Dutch Immediately Ban Unauthorized Downloads After EU Court Of Justice Confirms Incompatibility With Copyright Law

from the that-was-quick dept

The Court of Justice of the European Union is pretty busy these days. Earlier this week it released its important judgment striking down the EU's Data Retention Directive; now it has given its verdict on a complicated Dutch case involving the home-copying exception of European copyright legislation, and the associated use of copyright levies on blank media. As we reported back in January, the preliminary opinion of the EU's Advocate General was that the Dutch government should not allow unauthorized downloads of copyright material, as is currently the case, and that copyright levy calculations should not take such unauthorized downloads into account. Unlike the Data Retention verdict, where the EU's Court of Justice (ECJ) went well beyond what the Advocate General suggested, here the ECJ has largely followed his advice (pdf):

the Court holds that national legislation which makes no distinction between private copies made from lawful sources and those made from counterfeited or pirated sources cannot be tolerated.
In addition, it held that a copyright levy system that does not distinguish between authorized and unauthorized copies is not fair:
Under such a system, the harm caused, and therefore the amount of the fair compensation payable to the recipients, is calculated, according to the Court, on the basis of the criterion of the harm caused to authors both by private reproductions which are made from a lawful source and by reproductions made from an unlawful source. The sum thus calculated is then, ultimately, passed on in the price paid by users of protected subject-matter at the time when equipment, devices and media which make it possible to create private copies are made available to them. Thus, all users are indirectly penalised since they necessarily contribute towards the compensation payable for the harm caused by private reproductions made from an unlawful source. Users consequently find themselves required to bear an additional, non-negligible cost in order to be able to make private copies.
This ruling has already had one immediate effect, as TorrentFreak reports:
The Dutch Government confirmed to [the Dutch Website] Tweakers that downloading copyrighted material for personal use is no longer allowed, effective immediately.
Unauthorized downloading for personal use was permitted in the Netherlands because the government there believed that EU copyright law allowed it. The ECJ's ruling establishes definitively that it doesn't, and so the downloading exemption no longer applies.

The longer-term effect on EU copyright levies is harder to predict. The Court's verdict means that countries may no longer take unauthorized copies into account when calculating how much to add to the cost of storage. It will be interesting to see whether they reduce the copyright levy as a result, as they should if they implemented the new ruling faithfully. However, given the general lack of logic or fairness behind copyright levies, that seems unlikely. The best response would be to drop the anachronistic copyright levies altogether, and for the copyright industries to launch more online services offering lots of material at fair prices to encourage users to switch from unauthorized to authorized downloads, as has happened elsewhere.

Follow me @glynmoody on Twitter or identi.ca, and +glynmoody on Google+

Hide this

Thank you for reading this Techdirt post. With so many things competing for everyone’s attention these days, we really appreciate you giving us your time. We work hard every day to put quality content out there for our community.

Techdirt is one of the few remaining truly independent media outlets. We do not have a giant corporation behind us, and we rely heavily on our community to support us, in an age when advertisers are increasingly uninterested in sponsoring small, independent sites — especially a site like ours that is unwilling to pull punches in its reporting and analysis.

While other websites have resorted to paywalls, registration requirements, and increasingly annoying/intrusive advertising, we have always kept Techdirt open and available to anyone. But in order to continue doing so, we need your support. We offer a variety of ways for our readers to support us, from direct donations to special subscriptions and cool merchandise — and every little bit helps. Thank you.

–The Techdirt Team

Filed Under: copyright, eu court of justice, netherlands, private levies, unauthorized downloads


Reader Comments

Subscribe: RSS

View by: Time | Thread


  • icon
    TheResidentSkeptic (profile), 10 Apr 2014 @ 2:19pm

    Another measurement please.

    And this is going to have what impact on sales of "records" and "dvds" exactly?

    I'm skeptical that we will see any real numbers about the net effect of the ban.

    link to this | view in chronology ]

    • icon
      DannyB (profile), 10 Apr 2014 @ 2:55pm

      Re: Another measurement please.

      Maybe it will make them go down.

      The best way to get people to do something is to ban it.

      link to this | view in chronology ]

      • identicon
        Anonymous Coward, 11 Apr 2014 @ 12:34am

        Re: Re: Another measurement please.

        The Second Rule of Cool applies, methinks.

        link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    Wig, 10 Apr 2014 @ 3:11pm

    So, downloading copyrighted material is no longer permitted, effective immediately.
    And how long before the levy on blank media will be reduced?

    Probably never...

    link to this | view in chronology ]

    • icon
      That One Guy (profile), 10 Apr 2014 @ 3:32pm

      Re:

      Now now, I'm sure they'll be glad to take a reduction to all that free, hassle-free money they've been getting from the levies, and in fact I hear they've got that reduction scheduled to take place sometime on the 35th of next month, shortly after the Pope's D&D game and public conversion to Pastafarianism wraps up.

      link to this | view in chronology ]

    • identicon
      Arie, 11 Apr 2014 @ 6:11am

      Re:

      You're right it will never happen. Maybe only a modest reduction.
      Take into account "Kwartje van Kok".

      link to this | view in chronology ]

      • identicon
        madjo, 11 Apr 2014 @ 2:20pm

        Re: Re:

        For the non-Dutch-natives here. the "kwartje van Kok" was a 0.25 Guilder levy on fuel somewhere in the 90s when Wim Kok was our prime-minister, because of one of the oil crises.

        It was meant to be a temporary thing. But like with everything temporary, it had a nasty habit of becoming permanent.

        I'm actually expecting the copyright levy to go up, because fuck us, that's why. (and more blank-dvd-sales to go to Germany)

        link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    Anonymous, 10 Apr 2014 @ 3:20pm

    The Dutch are a dopey bunch anyway.

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 10 Apr 2014 @ 3:55pm

    as i said in the next post, when it's something to give aid to the entertainment industries, it happens effective immediately. when it's something that takes from the entertainment industries, it only happens after the law makers have sat down and debated what they can still do to penalise the public. the Swedish Justice Minister Beatrice Ask cant do enough to penalise her own people and help the Entertainment industries as much as possible. i wonder who backed her to get the job?

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    John Cressman, 11 Apr 2014 @ 5:25am

    Pay the Time if you Don't Do The Crime

    Hi...

    You haven't met me, probably never will... but just to be on the safe side, I would like to collect $1,000,000 from each of you in case, one day, you would in fact meet me and decide to punch me, kick me or otherwise harm me.

    Of course, just because you paid the $1,000,000 doesn't mean that you can, in fact, kick me, punch me or otherwise harm me, should we ever meet.

    I just want to collect the money now, in case you do...

    Hmm...

    link to this | view in chronology ]


Follow Techdirt
Essential Reading
Techdirt Deals
Report this ad  |  Hide Techdirt ads
Techdirt Insider Discord

The latest chatter on the Techdirt Insider Discord channel...

Loading...
Recent Stories

This site, like most other sites on the web, uses cookies. For more information, see our privacy policy. Got it
Close

Email This

This feature is only available to registered users. Register or sign in to use it.