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netAirspace.com & EU Coypright Article 11+13

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Zak (netAirspace FAA) 21 Mar 19, 19:15Post
Dear netAirspace members,
(especially those from the EU)

Next week, on Tuesday 26 March, the European parliament will vote on a new copyright legislation for the EU.

This new law contains several articles that were crafted with a "Lex YouTube" in mind. But since there can be no Lex YouTube, the law aims at all "online content sharing service providers".

That definition includes pages like netAirspace.com. We will especially be affected by 2 articles:

Article 11 prohibits the use of "press publications established in a (EU) Member State", unless proper licenses have been acquired. Note that there is no "Fair Use" law in the EU, neither under the old nor under the new legislation.

Article 13 requires "online content sharing service providers" to obtain licenses for all copyright protected material that may be shared on the platform, and/or use (undefined and currently non-existing) filter softwares to make sure that content uploaded by the users is not copyright protected.

The most toxic detail in the new legislation: if a user uploads copyright protected material to the platform, the platform provider can now be held liable for that.

In other words, if you make a forum post consisting of a copyright protected text, or if you upload a photo from another photographer, netAirspace.com would, under the new EU copyright legislation, be legally responsible for that, and could be claimed for compensation by the copyright owners.


What will happen with netAirspace.com if this law passes?

We haven't discussed this yet. But right now, the only viable solution I can see to protect netAirspace.com against possible lawsuits is to make the site unavailable to EU users by means of geo-blocking.

In other words: we may have to lock all EU users out.

Providing an online content sharing website to EU users without spending huge amounts of money on contract lawyers, licenses and third-party filter software would become an incalculable risk.


Is it really that serious?

Wikipedia switched off its German language version today (Thursday 21 March), in protest against the proposed law. Just saying.
https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/


What can still be done to prevent that law?

Call your EU representative immediately, and convince them to vote against the law.
https://pledge2019.eu/ assists you in the process.

Join the protests all across Europe this Saturday.
https://savetheinternet.info/demos has a map with many locations all across Europe.

Sign the online petition at change.org. This is weakest form of protest, as just signing an online petition won't change anything. Still, it's worth noting that, with over 5 million contributors, this already is one of the biggest political online petitions ever.
https://www.change.org/p/european-parli ... e-internet

Please help preventing Article 11 and Article 13.

Thank you!
Ideology: The mistaken belief that your beliefs are neither beliefs nor mistaken.
GQfluffy (Database Editor & Founding Member) 21 Mar 19, 20:21Post
With netAirspace being hosted in the EU (correct me if I'm wrong), does that have any affect on geo-blocking EU users from a website being hosted in the EU? {crazy}
Teller of no, fixer of everything, friend of the unimportant and all around good guy; the CAD Monkey
JLAmber (netAirspace ATC & Founding Member) 21 Mar 19, 21:48Post
Stop being such a drama queen.

Even if the EU Copyright Directive passes we would still receive a 'take down' or 'take down and stay down' notification from any party claiming copyright infringement before any action is taken. Though the German interpretation of this is somewhat ambiguous, almost all EU countries give 48 hours to take any such material down before there are any legal ramifications.

Article 11 is simply a piece of existing German law proposed to be woven into EU law as part of the new directives. If the so-called link tax was going to be a problem for us (as we're invariably smaller than our link sources, it won't be) we would already be in trouble under the existing German laws.

Zak wrote:We haven't discussed this yet. But right now, the only viable solution I can see to protect netAirspace.com against possible lawsuits is to make the site unavailable to EU users by means of geo-blocking.


Some of whom pay to use our site - they would have to be compensated. Then you have the issue of our EU uploaders who would forfeit control of their own copyright images, which in itself would be a breach of the directive. Of course there's also the issue of labour and services obtained under false pretenses from contributors who had no idea their time using the site was to be limited through no fault of their own...

Of course none of this will happen because there's a whiff of wannabe politician trying to get us to sign their petition about the whole thread. In reality we may have to change our T&Cs and tighten up moderation a little. The Daily might be an issue but I know three of our regular sources aren't averse to content sharing agreements, so even that would be little more than a small paperwork issue to resolve.
A million great ideas...
Zak (netAirspace FAA) 22 Mar 19, 00:00Post
JLAmber wrote:Stop being such a drama queen.

Easy to say for someone who, from as early as next Friday, may not be affected by EU legislation anymore. {mischief}

JLAmber wrote:Even if the EU Copyright Directive passes we would still receive a 'take down' or 'take down and stay down' notification from any party claiming copyright infringement before any action is taken. Though the German interpretation of this is somewhat ambiguous, almost all EU countries give 48 hours to take any such material down before there are any legal ramifications.

The German interpretation is highly ambiguous, indeed. The practice here is that a cease-and-desist lawyer (and that's a whole industry these days) will send you that take down notice, along with a ~€600 bill. And if you don't sign that c&d note *and* pay his bill, he can take you to court immediately.

