in newspaper headlines, and they will want to see explanations of both. The article becomes more helpful if we address them upfront.

Can we also please stop linking to Ancillary copyright for press publishers. While this is the correct term, the article is a) about a German law, and b) is terrible. It doesn't actually explain what the concept is, let alone what this proposal contains, which just makes things more confusing. Tom Edwards (talk) 19:55, 5 July 2018 (UTC)

July 5 2018?
I think there should be info about what happened on July 5th 2018. Pretty sure that event of not yet passing but putting back in the drawers has just happened just today. Qwertyxp2000 (talk &#124; contribs) 23:04, 5 July 2018 (UTC)
 * It is mentioned under 'Legislative process', it should probably also be in the lead. If you'd like to expand coverage on this from reliable sources, there seem to be plenty available. Be bold! —  Insertcleverphrasehere (or here)  23:25, 5 July 2018 (UTC)
 * I have done my attempts. The refs are directly from the article's references. The wording isn't the best, but at least I did my best to address the need for the leading section to mention July 5th 2018. Qwertyxp2000 (talk &#124; contribs) 02:12, 7 July 2018 (UTC)

Pure lobby work for Google, Facebook & Co. is not the purpose of an online encyclopedia - or is it?
The discussed EU directive tries to strengthen the rights of authors, photographers, musicians and other creators of content in a balanced manner. Of course this may endanger the business model of companies who try to get content for free form the creators to publish it to a broader audience (and then make money with this content via advertisements).

This is especially the case for some American companies who in the past even tried to overtake the copyright totally from the creators. As there is a lot of money at stake for these US companies one shouldn't be surprised that they now start to lobby against the directive, suggesting it would violate the "freedom of the Internet" - while it only "violates" their possibilities to get content for free and exploit creators for their own profits.

Apparently the lobbying of these American companies has been successful in so far as to convince other American organisations that their freedom is at stake here. But I think that pure lobby work for Google, Facebook & Co. is not the purpose of an online encyclopedia.

Plus this article violates the main principle of Wikipedia, as it clearly has a one-sided point of view. Erland Eschenwald (talk) 12:39, 4 July 2018 (UTC)


 * No it doesn't. The sources have focused more on one side, which is understandable when the Electronic Frontier Foundation, Creative Commons, and Wikipedia oppose something and book publishers, music labels, and movie studios -- all of which will make more money if it passes -- support it. Wikipedia simply reports what is in the sources. --Guy Macon (talk) 16:15, 4 July 2018 (UTC)


 * Speaking of, the source we used for the €5.5 million figure points to here, which says the figure is for 2016 and covers all lobbying, with no mention of specific legislation. XOR&#39;easter (talk) 19:26, 4 July 2018 (UTC)


 * They got me with that one! Thanks for spotting it. Tom Edwards (talk) 19:34, 4 July 2018 (UTC)


 * [sarcasm] How nice of Erland Eschenwald to assume that I (along with Tim Berners-Lee, Vint Cerf, Jimmy Wales, the Electronic Frontier Foundation, Creative Commons, European Digital Rights,the Max Planck Society and the Wikimedia Foundation) are too stupid to make up our minds on this and are instead unwitting pawns of Google and Facebook. And of course we all know that book publishers, music labels, and movie studios are 100% good and pure and would never stoop so low as to lobby for this EU directive, no matter how profitable it would be for them. --Guy Macon (talk) 09:25, 5 July 2018 (UTC)
 * This would also endanger content creators (such as us) when large media and publishing firms try to claim our work as their own. Lots of examples here. The last thing I need is content filters preventing me from reusing my own work as Elsevier et al has falsely claimed copyright and I lack an army of lawyers to defend myself.
 * I think Google and Facebook will do just fine, in fact there is a fair bit of press stating that these new regulations will in fact help them. Google already owns Content ID and think of the huge market this law would create for them. Whom this harms is those who care about the open web. Doc James  (talk · contribs · email) 11:58, 5 July 2018 (UTC)


 * The proposal also had zero penalty for falsely claiming ownership of another person's work. This opens the door for anyone to censor things that they don't like by claiming a copyright over them.


 * YouTube's ContentID system is a good example of automated content filtering. This video of 10 hours of pure white noise was flagged five times for copyright infringement. The reason that the vido wasn't taken down is that YouTube allows copyright owners to monetize infringing videos by running adds instead of having them taken down.


 * In this case the creator of the video was a music professor who is studying continuous sounds and how our perception of these kinds of sounds changes over longer periods. But what if he was like so many YouTube video authors -- dependent on ad revenue only to find that the money from the ads is now going to someone who falsely claimed copyright over his creation? --Guy Macon (talk) 13:55, 7 July 2018 (UTC)

August 26th Action Day
Julia Reda, the heroine who made the public aware of this massive totalitarian threat to the freedom of speech, has asked the public for an action day August 26th to show our opposition to turning Europe into China.

