Dear Public Policy wikifolk,
As some of you may be aware, I've been working with Jessica Coates (cc'd) -
of the Australian Digital Alliance(ADA) - formerly from Creative Commons
international - on a Wikimedia advocacy campaign in Australia with regards
to the possibility that Fair Use legislation could be introduced into the
Australian Copyright Act. This has been recommended many times before by
various government enquiries, and the Library and Education sectors of
Australia have long hoped for its introduction. Our current system - known
as Fair Dealing - is extremely limiting and prescriptive, which is why it
was illegal, for example, to use a personal VCR recorder in Australia until
2006, just to take one example...
Having sought and received confirmation from WMF-Legal that the proposal is
technically and legally allowable, and also received confirmation from the
ADA that their staff/communications/documentation resources would be
available to do the 'heavy lifting' in terms of public communications, I
have been running this straw poll/consultation with the Australian,
english-Wikipedia community:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Australian_Wikipedians%27_notice_bo…
You can see there the details of the proposed advocacy campaign on-wiki,
and also the background details of why this legal issue is relevant right
now in the Australian political landscape.
In short - I'm proposing to run banners on en.wp to logged out users in the
Australian-IP range who are viewing WP articles which include a Fair Use
image (e.g. corporate logo, album cover, film title card...), which will
point them to a landing page [probably on meta] explaining what Fair Use in
Australia would mean in practice, and why it's not nearly as scary as the
Copyright Lobby would have them believe. It can then point people to
further resources on the ADA website, ask them to contact their local
politician on the matter etc. [I do NOT intend for wikimedians to be
collecting a petition]. In this regard it is rather similar to the FoP
advocacy campaign run in Europe.
here's some local political context:
http://www.smh.com.au/comment/productivity-commission-to-say-fair-use-could…
and here's a video that ADA produced a couple of years ago for their
previous lobbying campaign in this topic (which was pitched to an audience
of online-creative industry in general)
https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?title=File%3ACreationistas_-_Aust…
And here's the actual government enquiry report which is currently sitting
in front of the politicans waiting for a formal reply:
http://www.pc.gov.au/inquiries/completed/intellectual-property/report
As you can see at the Straw Poll/Consultation page the comments so far are
heavily (though not unanimously) in favour of running this advocacy
campaign on-wiki. It has been advertised through watchlist notifications in
the Australian IP range, emails to the Australian-chapter mailing list, as
well as talkpage notices to the 1700 people in the category:Australian
Wikipedians.
So, as people involved in wikimedia/open-access advocacy in general, you're
welcome to comment on that page yourselves (though - do please indicate if
you're actually going to be affected by this proposal, since it's only
going to be visible in Australia). Equally - I'd love your feedback and
help in designing the banner and landing page (on meta?) IF the
consultation is eventually closed as demonstrating confirmed
relevant-community consensus to support. Obviously there's a Communications
side of this as well.
Sincerely,
Liam / Wittylama
wittylama.com
Peace, love & metadata
Hi all,
As we have stated in our annual plan [1], “currently, community members
must search many pages and places to stay informed about Foundation
activities and resources.” We have worked in the past two quarters to
create a single point of entry. We call it the Wikimedia Resource Center,
and its alpha version is now live on Meta Wikimedia:
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia_Resource_Center
As the movement expands to include more affiliates and more programmatic
activities every year, newer Wikimedians are faced with lack of experience
in the movement and its various channels for requesting support. In order
to expand Wikimedia communities’ efforts, we want to provide easy access to
resources that support their very important work. The [[m:Wikimedia
Resource Center]] is a hub designed in response to this issue: it is
intended to evolve into a single point of entry for Wikimedians all over
the world to the variety of resources and types of staff support they may
need to develop new initiatives or also expand existing ones.
This version of the Resource Center is only the beginning. For phase two of
the project, we will enable volunteer Wikimedians to add resources
developed by other individuals or organizations to the Wikimedia Resource
Center, and in phase three, the Wikimedia Resource Center will include
features to better connect Wikimedians to other Wikimedians that can
support them.
