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Entertainment entrepreneur Ryan Wiik has shared with us his view on the Digital Copyright Directive in the European Parliament.
The Digital Copyright Law adopted in September by the European Parliament was meant to be a large spread directive, that will empower musicians, directors, performers, but also cinema and TV writers, with several important rights.
Included in the directive, artists have the possibility of renegotiating their contracts for greater shares of revenue. However, the new directive may also force large web-based companies, such as Facebook and Google to use heavy filtering procedures, in order to restrict access to copyrighted content.
Ryan Wiik
Entertainment entrepreneur Ryan Wiik is excited about the possibilities that come with the new directive, as it will empower content producers and artists at large, to work better and safer. Wiik believes that the fact that artists are not currently getting enough pay, has a huge impact on their creative process and their works.
“That is why we get so many remakes, series reboots and sequels. The large companies that currently hold a monopoly in the entertainment industries, and they think it’s safer to produce content that is already proved it’s selling to the public. Hollywood is the best example of a conglomerate highly based on friendships and bankability,” Wiik said.
Services like Amazon and Netflix, streaming all over Europe, are likely to be imposed certain quotas by the EU, as to dedicate a minimum of 30% percent of their catalogue, only to local content.
The entertainment entrepreneur commented that “the approval of the Digital Single Market Copyright Directive, was highly welcomed by the European organizations that represent the creative side of the EU’s entertainment industry – film, TV and music alike.
“Well established filmmakers present at the Venice Film Festival, appealed the European Parliament to approve the new Directive. Artists like Paul McCartney supported it. The Federation of European Film Directors and the Federation of Screenwriters in Europe, supported the vote, as it would allow content producers to work without being exploited and without receiving their rightful revenues.”
Regarding Article 13, which is also known as the “meme ban” article, there are voices — such as pioneer Jimmy Wales (founder of Wikipedia) and Tim Berners-Lee (the World Wide Web creator) – that don’t necessarily reject the new law, but they warn that the Internet’s free nature, as an open platform meant for research, sharing and innovation might change into an automated surveillance tool.
Wiik explained: “Article 13 is indeed debatable, as it calls on the giant Internet companies to take ‘appropriate and proportionate’ measures to prevent the spread of content that violates copyrighting. I think that will change, because organisms such as the FTC (Federal Trade Commission) in the US, protected Internet privacy for almost 20 years. And as the Open Internet Order (OIO) – passed by the FCC in 2015 – stated, the Internet should be a public utility, not a private property.
“Yes, the Internet has to remain free, and it will, as there are many organizations that take care of that. But what we need today, especially in Europe, is to have the artists and performers of all kinds, feel free to create and be remunerated accordingly. How else are we going to get new and unprecedented good content?”
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