IPPro Issue 002

Copyright Reform
the Brussels political circle, given that where this has been attempted
already—namely Germany and Spain —it failed spectacularly. Small
publishers and startups are aware of this reality, and are trying to
raise awareness that rather than help the publishing sector, article 11
will only serve to further consolidate the press publishing sector and
stifle competition.
Is the danger of big companies stepping on the smaller companies
reflected across the copyright directive?
fortunes of the press sector. On the contrary, we have clear evidence
from Germany and Spain that it will actually do serious harm.
For instance, under the trial national laws the only online news
aggregator that paid licensing fees in Spain is Upday, which is
partly owned by Axel Springer, and in Germany, where trials were
implemented in 2013, Google has yet to pay a cent, despite the fact
that the so-called ‘lex Google’ was not-so-subtly targeted directly at
major market players.
Pandora’s Box
As the EU continues to make movements on copyright reform with
its copyright directive, Mozilla remains steadfast in its assertions that
such reform could open the Pandora’s Box for copyright. Raegan
MacDonald explains
What is the latest in terms of article 11 of the EU’s Copyright Directive?
The negotiations have devolved into a battle of attrition, as votes
and substantial dialogue on key issues in the draft directive are
repeatedly pushed back. The Parliament’s rapporteur—German
centre-right MEP Axel Voss—has struggled to secure a compromise
with other MEPs on two key elements, namely articles 11 and 13,
which remain incredibly controversial issues. These elements of the
proposal are most likely to have negative long-term implications for
the health of the online ecosystem, including for free expression,
innovation, and creativity.
With respect to Article 11 in particular—the proposal to extend
copyright protection to snippets and links of text, often referred to
as the ‘link tax’—publishers, companies, libraries, and digital rights
activists in Brussels are continuing to highlight the negative impacts
of the proposal.
A particular emphasis has been placed on dispelling the myth that this
proposal is good for the publishing sector. For instance, at a recent
conference in Brussels, Matteo Renzi, the vice-president of the largest
Italian digital publishers association argued passionately that this is
really being driven by major publishers to stamp out their competition.
Unfortunately, many politicians have been easily convinced by the
narrative that the ‘link tax’ is a means of strengthening publishers’
financial position vis-a-vis large companies like Google and
Facebook. It is extremely frustrating this narrative remains credible in
Yes. It’s the same in article 13, which tries to target YouTube and
Facebook, but casts such a wide net, the entire internet as we know
it could be turned upside-down. This is because it would essentially
make most online platforms liable for the actions of their users, in
addition to requiring licence agreements and upload filters. These big
platforms seem to be the only point of reference for the problem that
article 13 is trying to address, but really, YouTube and Facebook are
the only two companies that are going to be able to comply and
survive if article 13 passes. Of course I think their services would end
up looking very different, especially because, for instance, YouTube’s
Content ID system is more effective for audio recordings, whereas
the directive is clearly aimed at a wider body of copyright-protected
works. It will open the Pandora’s Box of different kinds of rights
claims which will require different kinds of filters.
Small companies would be hit the hardest and, unfortunately, there
doesn’t appear to be a payoff for artists and creators. It has never
been clearly explained by the legacy rights holders —the music
industry— how this article will bring the actual creators fairer treatment,
including fair remuneration. The major rightsholders believe they need
this for better ‘bargaining power’. While there may well be a reason to
discuss the interactions between some large platforms and the content
industries, this directive is not the place to do so. The EU is missing the
opportunity of a generation to update a fragmented and dysfunctional
copyright regime.
In your opinion, are there any positives to article 11?
Legally and practically speaking, no. To this day there has not been
any evidence that such a regulatory intervention would improve the
Our perspective is that article
11 will only add more confusion,
undermine media pluralism and access
to information, without any added value
to publishers and the media
Our perspective, which is shared by small and competitive publishers,
digital rights activists, and libraries, is that article 11 will only add more
confusion, undermine media pluralism and access to information,
without any added value to publishers and the media. It’s perplexing
that this attrotius idea remains on the negotiating table, like some sort
of copyright zombie.
Why do you think that article 11 is being pushed forward despite
its failed trials?
For both article 11 and 13 I think, as with most IP debates, it is
about control. You can read it all in the European Commission’s
impact assessment for the copyright directive: the problem framing
is that people don’t buy newspapers and that now there is a whole
generation of individuals who consume news almost exclusively via
digital sources.
There are two ways of looking at this period of digital transformation:
you can think, there is a shift happening—consumer and consumption
patterns are changing—we’re going to have to figure out new business
models and try to take advantage of new opportunities to reach our
audience via digital means, or you can double down on antiquated
business models and try to use regulation to smother market shifts.
EU lawmakers consider themselves to be global regulatory standardsetters—just
look at the GDPR. Unfortunately, articles 11 and 13 of
the Copyright Reform directive could make the EU a global standardsetter
in a new policy field and for all the wrong reasons. In the coming
months we’ll be working hard to ensure copyright in Europe doesn’t
turn back the clock. IPPro
Raegan MacDonald, head of EU Public Policy, Mozilla
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