Joana Cotar
EU Creators’ Rights Reform and Freedom of
Opinion
German Bundestag, March 13, 2019,
Plenarprotokoll 19/85, pp. 10009-10010
[Joana Cotar is an Alternative für Deutschland Bundestag member
from the central German state of Hessen. She is a communications manager and
since 2016 has been the AfD’s social media manager. Article 13 of the European
Parliament’s law on Copyright in the Digital Single Market, P8 TA-PROV
(2018)0337, reads in part: “…measures, such as the use of effective content recognition
technologies, shall be appropriate and proportionate.”]
Right honorable Frau President. Worthy
colleagues.
Yesterday, the internet was thirty years old.
Punctually upon this birthday, the EU sets about to destroy the free internet
as we know it. For that, we are also obliged to our federal government.
At the end of March, the creators’ rights
reform will be concluded and with it Article 13 which specifies that platform
providers will be liable not when they are first made aware of rights
violations, but already from the moment of the upload. Due to the quantity
which is daily uploaded on platforms such as Facebook or YouTube, there remains
for the firms nothing other than to install the so-called upload filters. These
filters will scrutinize all that you, ladies and gentlemen, wish to upload onto
the internet and automatically decide whether or not the content may be
presented.
Alexander
Hoffmann (CDU/CSU): It is already like that today!
The federal government has maintained in its
coalition agreement that they reject upload filters as disproportionate. At the
EU level, however, officials of the Union and SPD have indeed stood up vehemently
for Article 13.
Elizabeth Winkelmeier-Becker (CDU/CSU): Therein
is nothing about upload filters!
Alexander
Hoffmann (CDU/CSU): There is not a word of that!
You have deceived and lied to the people,
ladies and gentlemen of the government. Your coalition agreement is not worth
the paper it is written on.
Alexander
Hoffmann (CDU/CSU): Have you once read Article 13?
All professionals agree: such filters do not
work.
Patrick
Sensburg (CDU/CSU): They function every day: Facebook, for instance.
They are completely unsuited to
distinguishing permissible parodies, citations and merry memes from authentic
violations of creators’ rights. It will result in a massive over-blocking;
completely legal content will be censored. The founder of the internet, Tim
Berners-Lee, and 70 additional internet pioneers in a letter have turned to the
members of the European Parliament and clearly warned of these filters. They
would make of the open internet a tool for the automatic surveillance and
control of users. The UN special representative for freedom of opinion, David
Kaye, stresses that a new creators rights law may be required but not at the
cost of precisely that free expression of opinion which would
be endangered by the filters. They are therefore not the correct solution.
The federal data defense representative and
the director of the Max Planck Institute for Innovation and Competition also
criticize Article 13 and warn of the consequences. The Netherlands, Luxembourg,
Poland, Finland and Italy have acknowledged the dangers and rejected these new
guidelines since they strike no balance between the defense of the owner’s
rights and the interests of the citizens. It will also lead to the simple,
small bidders and start-ups having trouble – we have heard of it – because they
just do not have the resources to fulfill these new duties. Thereby will be
granted support for a further concentration of the internet. The big guy will
again be the winner.
Yet all this does not interest the officials
of the Union and the SPD. On the contrary: Frau Merkel has stressed that she
unconditionally wants these filters; she even already facetiously calls them “Merkel Filters”. You find that funny. For me, the state of freedom
of opinion in this country leaves laughter stuck in the throat, ladies and
gentlemen.
Alexander
Hoffmann (CDU/CSU): You have dramatic talent, Frau colleague!
Justice Minister Barley thought before the
last trilog negotiations that she wanted no filters. In the negotiations, she voted
in favor. Just how credible are these Social Democrats? When you know something
is false, then reject it and damn all! A person can no longer take you
seriously.
A petition for internet freedom gathered almost
5 million signatures. Young people go into the streets by the thousands to
demonstrate against the filters.
Alexander
Hoffmann (CDU/CSU): Because you have mis-informed them!
And what do the EU members of the Union do?
First, they assert the protest was not real, there were only bots behind it.
When these alleged bots had gone out into the streets, the members denigrated
them as a mob! Contempt for the voters cannot be more clearly expressed.
The first prize however goes to Manfred
Weber, lead candidate of the EVP and CSU member. After the March 23,
Europe-wide demonstrations were announced, Herr Weber attempted to move up the
vote in the European Parliament so as to leave the demonstrations luffing in
the wind.
Alexander
Hoffmann (CDU/CSU): That is just not right!
That is the EU as we know it.
Alexander
Hoffmann (CDU/CSU): Cheese!
And that is precisely the EU as we no more
want it.
Creators’ rights, upload filters, NetzDG, the
new state media contract, the action plan against the spread of fake news, a
whole series of additional measures in the EU and Germany indicate the road
ahead. One wants to destroy the internet as a place of free expression of
opinion because for those of the Establishment [Etablierten], it is simply a
thorn in the eye.
People no longer inform themselves by means
of the party-controlled media, but primarily on the net. Hitherto, the Etablierten could not control this place. That shall
now be changed, and by all means. Yet we stand against this attack against
freedom. The AfD had already last year voted against the upload filter, and we
will do so again at the end of March; since we of the AfD reject any form of
censorship. We stand for an open and free internet and we also stand before all
for freedom of opinion.
Erhard Grundl (Bündnis90/Grünen):
That is fake news!
[Translated by Todd Martin]
