E.U. Commission Suggests Permissive Copyright Rule

An anonymous reader submits "ITworld.com is reporting: 'The European Commission on Thursday presented a draft directive that punishes copyright infringement for commercial purposes, but leaves the home music downloader untouched, infuriating the entertainment industry.'"

Comments

Because the EU is about standardising policy

[Chuck Chunder]

As the article clearly states:

The proposed directive, meant to harmonize intellectual property right enforcement laws in the 15-nation European Union (EU)

It's not about changing existing law per-se, it's about coming up with a consistant framework that could be applied across the EU.

Re:Sounds good but...

[rking]

the USA has around 260million people. That's a lot for europe or other places to compare to

If you check the US Government figures for population by country you'll note that whilst USA is third on the list (albeit a distant third to China and India) that if you go down the list a bit, adding up Germany, France, UK, Italy, Spain... that combined they surpass the USA rather easily with more EU countries (smaller ones) still to be counted, and more joining too.

Which isn't to suggest that population is some sort of ultimate metric for the comparison of countries (in any event the EU and the USA are very different in nature, at least at present) just that 260 million isn't as many as you seem to think it is.

Completely wrong submission!

[infolib]

I have actually (Oh horror!) read the directive.

The directive does not legalise filesharing, or any other activity illegal under present copyright law. It deals solely with the enforcement of copyright law. A few highlights (or should i say lowlights?):

EU states must give anti-piracy alliances the right to apply for raids where they can seize infringing copies and related evidence. These raids can be granted without the presence or knowledge of the defendant, "in the event of an actually committed or imminent infringement"

It also demands that you must divulge information on the recievers and suppliers of "infringing goods" if you have yourself been pointed out as "a link in the network" of infringers.

Furthermore EU members must allow injunctions against "intermediar[ies] whose services are being used by a third party to infringe a right" (I wonder what exactly you'll have to do to prove that the resources you put the disposal of others will not be used for piracy...)