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ARTICLE 13 – HITS MEMES
The End of All That's Good and Pure About the Internet
https://gizmodo.com/the-end-of-all-thats-good-and-pure-about-the-internet-1826963763
We regret to inform you that the internet is on red alert once again. On Wednesday, the EU’s Legislative Committee will vote on sweeping measures that will upend the web in every way that we know it. Memes, news, Wikipedia, art, privacy, and the creative side of fandom are all at risk of being destroyed or kneecapped. And it looks like the boneheaded proposal has a good chance of passing.
By the time Americans wake up on Wednesday, the Legislative Committee will have voted on the final form of the EU Copyright Directive—the first major update to European copyright law since 2001. Much of what’s in the legislation has been met with approval, but Article 11 and Article 13 are considered disastrous by some of the foremost tech experts in the world.
Explaining what’s wrong with these two points of the proposal in detail is difficult because the proposals themselves are so vague. That’s the primary issue for critics. Both articles make unprecedented demands on anyone operating a popular website to monitor copyrighted material and to pay fees to news organizations when linking out to their articles. Defenders of the proposal say that critics are exaggerating because of assumptions they’re making about how the legislation will be implemented. Critics, like one of the “fathers of the internet,” Vint Cerf, and the inventor of the World Wide Web, Tim Berners-Lee, say the risks outweigh the benefits. Who are you going to believe?
Let’s take a look at what’s at stake with these new regulations:
Article 13
This section of the directive will completely reconfigure websites’ responsibilities when it comes to enforcing copyrights. Until now, the so-called Ecommerce Directive has given online platforms broad protection from being subject to copyright penalties when they simply acted as a conduit for user uploads. It’s very similar to the laws in the U.S. that exempt YouTube from penalties as long as its making its best effort to take down infringing material when it’s reported. YouTube uses an automated content recognition system combined with an army of human beings to review the material users’ upload. It costs the company millions of dollars to do this. Critics of Article 13 say that every popular platform—estimated to mean the top 20 percent—that allows users to post text, sounds, code, still or moving images will need one of these systems.
Last week, 70 of the most influential people in the field of technology signed a letter opposing Article 13. Pioneers like Cerf and Berners-Lee were joined by experts in virtually every facet of the online world to say that the legislation would harm freedom of speech, education, expression, and small businesses while giving major platforms that already heavily monitor their service a distinct advantage.