We want to hear what you think about this prototype and our plans for it!
If you have comments about the Wikimedia Resource Center, you can submit
your feedback publicly, on the Talk Page, or privately, via a survey hosted
by a third party, that shouldn’t take you more than 4 minutes to complete.
A feedback button is on the top right corner on every page of the hub.
Looking forward to more collaborations!
Best,
María
[1]
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia_Foundation_Annual_Plan/2016-2017/…
--
María Cruz
Communications and Outreach Project Manager, Community Engagement
Hello, team!
If have a good memory (I don't) you will recall that last month I asked you
to review and comment the text for two flyers on public policy topics I am
preparing. The issues were Freedom of Panorama and Safeguarding the Public
Domain. All the input was so great, that now I want to ask for the same
thing again.
I have drafted two new pages
<https://docs.google.com/document/d/1oMCxqErppinHpLUGB1FbqHK4js--d8fxc2KgBX_…>
(pages 3&4) - on Intermediary Liability Protection and on Text and Data
Mining. Comments and edits are highly appreciated!
The plan is to have these issue flyers designed nicely and then printed in
at least English. The final text will be moved to Meta.
Thank you!
Dimi
Hello everyone,
For your reading pleasure, here is the sixth issue of our newsletter.
If you’d like to stay engaged with you us on a more regular basis, please
follow us on Twitter: @wikimediapolicy <https://twitter.com/wikimediapolicy>
.
We would love to also include things that you see happening in your country
or elsewhere. If you have any feedback or want to let us know about an
issue, please fill out this form
<https://docs.google.com/a/wikimedia.org/forms/d/1-_XXZ3CC0tqX0vRQyU2cHjXxf3…>
or follow up with me by email at jgerlach(a)wikimedia.org.
Policy issue highlights
Amicus Brief in support of freedom to travel and collaborate
As we previously shared, on April 21, the Wikimedia Foundation signed an
amicus brief in support of two separate challenges to an executive order
that would restrict immigration and travel to the US. The brief in State of
Hawaii v. Trump (before the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals) and the similar
case of International Refugee Assistance Project v. Trump (before the
Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals) explains how the order would impact the
international operations of the signatories and outlines legal problems
with the order’s provisions and proposed implementation.
This is the third time this year that we, along with many other companies
and organizations, have filed an amicus brief in support of a challenge to
a U.S. executive order’s restrictions on international travel and
immigration. These travel restrictions would harm our ability to
collaborate with community members and stakeholders across the globe.
On May 8, oral arguments took place before the Fourth Circuit, during which
government lawyers were questioned about the order’s underlying rationale.
On May 15, arguments took place before the Ninth Circuit. An injunction
against an earlier executive order was upheld in similar case, State of
Washington v. Trump, in March; we are hopeful about the outcome of these
hearings as well. We will keep you posted on the progress of these cases.
Read the amicus brief:
https://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/File:Amicus_brief_of_tech_companies_%2…
Read the updated blog post:
https://blog.wikimedia.org/2017/03/15/amicus-brief-us-travel-restrictions/
Amicus Brief in support of intermediary immunity and community oversight
On Friday, May 12, the Wikimedia Foundation joined the Electronic Frontier
Foundation and others in filing an amicus brief in support of intermediary
immunity under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) in Mavrix
Photographs, LLC v. LiveJournal, Inc. Photo agency Mavrix has filed a
copyright infringement lawsuit against LiveJournal, claiming that one of
the blogs on LiveJournal featured some of its photographs and that the
presence of volunteer moderators, who prescreened content before it was
posted, made LiveJournal ineligible for the safe harbor granted by section
512(c) of the DMCA.
