German Publishers Want Monopoly On Sentences
Glyn Moody writes "You think copyright can't get any more draconian? Think again. In Germany, newspaper publishers are lobbying for 'a new exclusive right conferring the power to monopolize speech e.g. by assigning a right to re-use a particular wording in the headline of a news article anywhere else without the permission of the rights holder. According to the drafts circulating on the Internet, permission shall be obtainable exclusively by closing an agreement with a new collecting society which will be founded after the drafts have matured into law. Depending on the particulars, new levies might come up for each and every user of a PC, at least if the computer is used in a company for commercial purposes.' Think that will never work because someone will always break the news cartel? Don't worry, they've got that covered too. They want to 'amend cartel law in order to enable a global "pooling" of all exclusive rights of all newspaper publishers in Germany in order to block any attempt to defect from the paywall cartel by a single competitor.' And rest assured, if anything like this passes in Germany, publishers everywhere will be using the copyright ratchet to obtain 'parity.'"
Knowing how German works there is clearly lots of room for creativity in word construction (or is that Wortbildungkreativität?) :D
Tsunami -- You can't bring a good wave down!
Which will come first, this "Second Renaissance" or the year of Linux on the desktop?
Halley's Comet
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sigh, sorry my stupid little brother saw i was still logged in and decided to insult people using my account
(1.21 gigawatts) / (88 miles per hour) = 30 757 874 newtons