I would greatly appreciate if the Wikipedia staff would be willing to help out with bringing public attention to this fact. Thanks in advance for any help.

https://juliareda.eu/eu-copyright-reform/

David A (talk) 12:14, 19 July 2018 (UTC)
 * This is not a correct venue to post this. Try Village pump (proposals).--Ymblanter (talk) 16:47, 19 July 2018 (UTC)


 * Okay. Thank you for the help. David A (talk) 18:55, 19 July 2018 (UTC)


 * I have done so. David A (talk) 19:08, 19 July 2018 (UTC)

Not main page quality for In The News
This has been nominated 3 times now for ITN, and each time it's been closed because there will be another vote. I expect another nomination in January.

There is another problem with this article: it doesn't explain the directive. "intended to harmonise" in what way? By what mechanism? If approved, how would EU copyright law work? All you've got now is a list of specific complaints by special interests to specific sections, reading this thing I get no sense of the desired outcome or how it would be achieved. You'll have to do better if you want this article featured. Before someone drops a WP:SOFIXIT on me, I live in the States, I don't really care enough about an EU directive to read WP:RS and fix this article, but I do care about featuring quality articles on the main page of the en wiki. Anyway, my $0.02 to helping this get featured should the EU finally enact it.

--LaserLegs (talk) 10:55, 13 September 2018 (UTC)
 * Yes, you are right. Sadly the article has been reworked to make it look like a TV debate where the content of the matter is completely lost in favour of the theatrics of the various sides of the debate. We should reorganise it to remove the fluff and give coherent trustworthy information on what the goals and content actually are. --Nemo 12:07, 16 September 2018 (UTC)

"Small" and "micro" are not defined in the article.
That is true, however the distinction between micro, small, medium and large enterprises is well established in European legislation. I propose to add link to other article that defines this: Small and medium-sized enterprises (section European Union). --Dolosw (talk) 14:58, 14 September 2018 (UTC)
 * You're right, except that "well established" is a bit of an overstatement; it's also a matter of hierarchy of sources of law because the definition referenced by the proposed directive has a lower rank than the directive itself (Recommendation (European Union)).
 * The very section you reference doesn't have a direct source (so it might be better to reference the definition directly) and says that the definition is being reworked. See also and https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/?uri=CELEX%3A32003H0361 . --Nemo 12:24, 16 September 2018 (UTC)

Upload filters?
If I'm not wrong, a recently passed amendment to Article 13 explicitly prevents the usage of upload filters. See page 58.

"As of [date of entry into force of this directive], the Commission and the Member States shall organise dialogues between stakeholders to harmonise and to define best practices and issue guidance to ensure the functioning of licensing agreements and on cooperation between online content sharing service providers and right holders for the use of their works or other subject matter within the meaning of this Directive. When defining best practices, special account shall be taken of fundamental rights, the use of exceptions and limitations as well as ensuring that the burden on SMEs remains appropriate and that automated blocking of content is avoided." — Preceding unsigned comment added by 73.238.42.229 (talk) 23:19, 16 September 2018 (UTC)

Italian Deputy Prime Minister Luigi Di Mario Opposes The Directive
Link: http://www.ansa.it/english/news/business/2018/09/12/di-maio-blasts-ep-copyright-directive-ok_fb83a22e-75f0-43b1-85df-f0aaa8182099.html He’s an important figure in Italy so I think we should mention him in the opposition section of the article. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 207.172.180.75 (talk) 00:27, 25 September 2018 (UTC)

Articles from the news worth mentioning
YouTube has come out strongly opposing it as well as Italy Links YouTube: https://www.cnbc.com/2018/10/22/youtube-susan-wojcicki-creators-protest-eu-article-13-copyright-law.html Italy: https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2018/10/italy-steps-defend-eu-internet-users-against-copyright-filters-who-will-be-next — Preceding unsigned comment added by 207.172.180.75 (talk) 22:35, 23 October 2018 (UTC)
 * Added both. --M asem (t) 22:57, 23 October 2018 (UTC)

UKIP Is Against
The UK Independence Party is strongly against the directive. Link: https://www.ukip.org/national-ukip-news-item.php?id=105 — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2600:1002:b01c:9728:b4a5:78b9:61aa:d89b (talk) 11:31, 25 October 2018 (UTC)

Every adequat people is against 89.225.133.27 (talk)
 * , ✅ Sorry for the delay, though! Regards, SshibumXZ (talk · contribs). 06:18, 29 November 2018 (UTC)