We are joining a brief to United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth
Circuit to argue that it would be counter to the legislative intent behind
the DMCA to impose liability on intermediaries if there is a screening
process in place. If courts weaken these immunities for websites, they will
have less legal leeway to defer to user judgement. Moderation, and
enforcement of content policies by users, can help ensure that content is
legal, accurate, and safe. The Wikimedia Foundation relies on the DMCA safe
harbor to ensure that if infringing content ever appears on the Wikimedia
projects, it can be handled by admins and community processes. We believe
that the Wikimedia projects can thrive thanks to the safe harbor protection
that lets the Foundation respect community self-governance.
Read the amicus brief:
https://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/File:WMF,_et._al._Amicus_Brief_in_Mavr…
Wikipedia blocked in Turkey
As most of you will know, on Saturday, April 29 all language versions of
Wikipedia were blocked in Turkey. We filed an objection to the order to
block Wikipedia on Tuesday, May 2, which was denied, and then we filed a
petition with the Turkish Constitutional Court seeking a ruling to restore
access to Wikipedia users in Turkey.
Read the full blog post here:
https://blog.wikimedia.org/2017/04/30/turkish-authorities-block-wikipedia/
18 NGOs file intervention in support of freedom of expression in France
In 2016, French data protection authority CNIL decided to implement the
right to be forgotten worldwide, rejecting a compromise offer by Google and
requiring the search engine to respond to delisting requests by removing
corresponding search results from all of its domains. The case, CNIL v.
Google, is now before the French Supreme Court (Conseil d’Etat). Late last
year, we filed a petition to the Court and partnered with Wikimedia France
to publish an op-ed encouraging lawmakers to consider the importance of
public access to knowledge in the context of the right to be forgotten.
In February, the Conseil d’Etat has asked the European Court of Justice
(CJEU) to issue a preliminary ruling on the matter. Until that happens, the
case in France has come to a halt.
Now, a group of 18 non-governmental organizations from around the world
have jointly filed an intervention before the Conseil d’Etat. Internet
Freedom Foundation, the Software
Freedom Law Center (India), Association for Progressive Communications,
Institute of Technology and Society of Rio, Red en Defensa de los Derechos
Digitales, and others have written to France’s highest court, urging it to
annul CNIL’s order. The NGOs express their concern over the negative
implications the order has on freedom of expression and the precedent this
would set for censorship by governments in the developing world. We welcome
the intervention by this impressive group of organizations working for
freedom of expression around the world and will keep you updated when new
developments occur.
Read the intervention:
http://www.doughtystreet.co.uk/documents/uploaded-documents/Google_CNIL_FIN…
Read our op-ed in Le Monde here (in French):
http://www.lemonde.fr/idees/article/2016/11/25/le-droit-a-l-oubli-ne-doit-p…
Read about our own petition:
https://blog.wikimedia.org/2016/10/19/petition-right-to-be-forgotten/
Read the Conseil d’Etat’s press release about the request to the CJEU:
http://english.conseil-etat.fr/Activities/Press-releases/Right-to-be-delist…
Events
Creative Commons Global Summit
During the last weekend of April, we and a few other Wikimedians
participated in the 2017 Creative Commons Global Summit in Toronto. The
summit brought together people from around the world who work for free and
participatory culture and access to knowledge. We contributed to
discussions of public policy advocacy for the CC and free culture
communities, and on reimagining the CC tools (licenses, deeds, website,
etc.) for the current needs of users. In addition, Chuck from the Wikimedia
Foundation led a workshop on strategies to address the issues of reusers
not providing proper CC attribution and of creators sending reusers legal
threats in response to improper attribution.
At the summit, Creative Commons presented their latest State of the Commons
report, which shows that more than 1.2 Billion works are now freely
licensed! The report also includes an inspiring story about a medical
doctor, whose university students actively edit 42 Wikipedia articles on
health-related topics.
Read the State of the Commons report:
https://stateof.creativecommons.org/
Thanks for reading this newsletter!
All the best,
Stephen and Jan
==
Jan Gerlach
Public Policy Manager
Wikimedia Foundation
149 New Montgomery Street, 6th Floor
San Francisco, CA 94105
jgerlach(a)wikimedia.org
Please get in touch with Javier directly if you are interested in signing
as an individual. Might WMUK be interested in signing on too?
