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Euro DMCA Fails

Posted by Hemos on from the too-bad-so-sad dept.

Kr3m3Puff writes "Looks like the Euro DCMA has failed according to Yahoo! It seems that only two member nations had adopted the local law and therfore the Euro wide law will not be adopted. The BSA is complaining they have no protections." Update: 12/23 17:50 GMT by T : That's DMCA rather than DCMA -- silly acronyms.

23 of 240 comments (clear)

  1. Thank $deity for that... by RMH101 · · Score: 5, Informative
    I thought this was a foregone conclusion after David Blunkett et al's usual draconian bills.

    For all UK readers, this is probably a good idea to publicise http://www.faxyourmp.org - a very quick, easy and above all *free* way to get a digitally-signed paper fax to your local MP from a webpage.

    Shout loudly or lose yet more digital rights...

  2. Wrong by KilljoyAZ · · Score: 5, Informative

    Reading the article one finds the hasn't failed, it just won't be in place in time for 2003. There's nothing stopping these countries from adopting the law in the future.

    And for the last time, it is DMCA, not DCMA!

    --
    This .sig is currently on hiatus for retooling.
    1. Re:Wrong by nusuth · · Score: 2, Informative

      No, the article says the deadline has passed so it won't be an EU wide law.

      --

      Gentlemen, you can't fight in here, this is the War Room!

  3. There's no point to this article... by doctomoe · · Score: 5, Informative

    Whether the countries have or have not implemented the Directive's text into local law does not matter. As soon as a Directive is published, it has an obligatory effect in all of the EU countries, whether it's implemented or not. So in short, in a lawsuit, any of the parties can take advantage of the Directive and the local judge will have to respect it, even if it is in opposition with the local law.

    1. Re:There's no point to this article... by paugq · · Score: 3, Informative

      I'm sorry, but you are wrong.

      A directive per-se it's a bit more than nothing. The EU works this way: the European Council or the European Parliament dictate a directive and give the EU members a deadline to implement ("transpose") it. Every member must transpose the directive, but there's always a transient period (monthes or even years) until the directive gives shape to a country-specific law. While this transient period, the directive has no effect. The point here is this: a directive is not a law and won't be used by a judge.

      Kuro5hin carried an interesting article explaining what's the EU and how it works

    2. Re:There's no point to this article... by doctomoe · · Score: 2, Informative
      No, I am right :) It's true that a Directive has no effect given to it by the EU Treaty, but the EU Court has decided since 1970 that a Directive which has not been implemented or has been badly implemented has a direct effect for all EU countries once the deadline has passed.

      SACE (17 december 1970, ruling 33/70, rec. 1213)
      Van Duyn (4 december 1974, ruling 41/74, rec. 1337)

      I have studied EU law for 2 years, I know what I am talking of.

    3. Re:There's no point to this article... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Informative
      ...the EU Court has decided since 1970 that a Directive [...] has a direct effect for all EU countries once the deadline has passed.

      Yes. For the countries themselves, which means they can be held liable if they don't implement it.

      Local countries' criminal justice law is something different entirely. You can't be held responsible for a law that may or may not exist, which is why you can't be prosecuted under a law until it has become law. A directive is not a law, it's an obligation to pass something into law.

      For instance, in Belgium the law dictates that any law that a Belgian has to conform to has to be published in an official magazine. European laws aren't published there, so I can't be held responsible if I break one.

    4. Re:There's no point to this article... by doctomoe · · Score: 2, Informative

      EU law is published in the EU Official Journal, which is sufficient. And a Directive has not only consequences on the countries, but also on the citizens, as they can take advantage of it. The only persons that can not invoke it are the Governments of the failing countries. As the BSA is no country, they can make use of the Directive before a judge.

      You can debate over it as long as you want, just check a manual on EU law, and you'll see :)

    5. Re:There's no point to this article... by doctomoe · · Score: 2, Informative

      You can indeed only take countries to the EU Court and in rare cases companies.

