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Deutsch: Belgien gibt Pläne zur Durchsetzung geistiger Eigentumsrechte auf

Following a reported flood of calls and e-mails to the parliamentarians involved, a campaign by the digital rights group Belgian Net Users' Rights Protection Association (NURPA) and a series of meetings between the Belgian political parties and ISPA Belgium, the two main parties supporting restrictive solutions for intellectual property enforcement for Belgium have decided to suspend their efforts.

Both the Mouvement Reformateur (MR) and Socialist Party (PS) have decided - albeit for an unspecified period - to remove their initiatives from the parliamentary calendar. The MR is proposing Hadopi-like measures while the PS strategy has been to abandon the rule of law and force Internet service providers to block internet websites.

The MR and PS now appear to have reached the conclusion that a more defensible methodology will be to organise a comprehensive review of all of the issues at stake, including the issue of lack of access to legal content in the right format and price. This is now seen as preferable to focus solely on repression, in an environment where large sections of the population see the legal framework as illegitimate.

The increasing reticence of Belgian politicians on this point may not be hugely surprising. The initial push came from the outlandish promises made for HADOPI in France which seduced politicians into believing that this blunt approach might actually work. In January the Union of Independent French Phonographic Producers issued a statement that HADOPI had no perceptible impact on the French market - with market figures exactly in line with comparable European economies where draconian, repressive measures were not imposed. It is hardly surprising, therefore, that Belgian politicians are increasingly reticent to launch a policy which has no perceptible advantages for anyone and which causes such damage to both fundamental rights and to the perceived legitimacy of the legal framework for intellectual property.

The next stages of the process are not yet clear, as it will be heavily influenced by political developments in the world-record breaking attempts to form a government. The entire political process in Belgium is struggling to cope with ongoing political impasse, with two failed elections already and a third one likely to strike the country any time over the next few months.

Music: Independant producers want to debate the support measures (only in French, 18.01.2011)
http://www.leparisien.fr/flash-actualite-culture/musique-les-producteu...

Belgian Net Users' Rights Protection Association
http://www.nurpa.be

ISPA Belgium
http://www.ispa.be

EDRi-gram: Four strikes law returns to Belgium (9.03.2011)
http://www.edri.org/edrigram/number9.5/belgium-four-strikes-law-return...

(Contribution by Joe McNamee - EDRi)