---------- Forwarded message ---------
From: Javier Ruiz <javier(a)openrightsgroup.org>
Date: Tue, 16 May 2017, 22:14
Subject: [ORG-advisory] Joint letter to stop password demands at UK border
under Schedule 7 Terrorism Act 2000
To: ORG Advisory Council
Dear all
we are working with other NGOs, calling for organisations and individuals
to sign to the following statement, with a view to start ongoing pressure
to demand a stop on password demands at the UK border.
Please mail me if you have any queries. There is some background here
https://wiki.openrightsgroup.org/wiki/Terrorism_Act_2000/Schedule_7 and
here
https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2017/may/14/campaign-group-to-challeng…
Please forward it on to people you think may be able to sign. We’d like to
get it published by the end of the week. Apologies for the short notice.
Best, Javier
------
We, the undersigned, professionals, experts and practitioners in privacy
and human rights have observed that:
1) Mobile phones and digital devices today hold all of our personal
information, from intimate family photos to confidential work documents.
Most of our lives are documented digitally in some form. Our passwords are
the keys that unlock our digital lives and provide us with some privacy.
2) Recently there has been a growing international trend of authorities
demanding passwords at borders and forcibly gaining access to devices. A
coalition of human rights organisations in the US have launched the “Fly
don’t spy” campaign in order to ensure travellers are not forced to
disclose their passwords without reason.
3) In the UK, each year over 30,000 people are held without suspicion at
borders, many threatened with imprisonment if they do not reveal the
passwords to their phones, tablets and laptops. Their devices are then
copied and analysed. This is effectively unaccountable surveillance of
British citizens, circumventing investigatory powers legislation. Moreover,
80% of those stopped are from an ethnic minority suggesting the power may
be applied in a discriminatory manner.
We are concerned with these developments and believe that:
4) People should not have to choose between maintaining their right to
privacy or their right to travel, they should be allowed to have both. This
is especially true for journalists and human rights defenders who have a
duty to protect their sources.
5) No one should be forced to disclose their passwords without a warrant
based on specific suspicion and basic standards of evidence. No one should
be imprisoned for refusing to disclose it.
6) Thousands are already affected. The powers to compel password disclosure
at the border are open to abuse - infringing on the rights of individuals
to privacy, free speech and association - and should be removed.
END
_______________________________________________
ORG-advisory mailing list
Dear All,
On Friday, May 12, the Wikimedia Foundation joined the Electronic Frontier
Foundation, Public Knowledge, the American Library Association, and others
in filing an amicus brief
<https://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/File:WMF,_et._al._Amicus_Brief_in_Mavr…>
in support of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA)
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_Millennium_Copyright_Act> safe
harbor. The case in question is Mavrix Photographs, LLC v. LiveJournal, Inc.
LiveJournal has petitioned the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth
Circuit
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Court_of_Appeals_for_the_Ninth_…>
to grant rehearing, and the brief supports that petition.
LiveJournal is a blogging and social media platform. Mavrix is a photo
agency that filed a copyright infringement lawsuit against LiveJournal,
claiming that one of the LiveJournal blogs featured some of its
photographs. As the content in question was posted by users, LiveJournal
argued that it was immune to suit under the safe harbor granted by section
512(c) of the DMCA. However, Mavrix claimed that the presence of volunteer
moderators, who prescreened content before it was posted, made LiveJournal
ineligible for this safe harbor. It claimed that the moderators acted as
LiveJournal’s agents, and gave LiveJournal control over the alleged
infringing activity. The district court agreed with LiveJournal, but Mavrix
appealed. A panel of the Ninth Circuit overturned the lower court’s ruling,
holding that there is a genuine dispute as to whether the moderators are
LiveJournal’s agents or not.
