Yesterday, the European Parliament voted in favour of the infamous “link tax” and to build more firewalls on the Internet, obsessed with censoring any material that might infringe on copyright. In so doing, perfectly legal uploads would most certainly become collateral damage of the nearsighted robots that are supposed to enforce this.
The EU is quick to point out that this will not affect “small” companies, in practice meaning ones with fewer than 50 employees. That is hardly any comfort, and WordPress.com for instance has 779 employees at the time of writing this. Should everyone with a blog now start looking over their shoulders?
Mozilla (the folks behind Firefox) has more details on the situation before the vote, and where we are after the vote.
As for Sweden, here’s how the voting went: (Socialdemokraterna form the current government here, together with Miljöpartiet)
For:
Name | Group in the European Parliament | Group in the Riksdag |
Aleksander GABELIC | S&D | Socialdemokraterna |
Jytte GUTELAND | S&D | Socialdemokraterna |
Anna HEDH | S&D | Socialdemokraterna |
Olle LUDVIGSSON | S&D | Socialdemokraterna |
Marita ULVSKOG | S&D | Socialdemokraterna |
Soraya POST | S&D | N/A |
Against:
Name | Group in the European Parliament | Group in the Riksdag |
Fredrick FEDERLEY | ALDE | Centerpartiet |
Jasenko SELIMOVIC | ALDE | Liberalerna |
Cecilia WIKSTRÖM | ALDE | Liberalerna |
Kristina WINBERG | ECR | Sverigedemokraterna |
Malin BJÖRK | GUE/NGL | Vänsterpartiet |
Lars ADAKTUSSON | PPE | Kristdemokraterna |
Anna Maria CORAZZA BILDT | PPE | Moderaterna |
Christofer FJELLNER | PPE | Moderaterna |
Gunnar HÖKMARK | PPE | Moderaterna |
Max ANDERSSON | Verts/ALE | Miljöpartiet |
Jakop DALUNDE | Verts/ALE | Miljöpartiet |
Linnéa ENGSTRÖM | Verts/ALE | Miljöpartiet |
Bodil VALERO | Verts/ALE | Miljöpartiet |
Abstentions: none.
Appears not to have been present:
Name | Group in the European Parliament | Group in the Riksdag |
Peter LUNDGREN | ECR | Sverigedemokraterna |
Sources:
- Press release from the European Parliament
- EU definition of company sizes
- List of Swedish MEPs
- About WordPress.com etc.
- Copy of voting list from the European Parliament: euparl-copyright-votes-sep-2018.pdf (the relevant votes are on page 38 and 39)
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