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[da_nang]

They fucking applauded it, too.

"Thunderous applause."

Ceterum censeo Unionem Europaeam esse delendam.

[Loud Whispers]

UNLIMITED LIABILITY, AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAGHHHHHHH

[Kagus]

So begins the age of gorilla memefare

Dicks out again? Welp...

[Il Palazzo]

And lo, the EU sends us back into the Dark Ages.

On the face of it, it doesn't look like a bad idea. Anyone care to elaborate why they think it isn't?

[ChairmanPoo]

lawmaker Julia Reda from the European Pirate Party, who had favored more moderate reforms, said changes to a previously tough line adopted by a key parliamentary committee were merely cosmetic and two measures could endanger the freedom of the internet.

One could force Google, Microsoft and others to pay publishers for displaying news snippets. The other would require online platforms such as YouTube, GitHub, and Instagram to install filters to prevent users from uploading copyrighted materials, could endanger a free internet.

Stupid bits in bold. Tech giants are no saints but I see little point in appeasing copyright trolls.

[Il Palazzo]

By 'freedom of internet' the Pirate Party spokesman means 'freedom to pirate somebody else's intellectual work', I presume? Is that a good thing, though?

[Reelya]

Another law being passed, or considered (i'm not sure of the status right now), is one that would force all streaming services in Europe to offer 30% native content. For example, 30% of Netflix's catalogue offered to a Hungarian would need to be Hungarian movies and TV.

This one is likely to backfire badly. You can increase the native-percentage easily by merely restricting content - having less shows/movies in general. So, for Hungarians, you just offer them a much more restricted palate of international choices (remove anything more niche, and only offer mass-appeal mainstream stuff), while funding the absolute cheapest possible local content to pad out the local-content requirements.

For example, if you have 100 shows of which 15 are Hungarian, but you're told you need 30% Hungarian, the best solution is to start cutting shows out. Remove the least-watched (in Hungary) 50 shows (or put them on a rotating schedule which limits your choices), and now your selection is 30% Hungarian.

This indicates a problem with quota systems in general. If you apply a quota, then you need to cut things that are popular but don't fit in the quota - so you remove the worst rated American shows from your selection to make room for Hungarian-local stuff. But then ... the Hungarian-local stuff you want to add won't be top-notch fare, it will be stuff that you otherwise didn't want, so you'll be picking up previously rejected material. This won't "level the playing field" it will create a quality gulf between the American content and Hungarian content that's offered in the selection.

[Il Palazzo]

Another law being passed, or considered (i'm not sure of the status right now), is one that would force all streaming services in Europe to offer 30% native content. For example, 30% of Netflix's catalogue offered to a Hungarian would need to be Hungarian movies and TV.

One would think it would make Netflix lineup in Luxembourg somewhat restricted.

[Reelya]

It can be all-European content of 30%, however each nation has the power to force the entire 30% to be local-nation content:

Viola said that, starting in December, the EU’s 28 member states would have 20 months to apply these new norms and that countries “could choose to raise the quota from the 30% minimum to 40%.” EU nations can each choose whether the 30% includes sub-quotas on original productions in their countries and whether they want to follow the German model of adding a small surcharge on streamer subscription fees to support the national production fund.

So, a nation such as Hungary would need to decide whether 30% of Netflix being made in "Europe in general" was enough, or whether to increase a minimum-percentage to be Hungary-specific. I'd argue that it would always look enticing to increase that local-country mandate, since that means more jobs in their own country, for very little effort on behalf of the government. So, if they make you have 20% Hungarian content, then they'll think "21% would be better" and want to keep pushing that to the limit. The end result could be for example, that the types of things you're allowed to watch in different EU nations varies wildly, so in Hungary the number of French films you can see would decrease because that's now competing-for-quota with local Hungarian shows, whereas American shows are in the 70% of shows that are non-quota.

[da_nang]

By 'freedom of internet' the Pirate Party spokesman means 'freedom to pirate somebody else's intellectual work', I presume? Is that a good thing, though?

More like freedom to communicate over the internet. What the directive means is that websites will be held liable for copyright-infringing user-generated content, whether it is text, links, images, audio or video. Even worse, they will be required to prevent the upload of this content or face a fine.

So what does this mean for the average user? It means that the companies that run these websites will begin filtering uploads automatically which not even mighty Google has succeeded in doing without unacceptable false positives (and false negatives are rampant as well). The requirement to prevent the upload also means even more incentive for aggressive (read: faulty) filtering. It's shoot first, ask questions later but only if you have the money to force the lawsuit.

Article 11 doesn't make things better either as now even fewer news article will enter users' information streams. The newspapers are hoping to get more money from this, but in reality they will see fewer and fewer readers because the potential readers can't find the articles in a reasonable manner. Imagine the Internet without search engines. How are you going to find the information you seek? With article 11 this is what you'll be dealing with, assuming Google decides to even show the links. Not very informative, is it?

But worst of all will be the future of user-generated content dissemination. Want to discuss a news article on Reddit? Sorry! Reddit is not going to pay a license fee to let you link that article. Oh, you want post a snippet of an article so people can understand what you're talking about? Whoops, that may or may not be a copyright violation, guess the world will not be seeing your post today. Oh, and surprise instaban for infringing copyright. What's this, a Downfall meme about EU copyright reform? Fegelein.exe says it's 95% copyright infringing--BEFEHL IST BEFEHL! Instaban.

Not a very promising future, I assure you.

Ceterum censeo Unionem Europaeam esse delendam.

[smjjames]

What about impinging on the rights of people in other countries not in the EU? It's not going to be contained to the EU. Do you think Google would restrict it to the EU? Probably not. It'd be easier to apply to all, which is where the conflict comes.

[scriver]

I wonder if this will impact Swedish library and fair use for education laws. Those are very dear to me.

[da_nang]

7 out of 12 my country's MEPs voted for it... Fucking hell.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Ceterum censeo Unionem Europaeam esse delendam.

[Il Palazzo]

Yes, we heard you the first time. It doesn't make you look smarter, if that's the intent.

[smjjames]

I wonder how that'll impact Brexit because Brexiteers now have a new and real reason to leave.

Surprised any of the UK MEPs went for it, but then again, they're leaving it anyway.

edit: A breakdown by party if anybody is curious.