We joined an amicus brief to argue that this outcome is counter to the
legislative intent behind the DMCA. If having a screening process means
that a platform will lose its immunity to suit, websites will have less
legal leeway to defer to user judgement on issues like moderation and
content policies to ensure that content is legal and in line with community
or site policies. The Wikimedia Foundation relies on the DMCA safe harbor
to ensure that if infringing content ever appears on the Wikimedia
projects, it can be handled by admins and community processes. We believe
that the WIkimedia projects can thrive thanks to the safe harbor protection
that lets the Foundation defer to community decisions. .
We will keep you posted on the outcome of this case. As always, we will
continue to monitor ongoing cases related to copyright and other matters
that could affect the future of the projects, the communities, and the
Foundation, and speak up where we have an opportunity to do so. If you see
any similar cases in your country, please send an email to
apalmer(a)wikimedia.org or me (jgerlach(a)wikimedia.org).
Best,
Jan
==
Jan Gerlach
Public Policy Manager
Wikimedia Foundation
149 New Montgomery Street, 6th Floor
San Francisco, CA 94105
jgerlach(a)wikimedia.org
Lisette,
Our chapter (WMCZ) voted in favour of this issue yesterday, we will prepare the corresponding materials tonight (and then we should have tomorrow some information sent on behalf of our chapter to others.
Please inform me how an NGO can sign the petition online.
All best
Jan Loužek/Aktron
Wikimedia Czech Republic
______________________________________________________________
> Od: Lisette Kalshoven <lk(a)kl.nl>
> Komu: Publicpolicy Group for Wikimedia <publicpolicy(a)lists.wikimedia.org>
> Datum: 09.05.2017 13:33
> Předmět: [Publicpolicy] Last week of the RightCopyright.eu Campaign - we need your help!
>
Hi guys, We only have one week left on the www.rightcopyright.eu <http://www.rightcopyright.eu> campaign - I know a lot of you have already signed, thank you! If you have not: what are you waiting for!?We still need a lot of signatures to get to our goal, and a couple of days to make it. As you know we are collecting signatures to let the policymakers in Brussels know we need a better copyright for education. Right now, education exceptions are fragmented across Europe, which make sharing online difficult to do legally. We want to make sure we have equal rights for educators across the EU, and this includes museums, libraries, archives and other heritage institutions. Help us to achieve this goal by signing and sharing the petition. Please share to everyone and their mother the link to sign. We have the website in 13 European languages so you can share widely to people who are not English readers. You can:1. Retweet this: https://twitter.com/communia_eu/status/8607888804
45976576 <https://twitter.com/communia_eu/status/860788880445976576> or make your own tweet2. Share this on Facebook: “You may not know it, but you are breaking the law. Help us change this: bit.ly/rightcpy <http://bit.ly/rightcpy> #rightcopyright”3. Share this e-mail with mailing lists, friends/colleagues:“Dear ****,All over Europe, you are working towards shaping a new education system. A system that is collaborative, open and invites you to make the most of the tools and technologies around you. Unfortunately, copyright laws haven’t changed for over fifteen years, and this is affecting you every day.We would like to invite you to join us in our mission to shape the future of education now. Let’s make copyright right. Right now.Are you with us? Sign the petition at rightcopyright.eu <http://rightcopyright.eu>.We really appreciate your support![Name + email signature]”4. Include a quick message about the campaign in any newsletters you might send, or think might
be relevant for the campaign. You can find gifs and other useful things here: https://rightcopyright.eu/spread-the-word/ <https://rightcopyright.eu/spread-the-word/>5. All of the above :slightly_smiling_face:Please let me know if there are any questions or remarks, Cheers,Lisette Kalshoven
--
Kennisland | www.kl.nl <http://www.kl.nl> | t +31205756720 | m +31613943237 | @lnkalshoven | skype: lisette.kalshoven
----------
_______________________________________________
Publicpolicy mailing list
Publicpolicy(a)lists.wikimedia.org
https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/publicpolicy <https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/publicpolicy>
Hi guys,
We only have one week left on the www.rightcopyright.eu <http://www.rightcopyright.eu/> campaign - I know a lot of you have already signed, thank you! If you have not: what are you waiting for!?