      However that's not the root of the problem. Individuals, as well as most companies will of course use national Courts first. As the Directive has passed its deadline, EU law grants it a direct effect for EU citizens, thus they can invoke it in front of the local judge. This one could of course refuse to to apply it, saying it is not local law, but the risk is low, as he's aware that his decision would be reversed, either by the local Appelate Court, the local High Court or in the worst case by the EU Court.

      So the Directive pretty much will produce its effects in all of the EU countries from now on, as nowadays local judges tend not to challenge EU Courts (in any case they will lose when not applying a Directive...)

      Next to that, I actually took the pain to read the Directive and in my opinion, it doesn't bring anything new in respect to most local laws (such as French law for instance), which may also explain why that much countries didn't bother to formally implement it yet. All the panic issued here is mostly hype, we're not in front of a Dark Age of Digital Copyright, the Directive just regroups the existing laws in the majority of the countries in one formal and unified document.

      This Directive won't affect the issue of an actual lawsuit in 99% of the cases...

  4. But the bad thing is by rolfwind · · Score: 2, Informative

    the BSA will keep trying and trying...... that's what particularly bad about this situation.... it will keep on going and going and going - they just lost one round.

    The EU recently welcomed in a bunch of nations from Eastern Europe, around 10, like Poland. Those countries don't make a lot of money on Software Sales yet, nor on giant media type stuff. What's the incentive to pass a law for the politicians whene it doesn't do anything for their nation. They wolud have to see a benefit (personal or national) or its going to be a backburner issue for them.

  5. Re:Late == canceled? by doctomoe · · Score: 2, Informative
    The deadline doesn't matter, the only thing it changes is that the failing countries will have to pay a fine (If the EU Commission claims so). It doesn't change anything to the obligatory effect of the EU Directive.

    Finally, let's notice that around 80% of EU Directives are implemented late, so there's not even a particular message connected to the countries being late to do it...

  6. Re:Spellcheck! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Informative

    Here is how you can remember how it's spelt:

    D.M.C.A

    A Parody by Dave

    Sung to Y.M.C.A. by the Village People

    Young man, there's no need to feel down.
    I said young man, this law is good.
    I said young man, it helps the MPAA
    There's no need to hack at all now

    Young man, do away with mp3
    I said young man, don't decode that DVD
    If you do now, I'm sure you will find
    The F-B-I breaking down your door

    You will be busted under the D-M-C-A
    You will be busted under the D-M-C-A

    They will take everything from you,
    Say bye to your boxen and hard disks...

    You will be busted under the D-M-C-A
    You will be busted under the D-M-C-A

    http://whichwayup.org/writing/ymca/

  7. No reason to celebrate... by Kjella · · Score: 5, Informative

    The laws are late, but that doesn't mean that the remaining EU countries won't adopt them. Particularly with all the controversy around them, and the large consequences, things take longer than the very optimistic deadline. In particular, some of the things it implements is:

    * Your right is now tied to media. It's no longer legal to make mp3s of your cds, for one. Each country can make exceptions, but that's the directive.

    * Illegal to import media from other zones (for companies). Blatant undermining of free trade and competition in my opinion. Also illegal to sell zonefree players or any other kind of "circumvention device".

    It's the backdoor way of extortion. You can purchase something without a licence, but you can not use it unless you have a licenced player, and by extension, those licence terms apply to YOU.

    Let me put this in a way USians can understand:

    You buy a car in the US. It runs fine on the petrol around you, so no probs. Then you want to take it to europe, but you can't. Not for any technical reason, but because it can only use licenced gas, and that gas is only licenced to the US. Note that you never signed a licence agreeing to the fact that the car is only good in the US, but you've been had.

    It's also illegal to make your car work with any other gas. And if you ask the car manufacturer, he'll suggest that you either sell your US car and accessories and buy a Euro car (and likewise sell your Euro car and buy the US one back when you get home), or if you like it so much, buy one of each, even if they in function are completely identical.