ROLLBACKERS PLEASE STOP!
'''THIS TIME WE DONT NEED NEUTRALITY! OR YOU WANT THAT THERE WILL NOT BE ANY WIKIPEDIA ANYMORE?''' — Preceding unsigned comment added by 89.225.133.27 (talk) 12:04, 20 November 2018 (UTC)
 * , Wikipedia has registered its dissatisfaction with the proposed directive already, vide: the article's oppose sub-section, there really is no need to further dilute the article's supposed neutrality by registering one's extreme disagreement with the directive, in general, and, its thirteenth article, in particular. Also, sorry for the relative delay in replying to you! Regards, SshibumXZ (talk · contribs). 06:33, 29 November 2018 (UTC)

Some updated information that may be useful
Some of these references should be of definitive public interest to know about.

https://torrentfreak.com/article-13-suspense-builds-as-finish-line-nears-190115/

https://torrentfreak.com/rightsholders-call-for-suspension-of-article-13-190116/

https://torrentfreak.com/copyright-negotiations-canceled-as-article-13-opposition-rises/

https://torrentfreak.com/article-13-moves-forward-with-new-french-german-deal-190206/

https://torrentfreak.com/music-industry-asks-eu-to-scrap-article-13/

David A (talk) 08:03, 11 February 2019 (UTC)

Will Article 13 take effect in 2021?70.29.73.244 (talk) 22:09, 12 February 2019 (UTC)

Errors
This "such as YouTube (owned by Google)" is not correct. YouTube is owned by Alphabet Inc. which also owns Google. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 21:10, 14 February 2019 (UTC)
 * Fixed. Tom Edwards (talk) 22:10, 14 February 2019 (UTC)

Opposition
I just had to move a group from the Opposition to Support section after reading the citation given for their inclusion. In the past I've also had to trim lists of news articles of items which didn't oppose the directive. We need to go through each citation made and either quote from it - in the right place! - or remove it. Tom Edwards (talk) 07:36, 11 August 2018 (UTC)
 * I think it's very sad that this article has evolved towards bothsidesism. Wikipedia is not an electoral debate. Each topic should present a unified summary, with a neutral point of view. --Nemo 19:43, 1 September 2018 (UTC)
 * I've reverted almost all of your changes, with individual justifications. You think that quoting from the text of the proposal and citing major national newspapers is biased, which is completely wrong. Tom Edwards (talk) 07:27, 3 September 2018 (UTC)
 * We need to use independent secondary sources not primary sources. Thus I have removed the text in question. Doc James  (talk · contribs · email) 01:36, 4 September 2018 (UTC)
 * A bunch of the primary sources were restored again such as https://makeinternetfair.eu/en/node/18
 * This https://www.publishersright.eu/mythbuster is also not a high quality independent source
 * And neither is this https://www.ukmusic.org/news/uk-music-chief-slams-google-as-corporate-vultures-as-figures-show-googles-3 Doc James  (talk · contribs · email) 03:39, 5 September 2018 (UTC)
 * Then remove the citations, and remove all of the other primary sources in the article while you're at it. Don't just delete properly-cited chunks of text that don't fit your agenda. Tom Edwards (talk) 06:29, 5 September 2018 (UTC)
 * You appear to be doing an excellent job of making sure that any dodgy citations on the support side are removed -- which is a Good Thing. If (and I do mean "if" -- I haven't checked to see if this is the case) some other user is doing an excellent job of making sure that any dodgy citations (but 9only on the oppose side) are removed, that would also be a Good Thing. Try to avoid Whataboutism and try to insure that all the citations on both sides are high quality, OK? --Guy Macon (talk) 06:53, 5 September 2018 (UTC)
 * User:Tom Edwards why did you restore all these poor citations? Doc James  (talk · contribs · email) 22:41, 5 September 2018 (UTC)
 * See my message from the 5th. I was unhappy about having to clean up after you again. You should have fixed the problem you saw instead. In general the article is full of citations pointing directly to campaign websites of all varieties, which I'm relaxed about because it is accurately reporting the claims rather than making them. Tom Edwards (talk) 20:18, 6 September 2018 (UTC)
 * Doc James' edits have improved the article. Yours have been a mixture -- some genuine improvements, some that ignore basic rules about sourcing. --Guy Macon (talk) 00:30, 7 September 2018 (UTC)

