[Ecommerce] France about to get worst copyright law in Europe? and other bad news from France

[Manon Ress]

Cory Doctorow
Friday, December 2, 2005
http://www.boingboing.net/2005/12/02/france_about_to_get_.html

France about to get worst copyright law in Europe?
France may soon enact the worst copyright law in Europe, sneaking it
through in a legislative session scheduled for December 22 and 23.
Europe's equivalent to the US Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA)
is a controversial directive called the EUCD. Each EU state is
responsible for implementing the minimum set of EUCD restrictions
(which are far from minimal!) but each state can exceed the minimum,
and the entertainment lobby pushes hard to see to it that they do.
They've run amok in France, subverting the lawmaking process with a
farcical wish-list of penalties, mandates and software bans.

Copyfighters in France have published a detailed alert in French;
what follows is a loose, machine-assisted translation (substantive
corrections gladly sought):

* A prohibition on all software that permits transmission
[disposition is unclear without greater context] of copyrighted
material that does not integrate both a watermark and DRM
* A prohibition on marketing or advertising such software
* These prohibitions include legal sanctions<
* DRM mandates for digital radio transmission
* A universal wiretapping system for private communication [This is
defined elsewhere as a system to check for, say, music files attached
to email messages, and not one that would violate the "secret of
private correspondence".]
* Creation of a universal filering system for all ISPs
Link (Thanks, Paula!) (Thanks to "C" and Kirk for help with translation)

***********************************************************************

Also:  French Government Lobbied to Ban Free Software

<http://www.fsffrance.org/news/article2005-11-25.en.html>

November 25, 2005, for immediate release

Friday November 18th, 2005, French Department of Culture. SNEP and
SCPP have told Free Software authors: "You will be required to change
your licenses." SACEM add: "You shall stop publishing free software,"
and warn they are ready "to sue free software authors who will keep
on publishing source code" should the "VU/SACEM/BSA/FA Contents
Department"[1] bill proposal pass in the Parliament.

It appears that publishing Free Software giving access to culture is
about to become a counterfeiting criminal offence. Will SACEM sue
France T=E9l=E9com R&D research labs for having published Maay and
Solipsis (P2P pieces of software used to exchange data)[2]?

Up to this point, the rather technical debate surrounding the issues
addressed by DADVSI bill (copyright and neighbouring rights in the
information society) makes one ask: Just how much control do the Big
Players in the field of culture want to seize? It now looks like
years of quibbling have put an end to compromises.

What should have been the last meeting of CSPLA[2] Sirinelli
Commission turned into an arranged battle dealing with the "VU/SACEM/
BSA/FA Contents Department" bill. EUCD.INFO[4] cofounder Christophe
Espern, representing Creative Commons France, had to argue for 13
hours to defend the right of Free Software to exist, but he lost the
argument. The preliminary conclusions seem to regret that the bill
"cannot be proposed by CSPLA in before the deadline." Maybe the new
meeting scheduled today, November 25th, 2005, at 6:30pm, in the
offices of the French Department of Culture, aims to impose the
text ? [*]

"Havoc is breaking loose," says Christophe Espern. "How can people
possibly both pretend to defend culture and then want to ban the only
software giving universal access to it? Actually, the contradiction
may be only superficial: I think what they are truly after is the
control of the public... culture is just a excuse."

Absurd as it may seem, the DADVSI bill will bring an indifferent
public a surprise gift [5] for Christmas nothing less than complete
Orwellian control of digital culture.

We could avoid this disaster if the cabinet of Prime Minister started
by declaring the DADVSI bill a non emergency issue. This would give
the democratic debate a chance.

[*] The Sirinelli Commission adopted the bill proposal. This one will
be examined during the next plenary session of the CSPLA (December
the 7th).
References

[1] VU/SACEM/BSA/FT bill http://eucd.info/index.php?2005/11/14/175-
exclusif-amendement-interdisant-les-logiciels-non-equipes-de-mesures-
techniques

[2] Maay and Solipsis

[3] The Sirinelli Commission is a specialised commission part of the
Conseil sup=E9rieur de la propri=E9t=E9 litt=E9raire et artistique (CSPLA,
Artistic and Literary Property High Council). Its mission is to
ponder the possible responsibility of some intermediaries that would
encourage or promote counterfeiting by providing means or information
on means and methods (http://www.culture.gouv.fr/culture/cspla/
oeuvrinternet.htm).

[4] EUCD.INFO : www.eucd.info

[5] http://www.eucd.info/index.php?2005/11/14/177-droit-d-auteur-
eucdinfo-devoile-le-plan-d-attaque-des-majors

Notes about the organisations

SACEM is the main company dealing with collective copyright
management for music in France. French RIAA.

SNEP (Syndicat National de l'=C9dition Phonographique, national
syndicate of phonographic publishing), was created in 1922. Spokesman
for its 48 members, it represents them towards the government, the
MP, the administration, other professional bodies, the media and the
public.

SCPP (Soci=E9t=E9 Civile des Producteurs Phonographiques, civil company
of phonographic editors), gathers the money collected towards the
users of phonograms and videomusic users and redistributes it to its
members (more than 800 producers, including many independent
producers and the main international companies such as Sony BMG, EMI,
Universal, and Warner). It weighs more than 80% of the copyrights
perceived by the French producers.

FT - France Telecom, headquartered in Paris, France, is the former
monopoly provider in France and one of the largest provider of
telecommunications in the world.

BSA - Business Software Alliance is an organisation founded in the
USA and currently without official status in most European countries,
controlled by Microsoft and a few other large members.

VU - Vivendi Universal is one of the major players in the area of
media and telecommunications: entertainment creation and
broadcasting, production and broadcasting of films, music, and games
(PC and console-based).

About Free Software Foundation France

The FSF France (http://www.fsffrance.org/) is a non-profit
organization dedicated to all aspects of Free Software. Access to
software determines who may participate in a digital society.
Therefore the freedoms to use, copy, modify and redistribute software
- as described in the Free Software definition - allow equal
participation in the information age. Creating awareness for these
issues, securing Free Software politically and legally, and giving
people freedom by supporting development of Free Software are central
issues of the FSF France.

Press contacts

Lo=EFc Dachary. E-mail : loic@gnu.org Phone : +33 1 42 76 05 49

Fr=E9d=E9ric Couchet. E-mail : fcouchet@fsffrance.org Phone : +33 6 60 68
89 31

Christophe Espern. E-mail : cespern@eucd.info Phone : +33 6 03 60 05 20

************************************************
Manon Anne Ress
manon.ress@cptech.org,
www.cptech.org

Consumer Project on Technology
1621 Connecticut Ave, NW, Washington, DC 20009 USA
Tel.:  +1.202.332.2670, Ext 16 Fax: +1.202.332.2673

Consumer Project on Technology
1 Route des  Morillons, CP 2100, 1211 Geneva 2, Switzerland
Tel: +41 22 791 6727

Consumer Project on Technology
24 Highbury Crescent, London, N5 1RX, UK
Tel: +44(0)207 226 6663 ex 252 Fax: +44(0)207 354 0607