We still need a lot of signatures to get to our goal, and a couple of days to make it. As you know we are collecting signatures to let the policymakers in Brussels know we need a better copyright for education. Right now, education exceptions are fragmented across Europe, which make sharing online difficult to do legally. We want to make sure we have equal rights for educators across the EU, and this includes museums, libraries, archives and other heritage institutions. Help us to achieve this goal by signing and sharing the petition.
Please share to everyone and their mother the link to sign. We have the website in 13 European languages so you can share widely to people who are not English readers.
You can:
1. Retweet this: https://twitter.com/communia_eu/status/860788880445976576 or make your own tweet
2. Share this on Facebook: “You may not know it, but you are breaking the law. Help us change this: bit.ly/rightcpy #rightcopyright”
3. Share this e-mail with mailing lists, friends/colleagues:
“Dear ****,
All over Europe, you are working towards shaping a new education system. A system that is collaborative, open and invites you to make the most of the tools and technologies around you. Unfortunately, copyright laws haven’t changed for over fifteen years, and this is affecting you every day.
We would like to invite you to join us in our mission to shape the future of education now. Let’s make copyright right. Right now.
Are you with us? Sign the petition at rightcopyright.eu.
We really appreciate your support!
[Name + email signature]”
4. Include a quick message about the campaign in any newsletters you might send, or think might be relevant for the campaign. You can find gifs and other useful things here: https://rightcopyright.eu/spread-the-word/ <https://rightcopyright.eu/spread-the-word/>
5. All of the above :slightly_smiling_face:
Please let me know if there are any questions or remarks,
Cheers,
Lisette Kalshoven
--
Kennisland | www.kl.nl | t +31205756720 | m +31613943237 | @lnkalshoven | skype: lisette.kalshoven
This is a great place to have copyright focused discussions and meet people
from across Europe. Highly recommended.
Dimi
---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Krzysztof Siewicz <krzysztof.siewicz(a)nowoczesnapolska.org.pl>
Date: 2017-05-09 12:36 GMT+02:00
Subject: CopyCamp 2017 open call for speakers - please distribute!
To:
Hello,
* The Modern Poland Foundation is pleased to inform that the Open Call for
Speakers at the 6th International CopyCamp conference (September 28-29,
2017 in Warsaw) has launched under the title "Beyond copyright: how
exclusive rights affect real life?" *
* We would be more than grateful if you distribute this information in your
communities. About CopyCamp In the last 5 years, we have succeeded in
making CopyCamp the biggest conference about social and economic aspects of
copyright in Europe. It has been the place for a balanced, original, and
multi-sided debate. Over this time, we have facilitated exchange of ideas
about exclusive rights between 250 speakers from all over Europe and
abroad. At CopyCamp we discuss the law, but it is not a legal conference.
Our participants share their stories touching on real-life issues,
questioning popular beliefs that only experts should be concerned with
exclusive rights. Usually, we reach out to people active in culture,
education, science, government and technology. This year we also wish to
invite those active in other areas, for example, health, food or security.
Open call details We invite our prospective speakers to submit presentation
proposals at: https://copycamp.pl/en/contact/register-speaker/
<https://copycamp.pl/en/contact/register-speaker/>. Please note: your
presentation should not exceed 10 minutes. Please include an abstract of no
more than 1800 characters under one of the following thematic tracks: -
business models, heritage digitization, remix What are the boundaries of
appropriation in culture? Who owns the past and whether these exclusive
rights allow to control the present and the future? How to make money from
creativity without selling yourself? - health, food, security, and
exclusive rights In the age when information and its various embodiments
are subject to exclusive rights, who owns medicines and equipment necessary
to provide health care? Who owns grain and machines used to harvest it if
they are protected with patent-like rights or DRM? To what extent exclusive
rights can affect what you eat, how you exercise, or whether you can apply
a specific treatment? - text and data mining, machine learning, online
education Who owns the data fed to algorithms? Do you own the algorithms
you use to mine this data? What about the inferred knowledge? To what
extent exclusive rights may affect the way you do business or research?
