The Parliament for the EU (European Union) has voted in favor of a new internet law that could cause companies such as YouTube to be forced to apply stricter rules against copyright content. In a nutshell, the laws basically force websites to remove all content with copyright content, and make users pay a fee to share links to news websites and a complete ban from memes. This may sound nice and all, but these laws hurt creators whose only job is online content creating. So far this isn’t a law yet, but creators are uncertain about the future of the internet in the EU.
Getting into specifics, the proposed “European Union Directive on Copyright in the Digital Single Market” is the set of laws that will limit the amount of copyright content. This will make websites more responsible about copyright laws, and to supposedly “direct money to the creators instead of the company.” Currently, YouTube isn’t responsible for any violations, but YouTube must remove content when the right holders tell them to. The Proponents on the Copyright Directive claim the the creators are not being rightfully payed for their content. This means that any content with music, writing, or anything else that is not original will be prohibited on YouTube in the EU. This harms many content creators, as gameplays and music videos will possibly be prohibited to watch in the EU.
But the most controversial part, Article 13, is what many people are talking worried about. It states, “online content sharing service providers and right holders shall cooperate in good faith in order to ensure that unauthorized protected works or other subject matter are not available on their services.” So what does this mean? In basic terms, it says websites have to take initiative on removing copyright content. But the confusion is, what exactly is copyright content in these laws. And no one knows how they’re expected to identify it. An early version of the laws says, “proportionate content recognition technologies,” which basically asks companies to auto filter every single bit of content and every single little piece of a video to check if it has copyright content. 300 hours of content are uploaded every minute on Youtube, and many people agree that it would be impossible to auto filter every single video. Susan Wojcicki, CEO of YouTube, made a statement about Article 13. She says, “We realize the importance of all rights holders being fairly compensated, which is why we built Content ID and a platform to pay out all types of content owners.” Youtube already pays for minor infringements on videos, and already removes videos with large infringements. She also says this will be financially impossible to do what the EU is asking, since so many videos have many minor infringements, YouTube will lose money removing so many videos.
Obviously, many content creators on YouTube who live in Europe are not very happy about this. In fact, PewDiePie, a creator from Sweden who currently has the most subscribers (A subscriber count of 69 million) directly states, “I don’t want people who are over the age of 60, who have probably have never used the internet before, telling me how the internet should be run.” Many fellow creators agree with this statement. PewDiePie, and many other creators in Europe are scared for their channels and their future. People who are full-time creators on youtube, will lose their job if this law gets passed.
Thankfully, these laws won’t effect creators in the US. But you may have to say to your favorite YouTubers in Europe. However, the final vote won’t be until January 19th, the vote that will decide the future of the internet in Europe.
Sources: https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2018/sep/13/tech-giants-eu-internet-searches-copyright-law
https://www.alphr.com/politics/1009470/article-13-EU-what-is-it-copyright
Grover Middle School's Jagazine 