Urgent: Net Neutrality in EU under Threat; Please Write to your MEPs Now

The long saga of net neutrality in the EU is approaching its end, and things aren't looking good.  The compromise text contains some huge loopholes, which I've written about elsewhere. The key vote is on Tuesday, so there's still time for EU citizens to write to their MEPs. 

You can find contact details for all MEPs on the SaveTheInternet.eu site; those in the UK can also use WriteToThem.com.  Here's what I've just sent - please feel free to use its idea, but don't just copy and paste: MEPs will rightly disregard it.

The Internet has risen more rapidly and had more influence on society than any preceding technology. At the heart of its success lies an obscure technical feature: net neutrality. Simply put, it means that all traffic is treated equally. That level playing field has allowed innovation to flourish, and startups to create new industries in a way never seen before.

As you know, on Tuesday the European Parliament votes on new rules that supposedly enshrine net neutrality in Europe. In fact, those proposals contain such serious shortcomings that they are likely to have the opposite effect, and will undermine net neutrality.

I would therefore like to urge you to vote in favour of amendments that would return the text to a form nearer the earlier one approved by the European Parliament, which was far superior. In particular I would like to ask you to support the amendments specified here:

https://www.laquadrature.net/files/20151019-Amendments_TSM.pdf

In a surprising turn of events, the US has passed strong net neutrality laws (https://www.whitehouse.gov/net-neutrality). If the EU does not follow suit, it will threaten digital innovation in Europe, and hamstring its entrepreneurs, thus ensuring that the digital gulf between the EU and US widens, rather than narrows. For this and other reasons, it is vital that the amendments indicated above are included in the final text.

Thank you for your help.

Urgent TTIP Vote: Please Write (Again) to Your MEPs before Wednesday

There is (another) very important plenary vote in the European Parliament on TTIP this Wednesday, when the European Parliament will vote on a resolution concerning TTIP. The first time around, the vote was pulled for tactical reasons by the pro-ISDS camp, rightly afraid that the European Parliament would reject the inclusion of this anti-democratic idea in TTIP. Now they have cobbled together a "compromise" on ISDS which simply calls it something else, without solving the fundamental problem, which is that it gives corporations unique rights to sue entire nations, with us, the public, footing the bill.  Here's the proposed amendment:

to ensure that foreign investors are treated in a non-discriminatory fashion while benefitting from no greater rights than domestic investors, and to replace the ISDS-system with a new system for resolving disputes between investors and states which is subject to democratic principles and scrutiny where potential cases are treated in a transparent manner by publicly appointed, independent professional judges in public hearings and which includes an appellate mechanism, where consistency of judicial decisions is ensured, the jurisdiction of courts of the EU and of the Member States is respected and where private interests cannot undermine public policy objectives;

The good news is that MEPs are often responsive to their constituents contacting them, especially if large numbers do so on a particular theme. So I would like to urge you to write to your MEPs, using WriteToThem, or directly, to ask them to reject ISDS in all its forms.

If you want to find out more about TTIP in general, I have written a 6000-word explanation; you can also browse through the 51 columns I have written on the topic over the last two years. Finally, there is a documentary about TTIP, which provides a superb introduction to the issues – I'm in it, but please don't let that put you off.

I've included below the letter that I have sent to my MEPs: please feel free to draw on its arguments, but I urge you to put them in your words: MEPs hate and will dismiss letters that are carbon copies of others. Individually-written communications, by contrast, are very powerful.

I hope you will excuse me writing to you again on the topic of TTIP ahead of Wednesday's plenary vote. I would like to urge you to vote against the proposed "compromise amendment" on the topic of ISDS, which supposedly addresses the problems of this system. It does nothing of the sort: it still provides corporations with unique rights against entire nations; it creates a similarly unfair system where companies can win huge awards, to be paid by the public, but the best the public can achieve is not to lose. This is the very definition of a tilted playing-field.

