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2012: The year Irish newspapers tried to destroy the web![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() Irish newspaper industry trying to copyright web-links There is a currently a very interesting and frightening case being fought by a Solicitor firm in Dublin against agents for the Irish newspaper industry. Basically the newspaper industry is trying to charge for websites and blogs and all the rest for posting links to any of their articles in their newspapers. They have already done the groundwork in their submission to the Copyright Review Committee in July 2012 those 15 newspapers asserted baldly The attitudes on display here by the newspaper industry to the rest of us are a reminder of the boldness and hubris of the developers and bankers have to the functioning of this country. There is an extraordinary case being taken by McGarr solicitors to defend Womens Aid against the newspaper industry in Ireland who are demanding payment for links made from the Womens Aid website to articles in the newspaper. |
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Jump To Comment: 1 2In the article above there is a link to a submission made by National Newspapers Ireland to the Copyright Review Commission -in order words they are trying to change the law and will probably succeed because big companies always have their way over the people.
Anyhow in the wording they refer to a success in the UK where the govt there is totally in the pocket of big business.
The wording from Section 7 is:
It is the view of NNI that a link to copyright material does constitute infringement of copyright, and would be so found by the Courts. In particular the Committee should have regard to the recent decision of the UK Court of Appeal (Civil Division) in the case of the Newspaper Licensing Agency Limited and Others v Meltwater Holding BV and Others wherein it upheld the findings of the High Court which findings included:
- that headlines are capable of being independent literary works and so copying just a headline can infringe copyright:
- that text extracts (headline plus opening sentence plus “hit” sentence) can be substantial enough to benefit from copyright protection;
Just found this link from Electronic Frontier Foundation where they have picked up on the above story and they have been doing their work as it turns out that German newspapers have been trying to change the law there since 2009 and have restarted the efforts last year.
And back in 2006 Belgian newspapers tried to sue Google News for carrying links to their newspapers as did French newspapers try the same in Sept 2012.
Here is how the EFF describe it in their report:
Expanding copyright to allow rent seeking for linking would break the fabric of the Internet. Links and citations to articles do not infringe copyright, as links do not copy, distribute, or perform any copyrighted work. Despite some desperate assertions of the contrary, copyright protection of links is not enshrined in law. Newspapers, however, are pushing for legislation to support this dangerous claim, regardless of the implications it would have for free speech.
The Internet has changed the face of journalism by lowering barriers to mass publication and opening avenues for sharing and distributing news. But despite the new opportunities of a democratized media and citizen driven journalism, established journalistic institutions are struggling to adapt to the changing landscape of the news industry. While papers around the world are working to find new ways to make money and compete in the digital world, many experiments with varying subscription models have been so far unsuccessful. Staring down the barrel of vanishing revenues, some newspaper organizations have, for many years, resorted to aggressive enforcement of copyright ownership claims....
See also from 2002: https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20020725/1241234.shtml
Linking May Be Illegal In Europe
From 2006:
https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20060918/020228.shtml
How Dare Google Send Belgian News Sites Traffic! Court Orders Them To Stop
(From Sept) http://www.pcadvisor.co.uk/news/tech-industry/3379467/f...cles/
French publishers want to charge Google for republishing articles
(From 2006)
http://google.blognewschannel.com/index.php/archives/20...news/
Google Ordered To Remove Belgian News
Full text at link below.