No consensus on EU's new IPR Directive

Last month, the European Commission published the responses to the public consultation on Europe’s intellectual property rights enforcement directive (IPRED).  The consultation round exposed that there is a lot of criticism about the proposed European legislation. Most major copyright holders support the draft text, as they expect the enforcement of their rights will be more effective under the new regime. However,  internet providers, academics and concerned citizens call the enforcement measures disproportionate, claiming they threaten basic human rights and discourage innovation.

The “IPR Enforcement Directive” contains new measures that would make it easier to enforce IPR in the digital domain. The popularity of illegal filesharing  has been an important reason why the EU started thinking about updating IPR protection legislation. In the view of the EU, internet service providers should take up an active role in the online enforcement of IPR.

Earlier this year various stakeholders and all EU citizens were given the chance to have their say on IPRED, and a summary of the results of this consultation can be found here. A total of 380 responses were sent in, nearly half of which came from individuals.

What is apparent from the summary published by the European Commission is that there’s a clear lack of consensus between copyright holders on the one hand, and citizens, Internet providers and academics on the other.

Now the proposed law is expressly addressing the online world, the basic dilemma’s of regulating the internet become apparent. Although online freedom should be limited as soon as it harms others, stricter rules could have a chilling effect on innovation and, according to some, threaten basic human rights.

It is good for the legitimacy of the new law that so many submissions were done in this consultation round, especially the input of individual citizens is surprisingly strong, as I often have the impression the average European cannot really be bothered about what happens in Brussels.

Now it is the turn of the European Commission to show they have taken all this feedback into account.

Reference: TorrentFreak, European Commission - COM2010/779 final