[A2k] Fwd: EU: Commissioner Reding :Seizing the Opportunities of the Global Internet Economy

[Michelle Childs]

> Commissioner Reding at OECD meeting. Touches on net neutrality
> debate and 'fight against piracy' on line and Internet governance
>
> <snip>
>
> Because of these explosive developments, some are starting to
> question the founding principles of openness and neutrality that
> have been essential for the development and tremendous innovation
> power of the internet. As the internet is, like the space, the seas,
> the air, shared by mankind, we have to debate and decide upon such
> key issues at the global level and in close cooperation with the
> internet community of users. The discussion on network neutrality is
> not a technical question to be answered by regulatory authorities
> but firstly a political question to be answered by the people: the
> internet is theirs! While I believe that we should not overplay this
> question, our objective as policy makers worldwide should be to
> prevent powerful interests putting at risk the openness of the
> internet as a public space and weakening innovation on networks.
>
> <,snip>
> Social networks and user generated content are among the current
> boosters of the economy of the internet. Mobility will further
> contribute to the emergence of new business models. The relations
> between these innovative offers and traditional offers such as the
> press, the music and the audiovisual industry are confrontational in
> Europe as in the US and, I guess, in Korea as well. As policy
> makers, we can ease these relations by fostering self-regulatory and
> co-regulatory agreements, by incentivising the transition towards
> digital business models and if needed by creating legal certainty on
> the rights and obligations of the various players in the value
> chain. In that sense, the European Commission =96 focusing on creative
> content industries =96 is driving a strategic initiative aiming at the
> promotion of legal offer of contents online, the reinforcement of
> the consumers' rights and the fight against online piracy. Access to
> creative and informative contents is one of the main reasons why we
> use the internet. Protection of IPR is therefore a key issue for
> ensuring creativity and sustainability of the Internet economy.
>
> <snip>
> I very much welcome that the Seoul Declaration sticks to the
> conclusions of the World Summit and to the 5 priorities identified
> by the Internet Governance Forum: openness, security, access,
> diversity and critical Internet resources. This notion of the
> Internet as a "public utility" must continue to be a central guiding
> principle as we seek to ensure that its benefits are available to
> all and that it is protected from capture by any particular
> stakeholder group, whether it is particular governments or specific
> private sector interests.
>
> We must ensure that a future Internet has a sustainable model of
> Internet governance underpinning it, one that is equitable and
> inclusive. The subject of Internet governance has been a key issue
> of the debates at the World Summit in Tunis in 2005 and will only
> become more important in the future as the Internet itself becomes
> more important to our societies, including addressing the digital
> divide. This issue will certainly be deepened during the next
> meeting of the IGF that India will host in December.
>
>
>
> http://europa.eu/rapid/pressReleasesAction.do?reference=3DSPEECH/08/336&f=
ormat=3DHTML&aged=3D0&language=3DFR&guiLanguage=3Den
>
> Reference:  SPEECH/08/336    Date:  17/06/2008
>
>
> Viviane Reding
>
> Member of the European Commission responsible for Information
> Society and Medi
>
>
> Seizing the Opportunities of the Global Internet Economy
>
>
> OECD Ministerial Meeting "Future of the internet economy"
> Seoul, Korea, 17-18 June 2008
>
> Honourable Chairman Choi, Chairman of the Communications Commission
> of Korea,
>
> Honourable Secretary-general Gurria,
>
> Excellencies, Ladies and Gentlemen,
>
> It is a pleasure for me to represent Europe during the plenary
> session of this OECD Ministerial meeting on the future of internet
> economy. Our meeting is important and topical at a time where ultra-
> fast broadband is being rolled-out in developed economies while a
> large part of mankind has no access at all or no access to the
> internet at affordable prices. Therefore, I would like to thank the
> Government of Korea and the OECD for organising this high level event.
>
> Since the 1990s, the internet has changed our life and has
> transformed our economy. This process will accelerate as the mobile
> internet and ultra-fast broadband make it possible to deliver
> innovative services such as eHealth and eLearning everywhere, even
> in the poorest and most remote communities.
>
> Europe is doing well as regards key elements of the future internet
> economy: our best countries are world leaders, with above 35 %
> broadband penetration rates in Denmark, Finland, the Netherlands and
> Sweden. Europe is also a continent of mobile technologies, as you
> are in Asia. I am confident that Europe will lead the way to mobile
> internet solutions. These achievements were made possible thanks to
> pro-competitive policies of the European Union and its members
> countries, supported by independent regulatory authorities,
> fostering competition, innovation and attractive prices for consumers.
>
> As the European Union Telecom and Convergence Minister, I want to
> congratulate Korea for the number of broadband subscribers who get
> above 100 Megabytes per second internet connectivity =96 but we are
> working hard in Europe to catch-up! Our meeting follows the
> successful World Summit on the Information Society and supplements
> well other forums such as the Internet Governance Forum. We all
> share the view that the internet is a key tool for free speech and
> contributes to a more people-centred and inclusive society. It is
> also a tremendous instrument for conducting business, for eCommerce.
