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Deutsch: Spanien wird kein Drei-Treffer-Gesetz anwenden
As a ray of sunshine in a European environment favouring the disconnection of Internet users downloading allegdly copyrighted material, Spain (that will hold the EU Presidency from 1 January 2010) and Germany have decided not to join France and UK in promoting three strikes laws.
On 5 November 2009, the Spanish culture Minister Angeles González-Sinde stated during a TV show that the government "is not considering punitive measures for the end user of Internet" and that what needs to be done first was to "attack the origin of all these products that are on the Web sites, as well as those who benefit from them."
The minister also stated that "What is certain is that culture is a right and must be accessible but must be compatible with the people living out of it being able to do it". The Minister's opinions are shared by the Coalition of Creators and Content Industries as well as by Redtel representing the Spanish ISPs.
Already, in June 2009, the Spanish Coalition of Creators and Content Industries had decided to abandon plans for a three-strikes system after the Spanish Government indicated it would refuse to enact legislation allowing the disconnection of illegal file-sharers.
An inter-ministerial commission established by the Government in October has the task to find ways of ensuring that the availability of cultural content on the Internet does not reduce the copyright revenues of creators or content providers. The commission has to provide a report by the end of this year.
Another copyright-related scandal emerged last week in Spain, after Youtube decided to take down a parody video of a declining rock musician healvily involved with the Spanish collective society SGAE. The video produced by the satirical magazine El Jueves was posted in the portal of the magazine on YouTube. But the video-sharing website decided not to take down only that video, but the whole section produced by El Jueves with hundreds of videos, subscribers, comments etc. without previous notice or check. The magazine, of course, just posted another satirical press release hosted on a different videosharing website.
The musician declared he had just contracted a company to scan the network and complain against any comment considered offensive towards him. 72 hours later, when the lawyers retired the claim, the El Jueves portal was restored on YouTube.
The recently elected German governmental coalition, in a document outlining its policy proposal issued at the end of October 2009, expressed its intention to "achieve a high level of protection and an effective assertion of the copyright law." However, there is no question of disconnecting Internet access for repeated copyright infringers. "We want to promote the possibilities of an internal regulation with the participation of the right-owners and the Internet-providers," says the document. "We will not take initiatives for legal possibilities to block Internet access in cases of copyright infringements." The document also includes a commitment to facilitate European-wide licensing of online rights by copyright collecting societies.
González-Sinde: if the money invested is not recovered, the artist cannot
continue to record" (only in Spanish, 15.11.2009)
http://www.cadenaser.com/cultura/articulo/gonzalez-sinde-recupera-dine...
Spanish Govt Rules Out Three-Strikes Law (5.11.2009)
http://www.billboard.biz/bbbiz/content_display/industry/e3i6391eb52691...
Spanish Copyright Industry Abandons "Three-Strikes" (25.06.2009)
http://www.zeropaid.com/news/86493/spanish-copyright-industry-abandons...
Ramoncín makes 'El Jueves' channel disappear from Youtube (only in
Spanish, 11.11.2009)
http://www.20minutos.es/noticia/562971/0/ramoncin/youtube/jueves/
The TangaMan beats YouTube (only in Spanish, 13.11.2009)
http://www.eljueves.es/2009/11/13/youtube_caga_nos_devuelven_cuenta.ht...
German Gov't To Tighten Copyright Law (29.11.2009)
http://www.billboard.biz/bbbiz/content_display/industry/e3i018a992ff2c...
Germany says "nein" to three-strikes infringement plan (6.02.2009)
http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2009/02/germany-walks-away-fro...