On the subject of collecting primary sources/position statements, there's this from OpenStreetMap (opposition), this by some MEPs from ALDE, S&D, EPP and ECR (more moderate), and also the amendments themselves (which we don't seem to link directly at the moment). XOR&#39;easter (talk) 13:16, 7 September 2018 (UTC)
 * We already list Creative Commons in the "opposition" column, but if we want a primary source on that, there's this. XOR&#39;easter (talk) 16:46, 7 September 2018 (UTC)

User:Doc James, you've moved the disputed tag from the Opposition section to the entire Positions section. Can you give some specifics about what you want to see changed in these other sections? Tom Edwards (talk) 20:16, 14 February 2019 (UTC)
 * "Support" section contains a number of statements such as "to support their financial interests" in the voice of Wikipedia. We should not be doing this.
 * This ref is dead this ref does not support the content in question. Doc James  (talk · contribs · email) 20:19, 14 February 2019 (UTC)
 * Thanks, let's look at each of these.
 * The full quote regarding financial interest is: "In general, there is agreement among mainstream press sources that Internet platforms are lobbying against the bill to support their financial interests." Reading that, it seems clear to me that the sentence is reporting the collective opinions of newspapers. Looking at the sources, I also see that they refer very early on (some even in their headlines) to Google trying to escape paying out more to artists. Would using a quote from one of the sources be helpful? e.g. "lobbying against the bill to 'escape billions in copyright payouts'".
 * The VoteWatch link does work, but you have to log in to the site (BugMeNot has a login) and then go back to the original URL before you can see it. If you know of a site providing detailed voting statistics without requiring a login that would be a good replacement.
 * The Music Week link does support the content in question, which is a quote from Tom Watson. This article cuts out a section of the quote for brevity so if you just did a quick search in the cited page you may not have found it, but it's all there in paragraph seven.
 * Tom Edwards (talk) 20:38, 14 February 2019 (UTC)


 * This is not supported by the sources "In general, there is agreement among mainstream press sources that Internet platforms are lobbying against the bill to support their financial interests"
 * This source comments on Wikipedia and does not say they are lobbying to support their financial interests.
 * One could maybe say "Some newspapers" and comment on "Google".
 * Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 20:39, 14 February 2019 (UTC)
 * The strapline of that article talks about "a copyright law that would have required social media sites to pay for content", and the first paragraph mentions "compelling the tech industry to pay for content that it uses for free". I think that entirely supports the claim being made.
 * I'm not a fan of saying only that "some" newspapers are making these accusations because that implies that most newspapers disagree, which is not the case. If you want to avoid making any judgement on the popularity of this view, how about: "A variety of mainstream press sources agree that Internet platforms (chiefly Google) are lobbying against the proposal to support their financial interests". Tom Edwards (talk) 20:58, 14 February 2019 (UTC)
 * That blanket statement is also not supported by the references provided or the current facts avaliable. Doc James  (talk · contribs · email) 21:00, 14 February 2019 (UTC)
 * What, the whole thing? I don't agree at all, the sources very much support the statement being made. Can you give another suggestion for what we might say instead? Tom Edwards (talk) 21:26, 14 February 2019 (UTC)
 * There is no general agreement among the mainstream press or that "internet platforms" generally are doing this to support their financial interests. Doc James  (talk · contribs · email) 23:24, 14 February 2019 (UTC)
 * OK, I've changed it to read "A variety of mainstream newspapers have reported that Internet platforms are lobbying against the bill to support their financial interests". I hope that's agreeable. Tom Edwards (talk) 08:19, 15 February 2019 (UTC)
 * Okay and I have added "some". Doc James  (talk · contribs · email) 18:00, 15 February 2019 (UTC)

Position of the European Commission
It is interesting that this blog post by the EU Commission is no more.

One can see the prior copy here.

Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 00:37, 17 February 2019 (UTC)