And that's the big issue with the whole directive. It leaves a ton of practical questions open. Which means the cease-and-desist lawyers will have a field day.

JLAmber wrote:Article 11 is simply a piece of existing German law proposed to be woven into EU law as part of the new directives.

Not exactly. It is something certain German lobbyists tried to establish for years already, but never fully succeeded. Now they try to take the EU approach.

JLAmber wrote:Some of whom pay to use our site - they would have to be compensated. Then you have the issue of our EU uploaders who would forfeit control of their own copyright images, which in itself would be a breach of the directive. Of course there's also the issue of labour and services obtained under false pretenses from contributors who had no idea their time using the site was to be limited through no fault of their own...

Of course none of this will happen because there's a whiff of wannabe politician trying to get us to sign their petition about the whole thread. In reality we may have to change our T&Cs and tighten up moderation a little. The Daily might be an issue but I know three of our regular sources aren't averse to content sharing agreements, so even that would be little more than a small paperwork issue to resolve.

Again, not exactly. How do we ensure that nothing a user uploads violates any copyright? Because we will then be required by law to do so. No T&C will change that. An exception will be made for sites that are younger than 3 years, or operate on a fully non-commercial basis. None of which applies to us. We are older, and while the site doesn't make any money, we do sell memberships.

So yes, indeed, one other option to be on the safe side would be to give up selling memberships and remove the few remaining ads. Then we'd be non-commercial.

Either way, nothing will happen overnight. Even if the directive passes, it still needs to be transformed into national law, which will take a long time. So no, there won't be a block screen showing up from one day to the next.

But how many US sites were (and still are) geo-blocked in the EU after the GDPR passed? And that was a pretty mild regulation, and even made sense in large parts.

And finally, if all this is just a little local drama-queening, then why did the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights' office last week urge the EU to not pass this legislation as it is not in line with international standards on freedom of expression, and violates international human rights standards?

https://www.ohchr.org/EN/NewsEvents/Pag ... wsID=24298

That's something I wouldn't dismiss so easily.

This new legislation does a lot more than requiring a few tweaks to a site's terms and conditions. It creates a lot of uncertainties for owners of websites that allow users to upload text, photos, audio or video material.

It doesn't solve one problem, but it creates a thousand new ones. That's why almost all experts on internet law strongly urge the EU parliament to not pass the directive.
Ideology: The mistaken belief that your beliefs are neither beliefs nor mistaken.
Florida Metal 25 Mar 19, 14:49Post
F the EU, all the European countries should do what Great Britain did and get out.

I would miss all the great shots of photos from Europe if we did lock them out. Isn't there some protection of the photographers if the domain is outside of Europe?
Zak (netAirspace FAA) 25 Mar 19, 17:17Post
Florida Metal wrote:F the EU, all the European countries should do what Great Britain did and get out.

Yeah, because that's working so brilliantly for them, and domestic politicians never attempted to pass stupid laws.
This new copyright directive was mostly designed by Germans, btw.

Florida Metal wrote:I would miss all the great shots of photos from Europe if we did lock them out. Isn't there some protection of the photographers if the domain is outside of Europe?

It's not about protecting the photographers, it's about protecting the site.

Under the new law, if a user uploads a photo that is not his, the site would be liable for that. We'd have to make sure that no copyright is violated before we publish content provided by a user. "Send us a message and we'll take it down" won't cut it anymore.

And it doesn't help if the site is registered and hosted abroad. As long as the service is offered in Europe, we're bound to European law.

And as for the earlier drama-queening claims: Heise, Germans biggest tech-themed publishing house, today posted a solemn warning in regard of the copyright directive, saying:
Wir gehen davon aus, dass auch viele Webforen davon umfasst sind: In diesen Foren stellen Nutzer große Mengen urheberrechtlich geschützter Inhalte in Form von Texten oder Fotos zu Verfügung, die Nutzer hochladen und welche die Plattformen "mit Gewinnerzielungsabsicht" ordnen, verwalten und bewerben. Auch die Fotogalerie von c't Fotografie könnte unter die Neuregelung fallen. Hier gäbe es nicht einmal eine Möglichkeit, Bilder flächendeckend vorab zu lizenzieren. Dies hätte für uns als Anbieter eines solchen Forums zur Folge, dass wir unter bestimmten Umständen das Hochladen von Inhalten durch unsere Nutzer unterbinden müssen.

Translation:
We expect that many online forums will be affected. In those forums, users provide a lot of potentially protected content in form of text or images. The site providers process this material "on a commercial basis". Also, the user photo gallery provided by c't Fotografie (a photo publication of said publishing house) would be affected by the new directive. We wouldn't even have a chance to license photos in advance, on a large scale. For us, as provider of such a service, it would mean that we have to stop allowing users to upload own content.

https://www.heise.de/newsticker/meldung ... 47897.html

The article was written by Joerg Heidrich, the publishing house's legal adviser, who is widely considered one of the leading experts when it comes to online legislation.

