Backers say new rules are needed to bring regulatory frameworks up to speed with the internet age
European Union leaders on Wednesday proposed overhauling the bloc’s copyright and communications rules, which govern areas including music licensing and emergency phone calls, in an effort to shift power from Silicon Valley giants to traditional media and telecom businesses.
The proposals came in the form of two large packages of legislation from the EU’s executive arm. One is aimed at changing the EU’s copyright laws to ease online access to TV shows and movies and to grant new online rights to content owners, such as record labels and newspapers. Another is aimed at strengthening telecom firms that the EU is counting on to build a new generation of high-speed networks for Europeans.
The copyright proposals would grant news publishers new online rights to their articles, making it easier for them to negotiate payment when aggregators like Alphabet Inc.’s Google post snippets of their articles online. Other provisions would oblige online-video sites to automatically comb their catalogs for pirated uploads, and to be transparent to authors and performers about how much profit is made from their works to help them negotiate better licensing deals.
The telecom proposals would extend some telecom rules to chat and calling apps that so far haven’t been subject to telecommunications regulators. The proposals would require services like Microsoft Corp.’s Skype that allow calling to traditional phone numbers allow calling to emergency services. The rules also seek to spur private investments across Europe, especially in rural areas, by making it easier for telecom firms to profit from mobile and fixed networks they build and by granting cellular-airwave licenses for longer stretches.
Backers say the legislation is needed to bring Europe’s regulatory frameworks up to speed with the internet age. Telecom firms say heavy regulation has reduced their incentive to invest, while they face competition from internet services. Record labels also note a yawning “value gap” between how popular music has become online and the meager profit that they—and much less musicians—reap from it.
“Our creative industries will benefit from these reforms which tackle the challenges of the digital age,” said Günther Oettinger, the EU’s digital commissioner.