Journalists and authors
It appears that well this proposal was initially supported by journalists and authors the recently approved version is rejected by many of them. Doc James  (talk · contribs · email) 21:25, 14 February 2019 (UTC)
 * They are annoyed by a recent change, and that is worth mentioning, but are still supportive of the proposals overall: "this deal is good news for the industry and for authors in some sectors." Tom Edwards (talk) 22:10, 14 February 2019 (UTC)
 * Ah, you left out the last part "but it makes a mockery of journalists' authors' rights, promoting buy-out contracts and bullying to force journalists to sign away their rights and giving publishers a free ride to make more profits from journalists' work while the creator receives nothing. It is bad for journalism and bad for Europe. Agreeing on it, EU institutions have either been naive or have cynically betrayed the values of fairness and social justice Europe is meant to stand for"."
 * So no they clearly reject it overall. Doc James  (talk · contribs · email) 22:59, 14 February 2019 (UTC)
 * That is the annoyance that I mentioned. But they are referring to a specific change in language in one part of the proposal. If the group had decided to reject the whole thing they would have said so. Compare their letter to the one from the TV companies and big record labels, which ended with: "We therefore call on negotiators to not proceed on the basis of the latest proposals from the Council." Tom Edwards (talk) 08:19, 15 February 2019 (UTC)
 * Sure so "We therefore call on negotiators to not proceed on the basis of the latest proposals from the Council." means they reject the current proposal also. Doc James  (talk · contribs · email) 17:58, 15 February 2019 (UTC)
 * Jesus Christ...that was an example from a different letter from a different group. Tom Edwards (talk) 19:20, 15 February 2019 (UTC)
 * Okay so we can just go with the quote that it is "bad for journalism". We can leave it up to the reader to decide if that is a support or oppose. Doc James  (talk · contribs · email) 03:09, 16 February 2019 (UTC)
 * You are cherry-picking information to give a misleading impression of the source. I don't care enough about this issue to continue fighting over it, but don't mistake that for approval of your behaviour. Tom Edwards (talk) 19:40, 17 February 2019 (UTC)
 * No were do they say they still support the current version. Doc James  (talk · contribs · email) 03:39, 20 February 2019 (UTC)

Public protests: Attendance confirmed as 1.500 by police.
Police in Cologne confirmed that roundabout 1.500 persons were attending at the first protest against Article 11 and 13, even more than the first estimation by the organisers published by Heise.de: https://www1.wdr.de/nachrichten/rheinland/demo-urheberrechtsreform-koeln-100.html archived at http://archive.is/Sgmsc

I propose to change "Organisers made an unverified claim that 1,000 were in attendance in the same location.[97]" to "Official reports estimate that 1.500 people were attending at the protest." and add a reference to the WDR report. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 84.173.53.220 (talk) 09:56, 18 February 2019 (UTC)
 * That sounds fine in principle, but can we find the actual statement from Cologne police? It's highly unusual for organisers to provide a lower estimate than public officials, and images of the event on Heiss show no more than a few hundred in attendance. I've been looking for other sources and the only other count I can find is on Tag.de, who reported from the march that there were "a few hundred". Tom Edwards (talk) 22:06, 18 February 2019 (UTC)
 * I added the Tag.de count alongside the Heiss one and mentioned the disagreement. But I just don't think that the second-hand report of 1500 is credible given the other sources' claims, the photographic evidence, and the lack of a direct source. Tom Edwards (talk) 19:45, 19 February 2019 (UTC)
 * We have this source. Doc James  (talk · contribs · email) 03:39, 20 February 2019 (UTC)

Withdrawn blog post
Moved here

" In a blog post (since deleted) the European Commission went much further, saying that "there is ample evidence from respected sources...that ‘Big Technology’ has even ‘created’ grassroots campaigns against the Copyright Directive", and contentiously described those riled by "sponsored messages" from Facebook and Google as "the mob". "

This means they do not support this any more. Thus should not be in the article as this is no longer their position. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 03:15, 20 February 2019 (UTC)


 * That is not correct. Read the retraction message: "We acknowledge that its language and title were not appropriate and we apologise for the fact that it has been seen as offending. That is why we removed this article from our Medium account." This does not provide an excuse to ignore the European Commission's opinion, nor to replace it with an obscure MEP's. The cherry-picking continues. Tom Edwards (talk) 08:55, 20 February 2019 (UTC)
 * It is no longer their position. Adding it like they still support is undue weight.
 * The other is supported by a news article and thus is not original research.
 * Have started a RfC below. A removed opinion does not reflect their current opinion and it is unclear if it ever reflected their official opinion. Doc James  (talk · contribs · email) 20:36, 21 February 2019 (UTC)

