EU Strikes Down French "3 Strikes" Copyright Infringement Law

Erris writes "Opendotdotdot has good news about laws in the EU: 'EU culture ministers yesterday (20 November) rejected French proposals to curb online piracy through compulsory measures against free downloading ... [and instead pushed] for "a fair balance between the various fundamental rights" while fighting online piracy, first listing "the right to personal data protection," then "the freedom of information" and only lastly "the protection of intellectual property." [This] indicates that the culture ministers and their advisers are beginning to understand the dynamics of the Net, that throttling its use through crude instruments like the "three strikes and you're out" is exactly the wrong thing to do.'"

Comments

Re:The Free Culture Principle

[sakdoctor]

Yes I think I understand how this works

* Seek rock, but not at the expense of scissors
* Seek scissors, but not at the expense of paper
* Seek paper, but not at the expense of rock

France and Baseball

[MosesJones]

I mean come on, it should be struck down on the basis that France doesn't even play Baseball so a "3 strikes" rule is just the American Imperialism that they are always railing against.

Now a "7 Course Meal and you are out" sounds a much more French rule to have.

On the copyright side of course its quite odd that France, which has a set of music that only the French want to listen to (Manau excepted) is worried about piracy, hell if more people listen to some of their artists they should be glad.

3 Strikes?

[longacre]

Perhaps they rejected it simply because Europeans didn't understand the "3 strikes" baseball metaphor. They should adopt a "three yellow cards leads to a red card" policy.