But let me also stress out 2 important facts:

Even if the directive is passed by the European Parliament tomorrow, it will still take quite a bit of time for every country to transform it into national law. Several months at least, probably even a few years.

And there is one alternative to blocking the service for European users: we could stop showing ads and selling memberships. We would then not be affected by the new directive, as it only applies to commercial websites. (Not that we make any noticeable profits at the moment, but as long as we sell memberships, we'd still be considered a commercial site.)

So even if the directive passes tomorrow, the site won't turn blank for EU users any time soon.

But it would certainly be a lot better if the directive would not pass tomorrow.
Ideology: The mistaken belief that your beliefs are neither beliefs nor mistaken.
Yokes 25 Mar 19, 19:42Post
After about 200.000 people protesting against article 13, I think there is a real chance that article 13 will not pass tomorrow. It will be a tight result anyway.

Interesting fact is that "Impala Music" a sales organization and lobby representative has invited members of the european parliament for an evening discussion with drinks and food with european artists tonight. Helga Trüpel (Grüne, pro article 13) is on the list of the hosts.


Meanwhile German CDU politician Daniel Caspary spreads the assertion that the protesters are bought by an NGO, which got the money from big american internet companies.
Nun wird offensichtlich versucht, auch mit gekauften Demonstranten die Verabschiedung des Urheberrechts zu verhindern. Bis zu 450 Euro werden von einer sogenannten NGO für die Demoteilnahme geboten. Das Geld scheint zumindest teilweise von großen amerikanischen Internetkonzernen zu stammen. Wenn amerikanische Konzerne mit massivem Einsatz von Desinformationen und gekauften Demonstranten versuchen, Gesetze zu verhindern, ist unsere Demokratie bedroht.“


https://www.volksverpetzer.de/analyse/faktencheck-demogeld/?fbclid=IwAR2T2NktJgTA5k9Rwy_KmlApKgdgIQyO6t9OV7Epyy8Qtek5GcszAvbr3I0

Could get very expensive if you buy 200.000 people for 450€ each... {laugh}
Zak (netAirspace FAA) 26 Mar 19, 13:02Post
The Copyright Directive has been passed by the EU Parliament. {vsad}

National governments now have 2 years to transform it into national law. We will have to monitor the outcome of that process, and then discuss how we will be able to meet the new legal requirements.

But one thing is for sure - this is very bad news for netAirspace.com

We are now legally liable for any content you upload here, be it text, pictures or other media. And our responsibility starts with the moment we publish that content, not at the moment we receive a takedown order.
Ideology: The mistaken belief that your beliefs are neither beliefs nor mistaken.
Zak (netAirspace FAA) 27 Mar 19, 15:39Post
Are you up for a little more drama queening?

My US tech guys (the 'day job' tech guys) talked to their Google contacts today. Google is considering - as one of several options - to partially shut down YouTube and other platforms of theirs for EU users, at least for user-generated content.

Again, this is just one scenario. Google already has upload filter programs, to make sure that user videos e.g. don't contain copyrighted music.

However, these filters probably won't meet the requirements of Article 13, as that article requires platforms to not just filter content from the big publishers like Universal, Warner, Disney and the likes. But to preemptively filter any type of content (text, images, music, videos) that has ever been copyright protected anyhwere in the world.

Google is anything but sure their filters can do that. They have a large project team on this, and are confident that they can reach an agreement with EU lawmakers that their approach is good enough to meet the new legal requirements.

If yes, they will start selling licenses for their upload filters to third-party websites.

If not, they may block any user-generated content for EU users.

Here is a good video from the only YouTube channel I ever subscribed to. The guy is not necessarily an expert in online law, but he does explain the situation in a calm an unagitated way. Definitely worth watching:

Ideology: The mistaken belief that your beliefs are neither beliefs nor mistaken.
miamiair (netAirspace FAA) 27 Mar 19, 16:20Post
What kind of moron proposes such stupid a stupid law? Do you have an address, we'll mail them peanuts.
And let's get one thing straight. There's a big difference between a pilot and an aviator. One is a technician; the other is an artist in love with flight. — E. B. Jeppesen
Zak (netAirspace FAA) 27 Mar 19, 16:32Post
Axel Voss MEP
Euro­pa­bü­ro Mit­tel­rhein
Prinz-Albert-Stra­ße 73
D-53113 Bonn

Tel.: +49-228-96695200

E-Mail: info@axel-voss-europa.de
http://www.axel-voss-europa.de

Image

On his website, he boasts: "Finally put an end to Wild West on the internet!" {facepalm} {sick} {mad}

Still, keep it civil, please. There's already been bomb threats towards his office. That doesn't help anybody, either.
Ideology: The mistaken belief that your beliefs are neither beliefs nor mistaken.
vikkyvik 31 Mar 19, 20:08Post
Any clues on how other websites are planning on handling this?
Zak (netAirspace FAA) 31 Mar 19, 20:49Post
There is quite a bit of perplexity and insecurity. France (one of the main driving forces behind the law) has announced to start experimenting with upload filters very shortly. But generally speaking, there is no technical solution that can provide what this directive demands. Google's Content ID probably comes closest, but even that doesn't cut it.

