4 ms·

Copyright isn't working, says European Commission

76 points by pwg 15y ago

nextparadigms 15y ago
I see a lot more common sense coming from EU lately than from US.
- javascriptlol 15y ago
  EU bans claim that water can prevent dehydration: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/eu/8897662/EU-bans-claim-that-water-can-prevent-dehydration.html http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/eu/8897662/...
  - nl 15y ago
    Untrue: http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/the-lay-scientist/2011/nov/18/1 http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/the-lay-scientist/2011/nov...
    - Dylan16807 15y ago
      That counters different articles on the same topic, not the telegraph article. Nowhere did the telegraph article say that water itself was called bad, just that the dehydration statement could not be made. Also part of that article is logically unsound in the opposite direction. A significant amount of water is well more than a measuring cup full. Eating a pork pie does help prevent starvation, how could you disagree? It's a nitpick to complain that water only helps hypertonic and isotonic dehydration, the most common kinds. Edit: just read the linked pdf and t-winsnes's comment. I'm astounded that none on the articles reporting on this, especially the guardian article specifically written to debunk the drama, noticed that this is a rejection of the statement as a disease claim. Dehydration not counting as a disease means labels don't need approval under this regulation. Edit 2: huh, a downvote. I don't mind it but would you kindly give me a sentence why, whoever voted so? I'm not sure what I've done wrong.
  - T-Winsnes 15y ago
    The claim was not that water does not rehydrate, but that dehydration is not a disease. As hydrofix on slashdot said: "Actually, according to the original decision (http://www.efsa.europa.eu/en/efsajournal/doc/1982.pdf http://www.efsa.europa.eu/en/efsajournal/doc/1982.pdf) [europa.eu], it is not not about bottled water, but (any) water in general. However, as far as I understand, this conclusion was not reached because water would not prevent dehydration, but because they don't think dehydration is a disease. Which kind of makes sense – dehydration could be a symptom of a disease, but it is not a disease in itself. And the applicant asked a panel that verifies claims about products reducing the risk of a disease to verify a claim about a medical condition that –the board concluded– was not disease, so the board rejected the claim (or actually concluded [direct quote]: "The Panel considers that the proposed claim does not comply with the requirements for a disease risk reduction claim ...")"
  - rmc 15y ago
    [trustworthy citation needed] The Telegraph newspaper in the UK is a slightly less extreme version of the Daily Mail, but still quite mad. It's a common meme in the right wing UK media & populace that the EU is crazy and brings in lots of crazy silly rules and bans sensible things. This is mostly not the case, and is usually either exadurated or blatantly false. A UK right wing newspaper saying that the EU does something silly is about as common as a right wing american politician saying that some terrorists are muslim.
  - danssig 15y ago
    At least they didn't declare Pizza a vegetable.
- cabalamat 15y ago
  Maybe, but she also said "We need to keep on fighting against piracy", implying that although they acknowledge they've dug themselves into a hole, they want to keep digging.
nl 15y ago
Be very careful when reading this article. The only actual quotes from it are things like Sadly, many see the current system as a tool to punish and withhold, not a tool to recognise and reward and She added that the existing copyright system was not rewarding the vast majority of artists There is a very common copyright meme in Europe (mostly it seems from France and Belgium) that goes something like this: Google is making a lot of money, and they steal (aka spider) our work. Therefor Google should pay us. There are examples of this viewpoint in various court cases, for example: http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2011/07/google-versus-belgium-who-is-winning-nobody.ars http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2011/07/google-versu... In the ZdNet article the columnist added a lot of words about things like Rights-holders have long complained about the damage done to their industry by online copyright infringement. Governments and courts in countries including the UK have responded by blocking access to websites that help people unlawfully share music, videos, games and software. I think that Kroes is arguing for stronger copyright, not less. Here's a final quote. I hope I'm wrong about it being a "let's tax Google" argument again: In times of change, we need creativity, out-of-the-box thinking: creative art to overcome this difficult period and creative business models to monetise the art
- roel_v 15y ago
  What she's arguing for, and this is no secret in Brussels and even -dare I say- common sense, is better enforcement of copyright. The problem isn't with copyright itself, it's with the difficulties that those who want to use it to monetize content encounter when it comes to making sure people abide by it. Working DRM is impossible with current technology, I think everybody reading this agrees with that; so there are two ways forward: change technology so that it becomes prohibitively difficult for the average customer to copy content without a rights holder's consent, of a whole different business model all together that separates payment from copying. Both are very hard problems for which there are no real solutions in sight. In the short and medium term, the only realistic trend I see is a more active stance from the rights holders themselves in defending those rights - i.e. more lawsuits, without government involvement. (Criminal law is not the right tool for this issue anyway, it's a shame that we've wasted 15 years on going down that route now).
loup-vaillant 15y ago
> Sadly, many see the current system as a tool to punish and withhold, not a tool to recognise and reward (Neelie Kroes) As far as I know, copyright's primary goal originally wasn't to "recognize and reward", but to increase the output in creative works. And even if it is recognition and reward, it is done through punishment and withholding (state granted monopoly that if infringed, causes fines). I'd rather judge legislation by its actual consequences rather than by its professed intentions. And my impression is that copyright causes much more punishment and withholding than it does recognition and reward.