The Star
Is not exactly a good source. And what is this supporting exactly. https://copia.is/about/ Doc James  (talk · contribs · email) 00:53, 17 February 2019 (UTC)
 * I've replaced it with another source saying the same thing. The about page of Copia.is shows that Google and other large American firms sponsor the project. Tom Edwards (talk) 19:40, 17 February 2019 (UTC)
 * But not that they exercise editorial control over the statements that Copia.is makes, or that their priorities set the Copia.is agenda, or that Google is paying them for anything specific. Maybe they are, but the source doesn't say so, and I'd rather have a non-primary source for that kind of thing. (Pride of place on their list of sponsors is held by the MacArthur Foundation, not Google or Yelp.) This article (currently reference 12) is cited to support the claim Google and other American firms hired lobbyists to create arms-length campaigns opposing the directive, including Copyright for Creativity, but what it actually says is that C4C gets roughly 2/3 of its funding from the CCIA, which represents big American technology companies (the other 1/3 comes from the Open Society Foundation). It doesn't make any claim that Google paid for a particular campaign, going so far as to say, "[I]t is far-fetched to accuse these independent, pro-privacy, pro-digital rights organisations of being pawns of big tech, when they are in fact often their main opponents in the regulatory process on issues from ePrivacy to trade, or how to handle mis-information." And, while we're discussing textual tweaks, I don't think the Wikimedia Foundation should be described as a "technology company"; it's a 501(c)(3) non-profit charitable organization. Cheers, XOR&#39;easter (talk) 20:06, 17 February 2019 (UTC)
 * We aren't making any claims about whether they are directed or not, and I agree that they probably aren't. We are claiming only that the companies set them up and provided funding for them, which is true and supported by the sources. We can change the passage to explicitly mention the CCIA if you like, but do bear in mind that Google are that lobby's biggest members and that should be mentioned given their obvious links to the topic. If you want to soften "hired" into something a little softer (like "funded") that's okay too. Tom Edwards (talk)
 * Yup what we have here is WP:original research. Doc James  (talk · contribs · email) 03:38, 20 February 2019 (UTC)
 * The sources fully support the claims being made. Please do not arbitrarily remove information you don't want to hear. You have been acting in very bad faith lately. Tom Edwards (talk) 09:01, 20 February 2019 (UTC)
 * Okay two of use oppose your original research. Please stop re adding it.
 * A bunch of your edits here Tom are original research.  Doc James  (talk · contribs · email) 20:38, 21 February 2019 (UTC)
 * I just looked at your user profile for the first time. You are part of the Wikimedia Foundation, and yet here you are censoring information about the Foundation's involvement in a political campaign. This is an unacceptable conflict of interest and reflects exceedingly poorly on the Foundation, and you. I really can't believe how brazenly corrupt this is.
 * We now have two options. The easy way is that you apologise immediately and stop editing this article. The hard way is that I file a complaint on WP:COIN and have you forcibly blocked from editing the page. It's your choice, but I would recommend the easy way. I am not interested in further discussion with you. Tom Edwards (talk) 20:55, 21 February 2019 (UTC)
 * Okay so that you can continue your original research on the topic?
 * You have been a Single Purpose Account on this topic these last 8 months...
 * User:Tom Edwards I have started a discussion on COIN for you. Regardless I believe it would be good to have more people working on this topic.
 * By the way User:XOR& also says "I don't think the Wikimedia Foundation should be described as a "technology company"; it's a 501(c)(3) non-profit charitable organization" Doc James  (talk · contribs · email) 20:58, 21 February 2019 (UTC)

Position of Google
This source says: "Those backing the law include Axel Springer, the German publishing giant, and internet companies like Google, Facebook and Twitter."

https://www.theparliamentmagazine.eu/articles/news/tensions-heighten-ahead-crunch-eu-copyright-reform-vote

I have not see many directs comments from Google on their position. Those saying Google opposes appear to be mainly the publishing houses rather than Google itself. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 12:26, 7 July 2018 (UTC)


 * Google commented to the Financial Times stating that they opposed the directive. If you can't read the page, they said:
 * "The purpose of the DNI Working Group is to exchange views and improve collaboration between the news industry and Google. The group asked us to send them our views on Europe’s copyright reform, and we were happy to share our position and a summary of the views of others." Tom Edwards (talk) 22:32, 7 July 2018 (UTC)
 * Yes so some reports say they support it and other state they oppose it. Doc James  (talk · contribs · email) 10:57, 9 July 2018 (UTC)
 * I find it odd that the above quote, labeled "Google commented to the Financial Times stating that they opposed the directive." does not contain a quote showing Google either supporting or opposing the directive. Was there nothing in the article that addressed Google's position in Google's own words? --Guy Macon (talk) 13:13, 9 July 2018 (UTC)
 * OK, Google commented to the Financial Times confirming that they opposed the directive. Here are more quotes from the FT's article:
 * "Google opposes the copyright directive, which it says would impede the free flow of information, and in a recent email to publishers suggested they contact members of the European Parliament to express their views. In the email to the members of the DNI working group — and which has been seen by the FT — Madhav Chinnappa, Google’s director of strategic relations, wrote that the “timing is urgent” and provided a link to a directory of MEPs. “If you feel strongly about this, please consider contacting the MEPs,” he said."
 * On the one hand we have an obscure magazine stating in passing and without explanation that Google support the directive. On the other, we have Google directly telling the Financial Times that they oppose it. Not a difficult choice. Tom Edwards (talk) 19:27, 9 July 2018 (UTC)