    Screw them. If they want to make it region-crippled, they're asking for it. I don't mind if they copyprotect it with CSS2 or whatever. But if I'm banned from buying DVDs because I'm in the wrong zone, then they are just pissing me off. Somehow businesses should think a little about the customers they *do* have, and not only about the pirates (arr!) they *don't* have as customers, and probably won't have in the future anyway.

    Kjella

    --
    Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
  8. It's not an acronym, it's an abbreviation by oldmacdonald · · Score: 2, Informative

    An abbreviation is a shortened form of a word (replacing the letters IGITAL with a "." in the D of D.M.C.A for example). An acronym is when an abbreviation itself works as a word, liked RADAR.

    1. Re:It's not an acronym, it's an abbreviation by tomhudson · · Score: 3, Informative
      It's an acronym. Acronyms don't have to spell words. Your example is an example: before the phrase "RAdio Detection And Rannging" was shortened, there was no such thing as RADAR. Same with SCUBA (Self-Contained Underwater Breathing Apparatus), etc. Until they were shortened into acronyms, there was no such word.

      You, sir, don't know what you're talking about.

  9. Re:Well.. by Zeinfeld · · Score: 3, Informative
    why won't they protect their own companies from their property being stolen?

    It is somewhat a mark of the polarization of this issue that a comment like that gets moderated as Troll.

    Of course the issue for the EU parliaments is protecting property. Don't project from the corruption of the US Congress where this issue is decided with multi-million dollar bribes make you think that all countries are like that. The US is an aberation in that regard. While campaign contributions occasionally influence policies in Europe the blatant influence peddling simply does not exist. Politicians do not collect campaign contributions directly, their parties do. That makes a big difference on issues of this sort.

    Reading the story I have to think that it was created by the BSA. The statements made simply do not add up.

    It seems very unlikely that the EU council of ministers would issue a directive in April requiring legislative action by the end of the year. National parliaments are not merely a rubber stamp for EU directives, no matter how hard the BSA tries to make that claim. None of the European parliaments work at that pace. Legislation in the UK typically takes a minimum of two years and the legislative year starts in the autum. Time in the legislative calendar is very scarce and the idea that the government would allow Brussels to direct it to prioritize an IP bill is somewhat interesting.

    This is just a story created by a self important industry association as a way of trying to keep an issue alive. They probably realise that the tide is starting to run against them and that unless they get their way soon they will have to make concessions and may not get their way at all.

    --
    Looking for an Information Security student project suggestion?
    Try http://dotcrimeManifesto.com/
  10. Re:Netherlands, here I come... by phulshof · · Score: 2, Informative

    Well, one of the reasons for the delay has been the crisis in (read: fall of) the Dutch government. The Dutch implementation has already been through several rounds of review though, and it'll probably be up for discussion in the 2nd Chamber pretty soon after the elections in January. As I'm very much involved in these discussions I'll keep you posted on the progress...

  11. Sigh... EU Directive != DMCA by memes · · Score: 2, Informative

    PLEASE go read the Directive. It's short, as these things go, certainly much snappier than US legislation is - though the URL I have is long:

    http://europa.eu.int/smartapi/cgi/sga_doc?smartapi !celexapi!prod!CELEXnumdoc&lg=EN&numdoc=32001L0029 &model=guichett

    Among other differences from the DMCA, it establishes a *right* to exercise the equivalent of "fair-use". My reading of the draft UK regulations implementing this Directive suggests, for example, that if I want to make a Braille transcript of Disney's next opus and it's encrypted, I can apply to the Home Secretary (=~ Minister for the Interior) for appropriate cracking tools to get the job done.

    And my reading of the Directive itself is that once an encrypted work enters the public domain, it must open itself up. Cue "foom" sound of .PDFs blatting out plain text automatically 70 years after my death and mailing the Gutenberg Project to say 'hi'...

