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[Neonivek]

Seriously, Europe isn't perfect, but we never get stories about laws as completely batshit crazy as in the US.

Yes we certainly do.

For example UK Copyright law and Swedish Privacy laws are both insane! (Might not be Sweden... but I seriously cannot remember what country it is)

You know how US law protects parodies? UK Copyright law doesn't even protect obvious parodies.

Sweedish (that might not be Sweden) prevents surveillance to such a degree that it is illegal to even film crimes in progress or track down threats to their source.

[Reelya]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-29408121

No, they updated the UK laws to explicitly protect parodies. But you'll notice there were really no court cases over this. It was a theoretical risk. The real loss was opportunity cost: some writers say their legal department advised against mentioning brand-name products just in case. But there were no actual cases.

[Neonivek]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-29408121

No, they updates the UK laws to explicitly protect parodies. But you'll notice there don't seem to be any references to times anyone got charged over doing a parody. So it was a theoretical legal risk, which is now plugged.

I can state a few times it was done.

The difference is people like to rag on the US, not other countries

[Reelya]

http://www.fieldfisher.com/publications/2015/01/the-development-of-the-parody-exception-to-copyright-infringement#sthash.asNq6ok5.dpbs

Given that parody and satire are often seen as a cornerstone of British humour, there has been surprisingly little case law in the English courts on the subject. On the rare occasions where the question of whether a parody infringes the copyright in a work has arisen, the courts have shown a tendency to be relatively accommodating to the parodist.  There have been examples where the courts have found that no substantial part of the original work was used for the purposes of the parody or that the new work was sufficiently "original" not to be an infringement

It's never actually held up in court in other words.

[Antioch]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-29408121

No, they updates the UK laws to explicitly protect parodies. But you'll notice there don't seem to be any references to times anyone got charged over doing a parody. So it was a theoretical legal risk, which is now plugged.

I can state a few times it was done.

The difference is people like to rag on the US, not other countries

Yes but here you don't loose your home because you gave someone not even 2 years younger a blowjob 12 years ago.

[Reelya]

It's sort of telling when the counter-examples provided are very weak. The most "crazy" European laws so far have been the excessive right to privacy bestowed by Sweden, and that the UK didn't have an explicit fair-use clause for copyright until 2014. But if you look at the existing UK parody cases, the parodies were always deemed by a court to be "sufficiently original" not to breach copyright. So they already had a de-facto fair-use clause in the "originality" clause.

[Neonivek]

Are we including modern but no longer in use laws? or do they all have to be currently in use laws?

[ChairmanPoo]

Seriously, Europe isn't perfect, but we never get stories about laws as completely batshit crazy as in the US.

Yes we certainly do.

For example UK Copyright law and Swedish Privacy laws are both insane! (Might not be Sweden... but I seriously cannot remember what country it is)

You know how US law protects parodies? UK Copyright law doesn't even protect obvious parodies.

Sweedish (that might not be Sweden) prevents surveillance to such a degree that it is illegal to even film crimes in progress or track down threats to their source.

Dont forget that one of the first school mass shootings took place in Germany in tthe sixties... only the shooter used a spear, a mace, and flamethrower instead of a gun.

[penguinofhonor]

snip

I wouldn't say Neonivek rambling about some tangential topic is at all telling about the relative state of European and American law.

There are plenty of more similar laws that have been skipped over. You know that ridiculous example of someone who just turned 17 being accused of rape because their partner was three weeks shy of 17? In Ireland that can happen when you're both 16. To make things worse, their laws ignore the circumstances and default to charging the boy with rape, even though in this instance the boy has a mental disability and may not have been able to give consent (of course, some places in the US would do this too). The UK also has a sex offender registry that he could end up on.

So at least in the UK, things do not seem incredibly dissimilar from the US.

[Reelya]

But Ireland isn't part of the UK, so you're conflating two separate countries there to say the UK is similar to America.

And if you read the article about the Irish case, the whole gist of it is concern for the boy's welfare by the Irish court system, as opposed to the American "throw the book at 'em" attitude. This is what I mean by not actually being equivalent. In America, you have plenty of stories about people charged and convicted by kangaroo courts who end up on the sex offenders registry. Compare that to the best European example so far brought up, which is of a kid caught in a technicality, then the judge expressing concern that the case has even been brought up, and more worried about they boy's welfare than the girls.

[Neonivek]

But Ireland isn't part of the UK, so you're conflating two separate countries there to say the UK is similar to America.

And if you read the article about the Irish case, the whole gist of it is concern for the boy's welfare by the Irish court system, as opposed to the American "throw the book at 'em" attitude.

Moving goalposts you said Europe and now you are saying UK

Also that statement is VERY arguable.

[Reelya]

I'm not moving goalposts, i'm responding to penguin's claim that Irish law somehow reflects on the UK. He mixed up his countries.

And that one Irish case isn't even comparable. It's charges that haven't actually stood up in court. And the judge is instructing them to consider the accused's welfare as paramount. He won't end up with a conviction basically. Which is why presenting such speculative cases as being equivalent to people in America charged, convicted, then put on the sex offenders registry is definitely not equivalent.

Sure, sometimes there's a technicality which could be fucked if you applied it literally. The test of a legal system is how such cases get treated.

[Antioch]

I'm not moving goalposts, i'm responding to penguin's claim that Irish law somehow reflects on the UK. He mixed up his countries.

And that one Irish case isn't even comparable. It's charges that haven't actually stood up in court. And the judge is instructing them to consider the accused's welfare as paramount. He won't end up with a conviction basically. Which is why presenting such speculative cases as being equivalent to people in America charged, convicted, then put on the sex offenders registry is definitely not equivalent.

Sure, sometimes there's a technicality which could be fucked if you applied it literally. The test of a legal system is how such cases get treated.

Yes I noticed the same.

Take this paragraph from the article:

The judge also told the state solicitor he had “serious concerns” for the welfare of the accused and that he did not think the boy “understands what is going on.”

that is something VERY different from being convicted for rape and being put on a sex offenders list.

[Neonivek]

As for "Ohh the UK never had any insane instances of butchering of Copyright laws before Fair Use" >_> yeah... Lets just say if you have the clout there is a lot you can get around.

ANYHOW my point is that the US's "Insane insanity laws!" isn't a sign that the US is any more insane then any other (even first world) country... But more on how much more people pay attention to their insanity.

Heck if I asked people about Ireland's old parenting laws... They wouldn't know what I was referring to... If I asked people about Russia's censorship laws they MIGHT know about the propaganda ban MAYBE... If I asked them about Canada's moderation laws, I am sure even Canadian's wouldn't know it (though it is improving). Or the Bubblegum ban...

I'd give Japan examples but their more crazy laws but those flip flop so much that they are in law one month and out another. Not to mention that there is a huge difference between regional and "federal" law.

[Reelya]

As for "Ohh the UK never had any insane instances of butchering of Copyright laws before Fair Use" >_> yeah... Lets just say if you have the clout there is a lot you can get around.

You can take a snide tone, but that doesn't hide the fact that you're blowing hot air and can't find any citations to back up what you're saying. The louder you blow hot air about it rather than just googling a link that would back yourself up makes the point more strongly than I could.

The fact is, there are no citable cases where the copyright laws in Britain have screwed someone over for doing a parody. And not just for "people with clout". For anyone. Never happened basically, or the articles about the recent change would have had a field day going into all the case details. That's the sort of detail the media totally laps up because it makes great reading and can really pad out your article length. The lack of any case mentions definitely signals that the media reporting on this looked into it, and couldn't find a single juicy case to cite. And parodies are a staple of British comedy, so it's not like it's a rare thing.