> One of our favourite leisure activities, television, goes
> increasingly through the internet, as does our mail and our
> relations to public agencies.
>
> Because of these explosive developments, some are starting to
> question the founding principles of openness and neutrality that
> have been essential for the development and tremendous innovation
> power of the internet. As the internet is, like the space, the seas,
> the air, shared by mankind, we have to debate and decide upon such
> key issues at the global level and in close cooperation with the
> internet community of users. The discussion on network neutrality is
> not a technical question to be answered by regulatory authorities
> but firstly a political question to be answered by the people: the
> internet is theirs! While I believe that we should not overplay this
> question, our objective as policy makers worldwide should be to
> prevent powerful interests putting at risk the openness of the
> internet as a public space and weakening innovation on networks.
>
> Excellencies, Ladies and Gentlemen,
>
> There is also a need for a global approach on the security of the
> internet. I would like to give one striking example on how the
> security of information networks has become critical for the
> European Union: the massive Distributed Denial of Service attack on
> Estonia's networks in spring 2007 which heavily disrupted the
> eServices of this small European country and isolated the local
> networks from the global Internet. This attack made governments
> aware of the impact that such events can have on a national economy
> and on the fabric of society - indeed, a failure can propagate very
> widely and also affect other sectors such as energy supply,
> transport or financial services. We have also seen major disruptions
> caused by earthquakes in South East Asia and by cable breaks in the
> Mediterranean area.
>
> What could we learn and what should we do to face future
> disruptions? Firstly, there is a need for the international
> community to raise our response to Internet attacks as all countries
> are tightly interconnected. Secondly, we see a need to deal with
> these attacks in the broader framework of the policy and security
> dialogue between countries or regions of the world. Whatever the
> source of these attacks, international cooperation is needed in
> order to prevent them or to reduce the damages. In order to support
> progress on the security debate, the European Commission intends to
> present at the beginning of 2009 proposals on the protection of the
> critical information infrastructures, with the aim to improve the
> response capability in the European Union and to better contribute
> to international cooperation.
>
> This will become even more critical with the rise of the "internet
> of things". Indeed, RFID and sensor technologies embedded in
> products will not only significantly impact on business organisation
> and efficiency, but also impact our daily life, bringing security
> risks and governance concerns. We must address these risks if the
> "internet of things" is to deliver its full potential for economic
> growth. In particular, we must answer citizens' concerns if we are
> not to get a rejection of these new technologies. In order to
> stimulate the reflection on the various aspects of the IOT, the
> European Commission will launch in Mid September both a
> Recommendation on privacy aspects of RFIDs and a consultation paper
> on the governance of the internet of things.
>
> Social networks and user generated content are among the current
> boosters of the economy of the internet. Mobility will further
> contribute to the emergence of new business models. The relations
> between these innovative offers and traditional offers such as the
> press, the music and the audiovisual industry are confrontational in
> Europe as in the US and, I guess, in Korea as well. As policy
> makers, we can ease these relations by fostering self-regulatory and
> co-regulatory agreements, by incentivising the transition towards
> digital business models and if needed by creating legal certainty on
> the rights and obligations of the various players in the value
> chain. In that sense, the European Commission =96 focusing on creative
> content industries =96 is driving a strategic initiative aiming at the
> promotion of legal offer of contents online, the reinforcement of
> the consumers' rights and the fight against online piracy. Access to
> creative and informative contents is one of the main reasons why we
> use the internet. Protection of IPR is therefore a key issue for
> ensuring creativity and sustainability of the Internet economy.
>
> I note with satisfaction that the OECD Seoul Ministerial Declaration
> has identified many of the key issues and opportunities for the
> future of the internet, including recent discussions on ICT for
> energy efficiency and ICT for environment preservation.
>
> It also calls upon governments and industry to accelerate the
> transition from IPv4 to IPv6, thus providing a solution to the
> address space problem as we indeed risk falling short of internet
> addresses within 3 years, a situation which the "internet of things"
> will further deteriorate. Three weeks ago, the European Commission
> actually set the target that 25% of European internet users should
> be able to connect to the IPv6 internet by 2010. We will be pushing
> for it, notably by encouraging public services and leading websites
> to move faster to IPv6.
>
> Speaking about internet addresses, Europe is proud of the success of
> the "dot eu" web domain name, which was launched 3 years ago to
> provide EU residents and companies established in the EU with a new
> internet space. The ".eu" TLD will reach, in the course of 2008, 3
> million registered domains. The ".eu" reflects the unity of Europe
> in its diversity. For us, cultural and linguistic diversity is of
> the utmost importance for the people and a chance for economic
> growth. This is the reason why I have been insisting so much towards
> ICANN that the world internet community should have the opportunity
> to finally use an Internet recognising diversity with the
> introduction of Internationalised Domain Names.
>
> Excellencies, Ladies and Gentlemen,
>
> The spectacular take-up of mobile technologies in Europe and in Asia
> =96 and increasingly in the developing world =96 massively based on the
> GSM standard, makes it easy to predict that internet capable
> handsets will become a mass consumption product within a few years.