    And, as others have pointed out, the fact that EU member states are late implementing the Directive doesn't mean it falls. It's not a US Constitutional Amendment, guys. Other legal systems are available, out here.

    F'rexample, only five or six of 15 EU member states have implemented another Directive that says freelances can claim interest (at 7% over base) on invoices paid late by our clients. But even Greece will get round to it eventually - even if it takes a Greek suing her government in den Haag to make it do so.

  12. You're correct: it's worse! by phulshof · · Score: 2, Informative

    At least the DMCA stopped at circumventing a 'technological measure' that controls access to a work. The EU directive defines a 'technological measure' as anything that stops you from unauthorized acts. Yes, that's unauthorized acts! That goes quite beyond 'mere' access to a work.

  13. Anti-EUCD fight not finished in France by dolmen.fr · · Score: 2, Informative

    EUCD is the european drective that is the equivalent of DMCA in the European Union.

    The Anti-EUCD fight is not finished in France as the law project has been proposed on December 3rd. It will be voted in february.

    The FSF Europe/France is fighting it. Their aim is to propose arguments to deputees to reject the law. Yes, it is Free Software lobbying.

    The main problem is to inform the mainstream of the danger of this law: the approach is that the law kills the "private copy" autorisation.

    For more information (and more reliable) see http://eucd.info/.
  14. Re:Surprised ... by TomServo · · Score: 2, Informative

    As much as I hate to give ammunition to the pro RIAA/record company crowd, I think you've left out a number of costs in your list.

    I don't know the actual dollar amounts, so I can't tell you how much it adds to the $2.04 you've already stated, but I'm sure that it's at least a couple more dollars.

    Just off the top of my head (I don't work in the industry, but I can imagine that these would be involved): Distribution costs, Advertising costs (including TV & Radio ads for the biggest ones, plus getting your record played on major radio stations, press junkets, etc etc etc), production costs (renting/owning a studio, producers, mixers, equipment that goes along with all that)...

    There are tremendous costs involved with creating, distributing, and promoting an album. I have a friend who's been struggling with her own album, producing her own CDs, and trying to get promoted in Los Angeles. She's gotten some promotion from a DJ here in LA that's been promoting a lot of female artists in the area, but it's been a good year-year and a half since the CD was released, and I think it's still a money-losing effort.

    There's a lot more to it than that $2.04. Despite that, I agree that the RIAA still is greedy, just not to the point that you claim. I also agree that they are doing everything they can to destroy our fair use rights, and they need to be fought on every front, especially the political one. They may have lots of money, but if the populace can be educated, votes are still more powerful than money.

  15. French DMCA on the way by hysterion · · Score: 4, Informative
    As others have written, the headline is vastly overoptimistic. If the editors had read the following, they'd know that France, for instance, seems in the process of adopting a DMCA-like bill:
    • 2002-12-04 15:16:13 France to introduce own DMCA (articles,news) (rejected)

    Today's Libé previews a new bill introduced by the French government to, in one stroke and all too familiar terms, not only legalize anticopy media , but also prohibit everyone from diffusing, advertising and even making known any means of circumvention. (Google translation.) Meanwhile, no plans to end a 56 tax on blank CDs, which brought the industry 95.3 million in 2001. Sad news from a country which, in more enlightened times, pioneered copyright reduction (to 50 years) and thus enabled such wonderful reissue programs as Chronological Classics.

    --
    Timeo idiotikOS et dona ferentes
  16. Re:BSA by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Informative

    http://www.bsa.org/usa/about/members/
    BSA Members:
    World Wide Members:
    Adobe Systems
    Apple
    Autodesk
    Bentley Systems
    Borland
    CNC Software/Mastercam
    Macromedia
    Microsoft
    Network Associates
    Symantec
    Unigraphics Solutions/EDS

    Policy Council Members:
    Dell
    Entrust
    HP
    IBM
    Intel
    Intuit
    N ovell
    PeopleSoft
    SeeBeyond Technology
    Sybase