76 points by pwg 15y ago

I see a lot more common sense coming from EU lately than from US.

javascriptlol 15y ago
EU bans claim that water can prevent dehydration: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/eu/8897662/EU-bans-claim-that-water-can-prevent-dehydration.html http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/eu/8897662/...
- nl 15y ago
  Untrue: http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/the-lay-scientist/2011/nov/18/1 http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/the-lay-scientist/2011/nov...
  - Dylan16807 15y ago
    That counters different articles on the same topic, not the telegraph article. Nowhere did the telegraph article say that water itself was called bad, just that the dehydration statement could not be made. Also part of that article is logically unsound in the opposite direction. A significant amount of water is well more than a measuring cup full. Eating a pork pie does help prevent starvation, how could you disagree? It's a nitpick to complain that water only helps hypertonic and isotonic dehydration, the most common kinds. Edit: just read the linked pdf and t-winsnes's comment. I'm astounded that none on the articles reporting on this, especially the guardian article specifically written to debunk the drama, noticed that this is a rejection of the statement as a disease claim. Dehydration not counting as a disease means labels don't need approval under this regulation. Edit 2: huh, a downvote. I don't mind it but would you kindly give me a sentence why, whoever voted so? I'm not sure what I've done wrong.
- T-Winsnes 15y ago
  The claim was not that water does not rehydrate, but that dehydration is not a disease. As hydrofix on slashdot said: "Actually, according to the original decision (http://www.efsa.europa.eu/en/efsajournal/doc/1982.pdf http://www.efsa.europa.eu/en/efsajournal/doc/1982.pdf) [europa.eu], it is not not about bottled water, but (any) water in general. However, as far as I understand, this conclusion was not reached because water would not prevent dehydration, but because they don't think dehydration is a disease. Which kind of makes sense – dehydration could be a symptom of a disease, but it is not a disease in itself. And the applicant asked a panel that verifies claims about products reducing the risk of a disease to verify a claim about a medical condition that –the board concluded– was not disease, so the board rejected the claim (or actually concluded [direct quote]: "The Panel considers that the proposed claim does not comply with the requirements for a disease risk reduction claim ...")"
- rmc 15y ago
  [trustworthy citation needed] The Telegraph newspaper in the UK is a slightly less extreme version of the Daily Mail, but still quite mad. It's a common meme in the right wing UK media & populace that the EU is crazy and brings in lots of crazy silly rules and bans sensible things. This is mostly not the case, and is usually either exadurated or blatantly false. A UK right wing newspaper saying that the EU does something silly is about as common as a right wing american politician saying that some terrorists are muslim.
- danssig 15y ago
  At least they didn't declare Pizza a vegetable.
cabalamat 15y ago
Maybe, but she also said "We need to keep on fighting against piracy", implying that although they acknowledge they've dug themselves into a hole, they want to keep digging.

nl 15y ago

Be very careful when reading this article. The only actual quotes from it are things like Sadly, many see the current system as a tool to punish and withhold, not a tool to recognise and reward and She added that the existing copyright system was not rewarding the vast majority of artists There is a very common copyright meme in Europe (mostly it seems from France and Belgium) that goes something like this: Google is making a lot of money, and they steal (aka spider) our work. Therefor Google should pay us. There are examples of this viewpoint in various court cases, for example: http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2011/07/google-versus-belgium-who-is-winning-nobody.ars http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2011/07/google-versu... In the ZdNet article the columnist added a lot of words about things like Rights-holders have long complained about the damage done to their industry by online copyright infringement. Governments and courts in countries including the UK have responded by blocking access to websites that help people unlawfully share music, videos, games and software. I think that Kroes is arguing for stronger copyright, not less. Here's a final quote. I hope I'm wrong about it being a "let's tax Google" argument again: In times of change, we need creativity, out-of-the-box thinking: creative art to overcome this difficult period and creative business models to monetise the art

roel_v 15y ago
What she's arguing for, and this is no secret in Brussels and even -dare I say- common sense, is better enforcement of copyright. The problem isn't with copyright itself, it's with the difficulties that those who want to use it to monetize content encounter when it comes to making sure people abide by it. Working DRM is impossible with current technology, I think everybody reading this agrees with that; so there are two ways forward: change technology so that it becomes prohibitively difficult for the average customer to copy content without a rights holder's consent, of a whole different business model all together that separates payment from copying. Both are very hard problems for which there are no real solutions in sight. In the short and medium term, the only realistic trend I see is a more active stance from the rights holders themselves in defending those rights - i.e. more lawsuits, without government involvement. (Criminal law is not the right tool for this issue anyway, it's a shame that we've wasted 15 years on going down that route now).

loup-vaillant 15y ago

> Sadly, many see the current system as a tool to punish and withhold, not a tool to recognise and reward (Neelie Kroes) As far as I know, copyright's primary goal originally wasn't to "recognize and reward", but to increase the output in creative works. And even if it is recognition and reward, it is done through punishment and withholding (state granted monopoly that if infringed, causes fines). I'd rather judge legislation by its actual consequences rather than by its professed intentions. And my impression is that copyright causes much more punishment and withholding than it does recognition and reward.