EU Parliament calls for pan-EU copyright law The European Commission should create a directly enforceable EU-wide copyright law that could be used to bring copyright infringers to book, the European Parliament has said. Current law is not closely harmonised enough, it said. The Parliament has adopted a report from a French MEP which examined the state of intellectual …
It's not about how good/bad the UK laws are, it's about the fact that different countries which trade closely with one another have different laws. The point of regulation harmonisation is to make it simpler for firms to trade with, and consumers to purchase from, other countries.
The idea of a single , Europe wide, legal digital marketplace is good, however it must meet certain criteria if it to succeed...
Download to own, without any restrictions or DRM
A fair price, much lower than the price of a physical DVD or CD.
The principle of presumed innocence must be rigorously applied in any claim of copyright infringement.
While copyright terms are being harmonised, a significant reduction in the length of copyright is needed.
The benefit must go to authors and artists directly, not management companies
I am amazed at how slowly they are coming to terms with what they need to do, I suppose the EU itself, to be fair, doesn't need to do (and shouldn't actively be doing) anything.
It's down to the rights' holders to mimic an extremely successful model - offer everything in one place. The success of torrents is built around the fact that you can get extremely good quality stuff in the same place at the click of a few buttons. One goes to one's chosen site, has a quick browse, decides on getting the latest album by $Manufactured_artist and the latest episode of $TV_show and the back catalogue of Red Dwarf. A few clicks later and it's all on its way. Why can't the rights' holders come up with the same type of site on a pay-to-join-all-you-can-eat basis?
I'm a freetard not because I object to paying but because I object to current pricing levels and the slowness at which things become available to me. When the appropriate system is offered to me that puts me on the right side of the law and doesn't give me a walletectomy for the pleasure, I'm pretty certain I'll jump on board along with quite a large percentage of other freetards. Then all this rubbish being spouted by the EC will become irrelevant.
<<Like thsuch e Parliament's report, Kroes advocated the creation of a 'multi-territorial' licence for material. "Creating the legal Digital Single Market will lead to a wealth of options for citizens. It will strike a blow against piracy and benefit authors and artists," she said.>>
The Merkins and Sports people won't like it.
Let them lump it. Too long the FIFA, Hollywood and such have divide and conquer attitude.
Even "non-pirate" "grey" subscriptions and imports are on a massive increase (Sky Italia, Arab, Tring and Albanian satellite subs in Ireland and UK).
By all means have copyright and IP. Ditch SW patents. Copyright is more than enough.
But lets have fair prices and availability
Oh Arrr my hearties!
"There is a huge Digital Single Market for audiovisual material. The problem is that it's illegal, and it's not monetized," she said. "We have effectively allowed illegal file-sharing to set up a single market where our usual policy channels have failed."
And that is completely the fault of the copyright holders for not manning up to the challenge of providing an attractive consumer proposition in any way shape or form.
The horse has bolted and is far over the horizon. The sweet sweet tears of the copyright cartels and their shills in the EC are immensely pleasing.
There was always a demand for multi territorial licenses. But the rights holders loved parceling up rights by territory and selling them individually so it never happened.
It seems obvious now but it never occured to people that some were pirating material [from abroad] simply because you couldn't buy it .
The Phantom Menace took three months to get a UK release. Thanks to the threat pirates we got an official theatrical release of Revenge of the Sith within days.
Maybe slightly off topic, but I have always hated the idea that rights holders give that if you download some of their content from unofficial sources it is the same as if you had 'walked into a music store picked up some music CD's and left without paying'. Some even show this in video form to try and lick the two.
I have always disagreed with this. I always thought a closer analogy would be if music shop had for some reason left a box of CD sitting on the street. Or even closer someone had made multiple illegal copies of a CD and for whatever reason, had left a box of them on the street. Then passers by had taken CD's out of the box.
Copyright crime should be prosecuted in the same way as the example above would be, with only the person put the illegal copies of the CD's in the public domain or the shop who left the CD on the street, being punished.
The right holders delusional statements like that at the start of my post and their fanatical attempts to get the law changed (no matter how many intrinsic freedoms are suppressed to do it), to protect a business mode that is out date. Is why they get such little support from the public.
Oh and sites streaming video, etc are that same a pirate radio station broadcasting music they have not paid for. Normally they are punished, but not all the people who listened on their radio's.
That the Police 'MAY' start to focus on crimes that 'HURT' society more that crimes which have the weigh of legislation behind them.
i will be intresting to see how this new philospohy (if adopted) will affect the Witch Hunt into societies greatest villian the 'downloader'
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