> We integrate a mobile broadcasting function =96 you might have noticed
> that Europe has just made the choice of a single standard for mobile
> broadcasting, the DVB-H standard, which perfectly supplements the
> worldwide success of DVB-T for terrestrial television. As European
> companies are at the forefront of convergence between audiovisual
> media, telecom and the internet, I am confident that this shift
> towards mobility will reinforce our position.
>
> We in Europe believe that, in the full respect of intellectual
> property, innovation should be shared. This is the reason why we are
> in favour of cross-border research in Europe and between Europe and
> other parts of the world.
>
> A part of these research efforts goes to the future of the internet,
> in particular with projects for the improvement of the internet
> architecture and projects on 3D internet. Indeed, trends in mobile
> use and a continuing increase in the objects connected to the
> Internet and the applications running them are going to be so
> demanding for the current infrastructure of the Internet that new
> architectural solutions may be needed and more efficient - today=92s
> internet was not designed with 100 Megabit-per-second data rates in
> mind. Scalability, routing, security and trust are issues that the
> basic network architecture might have to adapt to.
>
> In order to shape this "future internet" for the benefit of our
> citizens and the innovation potential of our companies worldwide,
> the European Union intends to spend 300 million Euros until 2013. I
> call today our partners worldwide to join this effort!
>
> A wonderful tool of cooperation between research communities
> worldwide is offered by high capacity research networks. Europe has
> put in place and supports the GEANT network =96 a multi-gigabit pan-
> European data communications network, reserved specifically for
> research and education use. I am proud that GEANT is largely
> connected to networks in Asia and I would like in particular to
> congratulate Korea for the leading role it has taken in the Trans-
> Eurasia Information Network since its conception at the ASEM summit
> in Seoul in 2000. ICT research is money well spent as ICT account
> for a large part of productivity growth =96 40 % in Europe =96 and a
> substantial part of the GDP growth =96 25 % in Europe.
>
> Excellencies, Ladies and Gentlemen,
>
> On the issues of research cooperation and cooperation on the
> standards, as well as on regulatory cooperation, the European Union
> is willing to reinforce its relations with other parts of the world.
> I will therefore propose in the coming weeks an EU strategy to
> establish stronger and more comprehensive partnerships with other
> parts of the world. In this context we have to secure a level
> playing field in terms of conditions for investment and regulatory
> rules. As regards research activities in these renewed partnerships,
> our joint priorities could usefully be inspired by the research
> agendas of the European Technology Platforms, which gather industry,
> academia and research institutes on strategic areas such as software
> =96 including open source =96 robotics, electronic media, nano-
> electronics, mobility, embedded systems and photonics.
>
> The internet is a wonderful tool for researchers. It also
> facilitates inclusion, between social groups and between ages. For
> this to happen faster, I have decided to act the end of this year I
> will present a comprehensive Action plan to make a wide range of
> services and technologies accessible to all Europe-wide.
>
> The issue of inclusion is to a large extent linked with the price of
> electronic communications, in particular broadband. Our approach in
> the European Union roots in open markets and competition, and takes
> advantage of modern regulatory frameworks for networks and for
> content =96 for instance in 2007 we have modernised the rules
> applicable to audiovisual media services and enlarged their scope to
> on-demand services such as the video-on-demand services that are
> flourishing in Europe. In some parts of the world, the lack of
> independent regulators, the excessive dominance of incumbent
> operators and hence the lack of competition are detrimental to a
> more vibrant market, cheaper prices and more services offered to
> consumers. Opening the markets to foreign investments must become
> normal. I am glad that the Seoul Declaration rightly acknowledges
> this. I believe that we can accelerate this move by enhancing our
> regulatory dialogue, exchanging and applying best practices.
>
> Excellencies, Ladies and Gentlemen,
>
> I very much welcome that the Seoul Declaration sticks to the
> conclusions of the World Summit and to the 5 priorities identified
> by the Internet Governance Forum: openness, security, access,
> diversity and critical Internet resources. This notion of the
> Internet as a "public utility" must continue to be a central guiding
> principle as we seek to ensure that its benefits are available to
> all and that it is protected from capture by any particular
> stakeholder group, whether it is particular governments or specific
> private sector interests.
>
> We must ensure that a future Internet has a sustainable model of
> Internet governance underpinning it, one that is equitable and
> inclusive. The subject of Internet governance has been a key issue
> of the debates at the World Summit in Tunis in 2005 and will only
> become more important in the future as the Internet itself becomes
> more important to our societies, including addressing the digital
> divide. This issue will certainly be deepened during the next
> meeting of the IGF that India will host in December.
>
> This OECD ministerial meeting is an important opportunity to
> reiterate key principles and to highlight the economic opportunities
> created by the internet. I am grateful to the OECD and to the
> Republic of Korea for bringing together so many governments of the
> world to help share and propagate this vision.
>
> Thank you for your attention.
>
> ---------
> Michelle Childs
> Head of European Affairs
> Knowledge Ecology International
> www.keionline.org / www.cptech.org
> Phone:+44(0)207 226 6663 ex 252
> Email: michelle.childs@keionline.org
>
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