 * After looking at both sources, I agree with Tom Edwards on this. It is unlikely that Parliament Magazine somehow discovered a source where Google supports the proposal yet nobody else can find that source. Financial Times has a direct quote. BTW, the story has been picked up by other sources: -Guy Macon (talk) 22:47, 9 July 2018 (UTC)
 * Yah theparliamentmagazine appears mistaken. Doc James  (talk · contribs · email) 21:23, 21 February 2019 (UTC)

Axel Voss
Has made some interesting statements on how the law may work. This source says "This is sheer nonsense and testifies to the absolute lack of understanding of this person," commented the copyright expert Till Kreutzer of Irigths.info these statements on ancillary copyright." Doc James  (talk · contribs · email) 23:32, 21 February 2019 (UTC)

De Spiegel
Has a piece here from Feb 22 2019 about the split within the SPD party over the copyright directive. Doc James  (talk · contribs · email) 23:00, 22 February 2019 (UTC)

Internet Law
Do people deem this to be a suitable source?

https://www.internet-law.de/2019/02/vier-gegenthesen-zur-eu-urheberrechtsreform.html

States this "If this legislative process gives the impression of an overpowering lobby by Google & Co., this is nothing more than a caricature"

Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 06:04, 1 March 2019 (UTC)


 * And than we have this looking critically at the lobbying from politicians such as Axel Voss. Doc James  (talk · contribs · email) 07:45, 2 March 2019 (UTC)

Video by the WMF
Wondering peoples thoughts on using this within the article? Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 09:48, 23 March 2019 (UTC)
 * I have no serious objection, as long as it is properly labeled, with a caption that makes clear it is a statement from the Wikimedia Foundation rather than the volunteer community. (One way or another, it'll be of historical interest in a few days.) XOR&#39;easter (talk) 20:12, 23 March 2019 (UTC)

RfC on Removed Blog Post by the European Commission

 * The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

This text has been added by User:Tom Edwards

"In a blog post (since deleted) the European Commission went much further, saying that "there is ample evidence from respected sources...that ‘Big Technology’ has even ‘created’ grassroots campaigns against the Copyright Directive", and contentiously described those riled by "sponsored messages" from Facebook and Google as "the mob""

As mentioned the blog post has been deleted with the comment that "We acknowledge that its language and title were not appropriate and we apologise for the fact that it has been seen as offending." Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 21:03, 21 February 2019 (UTC)

Oppose inclusion

 * Oppose as opener. If this was published by mistake, as it appears to be, claiming that this reflects their official position is not really appropriate. Doc James  (talk · contribs · email) 21:05, 21 February 2019 (UTC)
 * Oppose on balance. There are just too many question marks about who wrote it, whether the stated reason for taking it down was the real reason, etc., etc., for us to make this kind of statement in Wikipedia's voice. XOR&#39;easter (talk) 21:44, 21 February 2019 (UTC)
 * Oppose. The mistaken publication is not the issue (such a leak/gaffe could be highly relevant and well covered) - the lack of secondary sources covering this is. Sourcing to an archived version of a retracted post clearly is unreliable (as the organization behind the post retracted). While the retraction itself (and the contents) may be DUE - one would need secondary sources discussing this. All I see is the register and techdirt referring to the redacted portions (e.g. techdirt - " the EU Commission "removed" the post without an apology -- but with the standard cop out of someone who did something bad but can't admit it") - however this is a level of sourcing that I don't fell is DUE for inclusion. Icewhiz (talk) 14:37, 12 March 2019 (UTC)
 * Oppose the lack of a secondary source substantiating the sequence of events is fatal Gumsaint (talk) 04:59, 14 March 2019 (UTC)
 * Comment - additional quality secondary source. The Independent.  Also, opinion from Cory Doctorow  Summoned by bot. Chris vLS (talk) 17:16, 18 March 2019 (UTC)
 * There was also coverage in WIPR, I think? But without subscription, dunno much. Chris vLS (talk) 17:20, 18 March 2019 (UTC)

Discussion
Per twits by Julia Reda it appears that neither responsible Commissioner of the European Parliament agreed to the publication of the since withdrawn blog post. People are trying to figure out who approved it. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 23:35, 21 February 2019 (UTC)


 * The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Table for 'converting" pre-March 2019 draft to final
Because of the whole renumbering thing, I'm wondering if it just better to present the Content of the Directive as a table, with columns for pre-March 2019 article number, final article number, brief name of article, and the general purpose of the article with any additional details within it. Everyone is going to remember this as "Article 11 and 13" of the Directive, even though those are now 15 + 17, and we need to make that clear. By headers its not, but a table would do it better. --M asem (t) 16:33, 27 March 2019 (UTC)