The avowed intent of this "compromise", and of ISDS itself, is to ensure that foreign investors are treated fairly. That is only right, but ISDS and the compromise are exactly the wrong way to go about this. If either is in place, there is no pressure to address the real problem, which is that local laws may not treat foreign investors in the same way as domestic ones. Far better to change laws to make them truly fair, than to introduce another unfair system that undermines the rule of law by creating special structures outside it.

I would therefore ask you to reject ISDS completely, as well as any attempts to introduce it in other ways, for example through the "compromise amendment".

Help Reform EU Copyright: Please Write to your MEPs Now

Although it's rather dropped off the radar, an extremely important revision of the EU Copyright Directive has been underway for years. The biggest development recently has been the excellent work by the German Pirate Party MEP Julia Reda, who put together a draft report on the existing Copyright Directive and some bold but sensible proposals for what the next iteration should contain. Naturally, that report has come under fierce attack from the copyright maximalists, who believe that copyright should only ever get stronger and longer for their benefit, and that it should never be changed for the benefit of the public, who are regarded simply as consumers that must pay for every use of everything.

Reda's report has received over 500 amendments, many of which not only weaken it, but completely reverse its intent. Next Tuesday, the main European Parliament committee responsible for this dossier, JURI, votes on which amendments to incorporate into the report. It is therefore important for people to contact their MEPs, asking them to pass on messages about which amendments must be rejected. Communia has put together a good guide to both good and bad amendments, which you might want to draw upon.

I have included below what I am sending to my MEPs; please feel free to draw on it, but do not copy it verbatim, since that lessens the impact of sending a personal message. To find out who you MEP is, you can use WriteToThem.

I am writing to you in connection with the JURI vote on Julia Reda's draft report on revising the Copyright Directive. As you know, this is an extemely important opportunity to make copyright fit for the digital age. If it is not taken, it is likely to impact adversely the EU's competitiveness and also lead to an increasing disregard for copyright law, especially among young people. I would therefore like to urge you to pass on to your JURI colleagues the following comments about some of the key proposed amendments, and why they should be rejected.

Reject amendments 252 to 257

These all attack the public domain. Copyright is an exceptional monopoly granted for a limited time; after that time expires, works enter the public domain, which therefore forms the foundation of all copyright laws. The public domain represents the great store of knowledge that all can draw upon to create anew. It must be defended.

Reject amendment 409

This is an extraordinary attack on the hyperlink, which lies at the heart of the Web. It would impose an impossible responsibility on everyone creating Web pages: to know the exact legal status of the Web page to which they link. That is a job for judges, not people sitting at home sharing interesting links with their friends and family.

Reject amendment 279

Copyright has been getting stronger, longer and wider for the last 300 years. It is now so unbalanced that the vast majority of Europeans ignore it every day as they use the Internet. In order to salvage at least some respect for the law, copyright needs to be rowed back, not pushed forward even more.

Reject amendment 421

It is absurd that people cannot take pictures of public scenes without worrying about copyright issues. What is public must remain public, for anyone to use, otherwise we are effectively destroying the public sphere.

Reject amendments 236 to 244

The public pays for public sector information, and has a right to use it. But there is another powerful reason for placing public sector information in the public domain: it allows the creation of huge new markets. Perhaps the best example is the information from the Human Genome Project, which was placed in the public domain, and has added $1 trillion to the US economy as a result (http://www.nature.com/news/economic-return-from-human-genome-project-grows-1.13187).

Reject amendment 446

Text and data mining are hugely important new tools that could lead to major scientific discoveries. Attempts to require researchers to pay for the legal right to carry out these techniques on material they have already paid to access is double-dipping, and completely unreasonable.  It is likely to put European researchers at a serious disadvantage compared with their peers elsewhere.

Reject amendment 531

DRM overrides basic rights; it is another example of where copyright is completely unbalanced. It has the ironic effect of making unauthorised copies of works without DRM more attractive than legal ones hobbled by it, and giving power to US companies like Apple and Amazon that control the DRM used for European works.

It is vitally important to get copyright law right, since it is now completely out of step with how people use the Internet, and how they create and share works. If the copyright directive is not updated appropriately now, there may not be another opportunity because copyright will have become completely irrelevant in the digital world.  Thank you for your help.