Once again, before any action can be taken, we need to know what the national laws will look like, which can take up to 2 years. The worst case scenario is that different EU countries will pass very different laws, which would require different approaches for each of them.

But as the directive is pretty specific in its main aspects, I don't think that will happen.

About the other websites - the biggest German internet forum (by a wide margin), motor-talk.de (a forum about cars, 2.8m users, 46m posts) had warned that passing the directive may lead to drastic changes to their service. But again, we'll have to wait for the national law to arrive, before we can know how drastic they will be.

Germany's biggest photo website, fotocommunity.de, has no idea how to meet the new requirements. They say that, in order to be able to meet the new legal standards, all photographers would have to register their photos in some (currently non-existent) license database before being able to upload them to an interactive website. How this is supposed to work in practice - nobody knows.

At the end of the day, the new legal standard could lead to platform websites like YouTube, Instagram, Flickr etc. being able to only host media provided by big publishers. That kind of media is easy to license, and as long as you accept only licensed uploaders, there is no real risk for the platform provider to run into copyright issues.

Of course, this means that no platform, big or small, would still be able to accept user-generated content. For independent artists, the only chance to promote their material would be to launch an own website.

For discussion forums, it would mean the end, plain and simple. It is not, and never will be possible to make sure that nothing a user posts in a forum in form of text and/or pictures would not violate any copyright. Platforms like YouTube will probably also have to disable user comments, for the same reason. This is the only positive aspect I can see in the directive. {mischief}

For the big publishing houses (who massively pushed and lobbied the directive), this is a massive business opportunity. They hope to regain the influence they lost when YouTube & Co. had entered the stage.

For the big platforms, the directive isn't good, but probably won't be a neckbreaker. Smaller platforms, independent artists and the general public got screwed.
Ideology: The mistaken belief that your beliefs are neither beliefs nor mistaken.
ShanwickOceanic (netAirspace FAA) 31 Mar 19, 21:33Post
Zak wrote:Germany's biggest photo website, fotocommunity.de, has no idea how to meet the new requirements. They say that, in order to be able to meet the new legal standards, all photographers would have to register their photos in some (currently non-existent) license database before being able to upload them to an interactive website. How this is supposed to work in practice - nobody knows.

Possibly - possibly! - workable if these license databases provide a sensible API such that the photog can do that as part of the upload process, and if the legal situation around that absolved the photo site of responsibility for false claims (unlikely). But as soon as someone tries to upload their shot to us and JP...
My friend and I applied for airline jobs in Australia, but they didn't Qantas.
Queso (netAirspace ATC Tower Chief & Founding Member) 01 Apr 19, 02:33Post
God Bless America.
Slider... <sniff, sniff>... you stink.
miamiair (netAirspace FAA) 16 Apr 19, 08:32Post
And here you have it...

Link
And let's get one thing straight. There's a big difference between a pilot and an aviator. One is a technician; the other is an artist in love with flight. — E. B. Jeppesen
Zak (netAirspace FAA) 16 Apr 19, 14:19Post
Our useless government is trying a ridiculous stunt here at the moment. In their coalition agreement, they had ruled out any upload filters or the likes, but on the European stage, they designed and pushed this law.

Now, they would have had a last chance to stop it yesterday, but decided to vote in favour of it. At the same time, they released a statement saying that they intend to design the national law in a fashion that will not require platforms to use upload filters.

How that is supposed to work in practice, the government speaker could not answer yesterday.

Clueless morons at work.

Wikipedia founder Jimmy Wales said last week, in an interview with a German magazine, that the new directive could be the end for web forums and smaller platforms.

But once again - first, we need to know what the domestic laws will look like. As the article mentioned, there is a real chance that the different EU countries will pass rather different national laws, potentially requiring individual approaches for each country. {facepalm}

Did I mention the clueless morons yet?

Also, on a related note - there was a nice live demonstration on how upload filters work in practice yesterday: YouTube's "fact check tool" flagged most live streams of the Notre Dame cathedral going up in flames as potentially fake news, and linked to an article on the established facts around 9/11. {facepalm} {facepalm}

https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/ry ... ivestreams
Ideology: The mistaken belief that your beliefs are neither beliefs nor mistaken.
 

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