Reprobel
It's probably worth expanding a bit on article 16, which essentially overturns the ECoJ Reprobel case (and allows private copy levy to benefit publishers directly): «Article 5(2)(a) and Article 5(2)(b) of Directive 2001/29 preclude national legislation, such as that at issue in the main proceedings, which authorises the Member State in question to allocate a part of the fair compensation payable to rightholders to the publishers of works created by authors, those publishers being under no obligation to ensure that the authors benefit, even indirectly, from some of the compensation of which they have been deprived».

http://curia.europa.eu/juris/document/document.jsf?text=&docid=171384&pageIndex=0&doclang=EN&mode=lst&dir=&occ=first&part=1&cid=6400227

https://europeancopyrightsociety.org/opinion-on-reprobel/

Nemo 10:15, 28 March 2019 (UTC)

A Commons file used on this page has been nominated for deletion
The following Wikimedia Commons file used on this page has been nominated for deletion: Participate in the deletion discussion at the. —Community Tech bot (talk) 16:51, 28 March 2019 (UTC)
 * Protesto contra a reforma europeia do direito de autor, em especial os artigos 11 e 13, em Lisboa, Julho de 2018.jpg

This is not law yet
It has not completed its legislative procedure, right? – Kaihsu (talk) 07:07, 3 April 2019 (UTC)
 * Correct, officially it's still a "proposal" (see here: EU Legislative Observatory - "status: awaiting Council 1st reading position / budgetary conciliation convocation"). The new directive still needs to be formally approved by the Council of the European Union, which could theoretically reject the proposal and send back the proposal to EU Parliament for a second reading. --Holapaco77 (talk) 08:42, 3 April 2019 (UTC)

Breakdown of votes
Is breakdown of votes between political groups available? If so, it should be included next to information that 348 MPs voted in favor and 278 MPs voted against. 193.198.162.14 (talk) 15:19, 26 March 2019 (UTC)
 * I don't think a breakdown by MP is appropriate but we can do breakdown by country, as it has been established in most sources that support/opposition is primarily demonstrated at that level. --M asem (t) 15:30, 26 March 2019 (UTC)
 * Actually, both might be appropriate, since the Directive has largely been a project of the center-right parties. Unfortunately, such information is not yet available as far as I can see. Pretty sure activists will want to mobilize against those in favor wrt the EU elections in May, so I expect a list to appear sooner rather than later. Regards So  Why  15:44, 26 March 2019 (UTC)
 * The breakdown could be quite interesting. From what little I've seen collated so far, the breakdowns within nations could be significantly different from the totals. E.g., the S&D overall were 99 in favour, 54 opposed and 6 abstaining, while I've heard that within the German contingent, only 1 SPD member was in favour. Waiting for more comprehensive lists is probably the best course of action, and shouldn't take long. XOR&#39;easter (talk) 17:55, 26 March 2019 (UTC)
 * The vote even by party line would be questionable unless it is clear other third-party sources are doing it, otherwise it creates the appearance of original research (Framing data in a way not previously framed before). By I do know that vote-by-country is how its been framed throughout the working through passage, so its not so much original research. --M asem  (t) 18:32, 26 March 2019 (UTC)

I did add a chart with the votes by political group to the article. It shows the corrected voted (7 MPs of S&D changed their vote because they said they made a "mistake" for example see page 53 -a lot of EPP MPs made mistakes as well but in addition it only changes 1 vote against and 1 abstention-) In detail the results after corrections are:

EPP +153 -29 a12 (without corrections +153 -28 a13)

S&D +92 -61 a6 (without corrections +99 -54 a6)

ECR +23 -42 a2

ALDE +35 -26 a3 (without correction +36 -25 a3)

Greens-EFA +4 -39 a4

GUE/NGL +5 -36 a3

EFDD +6 -28 a1

ENF +15 -14 a3

Non-Inscrits +5 -9 a2 (without corrections +7 -8 a1)

In the chart I did add the members who were not present to the abstentions. (By the way: The European Parliament itself lists the votes by political group and not by country. Makes sense because the MPs sit with their political group and not with all MPs of their country. On the other hand in a lot of countries MPs of different parties did vote very different, although they are from the same country. Most members of the Greens and GUE/NGL for example voted against the directive, although most MPs of their countries voted for the directive) --Yoda1893 (talk) 14:40, 3 April 2019 (UTC)
 * Here you can find the numbers without corrections. But I think it makes more sense to include them. --Yoda1893 (talk) 17:11, 3 April 2019 (UTC)
 * I removed the corrections in the chart because they were not actually counted and would not have changed the decision. --Yoda1893 (talk) 03:10, 19 April 2019 (UTC)