What does it mean to own data about someone, or data necessary for that
person’s education? - IoT: autonomous cars, smart homes, wearables What
does it mean to own exclusive rights to software and data used to construct
autonomous agents? What can you do with an interconnected “thing”? What
will it mean in a near future for traditional concepts such as property or
personality? - hacking government data, public procurement, public aid in
culture Who owns information created using public money? How can this
information be appropriated? What is the role of government in the
development of information infrastructure? Deadline: May 31, 2017 Open call
results will be announced by the end of June The organisers are not capable
of covering expenses related with Open Call speakers’ participation in the
CopyCamp conference. As always, we will be pleased to host all interested
parties in a neutral and friendly space, and encourage participants to
share thoughts and exchange ideas.*
Kind regards,
Krzysztof Siewicz
tl;dr
Ça y est ! The copyright amendments in the lead European Parliament
committees have been proposed. From now on we are focused on building
consensus and forging compromises. In the meanwhile, we answered the
European Commission’s consultation on “data driven economy”, telling them
that a new related right on data isn’t a swell idea. In Hungary, a new
proposed law might make operating NGOs with funds from abroad very
unpleasant.
This and past reports: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/EU_policy/Monitor
===
Copyright reform - Amendments on the table: With the exception of the
tardive Civil Liberties Committee all relevant bodies have proposed their
amendments to the EU copyright reform text. [1] Why this is so important?
>From now on no new text can be added, meaning that the final version that
the European Parliament will adopt must be made out of wordings and
snippets already on the table. The rapporteurs and their shadows are
starting to plough through the 3000+ amendments and to look for possible
compromises.
---
Legal Affairs Committee (JURI): This is the main lead committee.
Essentially, the version it adopts will be one voted on in plenary, except
for Article 13 (upload filtering). We are still waiting for the committee's
secretariat to compile the file with the 1000+ amendments and to send it to
the translation services, which makes it a bit hard to analyse what we will
be working against in the coming months. What we know for sure is that a
full Freedom of Panorama has been proposed by MEPs from the Social
Democrat, Liberal, Green and Radical Left groups. We are unsure about the
Conservative Reformist group. We also know that a Safeguard the Public
Domain clause has been proposed by the Social Democrat and Green shadow
rapporteurs. Other than that, positive changes on the table are a complete
deletion of the press publishers’ right, a removal of the upload filtering
provisions, a full user-generated content exception, a full text and data
mining exception and several broad educational exceptions.
What we cannot really know yet is what and how many negative proposals are
heading our way. From here on the next step is for the rapporteur and her
shadow rapporteurs (one from each political group) to figure out where they
can reach an agreement ahead of the committee vote. The first consideration
of amendments has been scheduled for the 29 & 30 May. Until then many
conversations will be had.
---
Internal Market Committee (IMCO): This committee takes the lead only on
Article 13, which is asking for online platforms with large amounts of
user-generated content to install “content recognition technologies” and to
cooperate with rightsholders. There was a meeting of this committee last
Monday where this role of online platforms was debated. [2] Although the
context of the discussing included another Directive, there still seems to
be a majority that recognises that this is also a censorship issue
(something we have been raising). Even Christian Democrat MEPs are
critical. It seem clear that Article 13 with substantially change in
nature. It is however not clear how. Most MEPs want to keep some text
included, but are struggling to find the wording that will appease most
stakeholders. We from Wikimedia are emphasising that public domain content,
content used under exceptions & limitations and freely licensed should be
by default excluded from the provision. More importantly, we need to make
sure that the intermediary liability provisions of the E-Commerce Directive
remain in place. The million euro question is, what do rightsholders get in
return, if we get all these safeguards and delete any mention of “content
recognition technologies”?
