Article 11 (The link tax) and Article 13 (The upload filter) have passed the vote yesterday, and could mean the end of the internet as we know it, and it threatens tons of artists, including myself.
15 against 10 MEPs voted in favor of the law proposal, but the battle still continues. The law will not be put in effect until the European Parliament accepts the law on 4-5 July, so now it's more important than ever to speak up!
Please make a Journal, tell your friends, post on social media, and do anything you can to raise awareness! Europeans, please contact your MEPs! It just takes 10 seconds using the pre-written e-mail draft found here!
For more information on what's going to happen next, please see this page. For more information on the problem in general, please see this page for more detailed information, or read the paragraphs below for a shorter explanation.
I will keep you updated on the situation after 4-5 July.
Thank you for reading and your support!
PLEASE DO NOT TURN THIS INTO A POLITICAL DEBATE! ANY POLITICAL COMMENTS NOT DIRECTLY RELATING TO ARTICLE 11 AND 13 WILL BE DELETED, REGARDLESS OF YOUR POLITICAL STANCE!
----- What is Article 13?
The upload filters that will be established because of Article 13 will be put in place on every content sharing site, and will function similarly to YouTube's Content ID filter, which can automatically detect copyrighted works like music and thus automatically either mute the vid or outright delete the vid.
However, our technology isn't advanced enough to create a flawless filter. Such a filter cannot tell the difference between legit copyright infringement and fair use. As such, much like YouTube's Content ID filter, it'll likely give false positives and block legit content, and might even fine the uploader.
However, Article 13 takes it a step further. It will not just be videos and music being blocked, which endangers people who make remixes, mashups, covers and the like, it could also block images, endangering memes, parodies and fan artists. As written text is also subjected to copyright, it also endanger things like fanfiction, code sharing and even discussion. And this is exactly why it's so disasterous if Article 13 is established, and needs to be stopped.
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What is Article 11?
Article 11 is essentially a tax on hyperlinks. Basically, if this law is passed and you host a link, you owe whatever company is behind that link some money, as it's essentially their copyrighted content. This could spell trouble for your favorite search engine, as they provide countless links.
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What if this is a hoax?
There's no logical reason to assume it isn't real because the risk of it being true is too high, and there are absolutely no drawbacks to believing it's real, other than having to swallow a bit of your pride and admit you were wrong. But that doesn't stand in proportion to the threat of it being real. Believe me, I'd love to be wrong and have this turn out to be a hoax, but until we're certain of that, we cannot risk it being true after all. It's better to believe it being true and act against it, and it turning out to be a hoax, than to believe it's a hoax, doing nothing about it, and turning out it was true. Personally, I don't believe in conspiracy theories like these, especially if there's nothing to be gotten out of it, but I still included this paragraph for the for the skeptical people.