---
Opinion Giving Committees: The rapporteur of the Industry and Trade
Committee (ITRE) has decided to work on an opinion dealing only with text
and data mining and Article 13. On the first topic Mr. Krasnodebski (ECR
PL) has proposed a full and broad exception that we can fully embrace. On
the latter, his team are currently working on a compromise with the
shadows. There is political willingness to listen to our concerns and try
to reflect them in the compromise text.
The Culture Committee (CULT) is not great on too many issues, but has
proposed a baseline Freedom of Panorama (mandatory everywhere but details
up to Member States). What is a surprising turn is that the Christian
Democrats are supporting such an exception while the Italian shadow from
Movimento 5 Stelle, who have previously supported a full Freedom of
Panorama, now prefers not having it at all.
The Civil Liberties Committee (LIBE) has, after some political wrangling,
finally received the right to contribute an opinion. They are joining the
procedure very late, which means that by the time they are done the lead
committees might have already agreed on many compromises. Still, the LIBE
opinion can be used to feed new wordings into the process.
===
European Data Economy Consultation: After roaming, data protection,
privacy, digital contracts, geo-blocking and copyright, the European
Commission is now tackling data as its next big Digital Single Market
package. We have communicated to the Commission as early as 2016 (by form
of meetings with the relevant units and two political cabinets) that the
Database Rights Directive and the sui generis right it establishes is a
major nuisance. Instead of tacking this clearly defined issue, the European
Commission ran an extremely, blatantly biased consultation [3] (excuse me,
but these qualifications are actually an understatement) on how to improve
the European Data Economy. Their premise is that data is valuable and
should be used and shared. Companies don’t share (read: sell) their data
because they have no way to protect its economic value. So, by establishing
a new copyright-like right on data, sharing in Europe will be fostered.
Wikimedia [4][5] and EDRi [6] have answered the consultation. In our
answers, we kept hammering the point across that current legal obstacles
are what is hindering the sharing of non-personal data. We also called them
out on their bias and made sure not to forget to mention that personal data
must remain protected. Next we are expecting a dialogue or some other form
of structured, real-life consultation.
===
Hungary: The government proposed new law in Hungary that would require NGOs
receiving more than 7.2M HUF (~23000 EUR) from foreign sources ("directly
or indirectly", whatever that means) to register as an "organization
supported from abroad" and say that on every publication it issues. It also
includes stringent reporting criteria for foreign funds (including the name
and location of every single donor). Text of the proposal [7] (in
Hungarian), Council of Europe review
<https://www.coe.int/en/web/ingo/-/the-conference-of-ingos-calls-on-hungary-…>.
[8]
This is part of a trend of government hostility to NGOs, especially
watchdog and liberal NGOs, which are seen as tools of international
political forces. Another planned but not yet proposed legislation would
require NGO officials to publish a wealth declaration, much like
politicians.
This would probably be a significant burden on NGOs operating in a
chapter/grant system like Wikimedia does, both administratively and because
"organizations supported from abroad" would likely become targets of
pro-government propaganda.
(HT Tisza Gergő)
===
Your Input: From now on this report will offer a tribune to policy related
news from European countries. Please don’t hesitate to just drop me some
text if you believe it fits here. Many thanks to Tisza for being the first
to volunteer!
===
[1]
http://www.europarl.europa.eu/oeil/popups/ficheprocedure.do?reference=2016/…
[2]
http://www.emeeting.europarl.europa.eu/committees/agenda/201704/IMCO/CJ18(2…
[3]
https://ec.europa.eu/digital-single-market/en/news/public-consultation-buil…
[4]
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/b2/European_Data_Economy_C…
[5]
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/ba/European_Data_Economy_C…
[6]https://pad.edri.org/public_pad/Data%20Economy%20public%20consultation
[7]http://www.parlament.hu/irom40/14967/14967.pdf
[8]
https://www.coe.int/en/web/ingo/-/the-conference-of-ingos-calls-on-hungary-…