She's a millennial crackpot who somehow got elected to office in Germany. She gets paid. She doesn't work for free and then hope to make money selling t-shirts or getting GoFundMe donations. She cashes a government check.
However, her "philosophy" is that the Internet should not be regulated, and that "freedom of speech" means "sharing" copyrighted material. Don't call it "piracy." Call it the Communist manifesto that information (or entertainment) belongs to everyone.
If she wasn't in office, she'd be sitting in her basement nattering her worthless opinions on YouTube, Tweeting obsessively, squealing into a podcast microphone, and GIVING AWAY entire discographies, filmographies and bibliographies to promote herself. "You are AWESOME!" she will be told. She will find this better than an orgasm. Because she's never had one.
Years ago, struggling companies like AMAZON and EBAY needed a break. They got plenty. No sales tax. Look the other way on "gray market" goods. If people sell bootlegs, you can say, "We're JUST A VENUE, we don't know." The Internet soon became a paradise for blogs and forums and then torrents to not only give things away and take a profit from ad revenue, but insist that this was a "new paradigm." Pirate Bay notoriously declared that flaunting the law was fair. After all, Russia and China do it all the time. Why not Sweden?
People began making big money off the claim that it was "fair" to take the profit away from TV networks, publishers and movie studios. The result? Megaupload, owned by a Nazi who moved to New Zealand, bought the most expensive mansion on the island, and re-named himself KIM DOTCOM. The money that belonged to the artists went to HIM, because, oddly enough, the people downloading had no problem rewarding his "hard work" in providing unlimited access to freebies. Just pay $20 a month for a "premium membership" to KIM DOTCOM. He made a fortune off the memberships and the ad money.
"Copyright is COPY WRONG," the saying goes. Any attempt to strengthen the DMCA laws failed. Amazon, Wikipedia, Assange, Google...all lobbied to shoot down Senator Schumer, Senator Leahy, and any politician anywhere in the world. Who doesn't like hacked photos of Jennifer Lawrence with semen all over her face? Who doesn't like an entire free discography of The Beatles or the Beach Boys? How about all the Harry Potter books?
The European Union now wants to bring back some copyright sanity. Once again, idiots like Julia Reda and the "we like free" and "freedom of speech" bunch are screaming bullying and threatening. The cost of piracy over the past decade has been: the almost extinction of record stores, the death of most bookstores, and the closing of movie theaters. Movie companies unable to make profits on anything but stupid super hero movies and kiddie films, have flooded the market with stupid super hero movies and kiddie films. TV networks rely on cheaply made "reality" shows. Music labels no longer invest in new artists or protect back-catalog sales, and like the book industry, rely on a few best-sellers to carry them along. That's the reality. But "We like it FREE," as Puzo (one of the notorious long-running forums) likes to say. Selfishness and greed rule, and the big Internet companies have been able to lobby and intimidate lawmakers.
The E.U. would simply like the countries who are trying to destroy Capitalism, to STOP IT. Stop hiding torrent servers in Russia and on Asian islands. Stop allowing blogs in Croatia and other vile countries to allow people to post links on "Yadi" and other sites that refuse to acknowledge a DMCA takedown request. Like Pirate Bay, there are outfits that simply say, "Screw you, you can't prosecute us, so leave us alone. And no, we have NO morality. We love ANARCHY, as long as it doesn't affect us personally. Call us hypocrites. Or better yet, don't call us at all. Ha ha ho ho hee hee."
What Nerdy Nazi Julia Reda would say to me is, "Herr Smith, you wrote 19 books. They are in libraries. So, what's the big deal if they are given away free via download all over the world? What's it to you? It's YOUR responsibility to spend time you could be writing in surfing the Net and finding and reporting the illegal downloads. Spend all day, because there are hundreds of illegal private forums around, and "members only" blogs hosted by GOOGLE. Spend a chunk of money on hiring Web Sheriff or some other company to use technology and hunt for you. But, ha ha, NOBODY can get a takedown if the site is in RUSSIA or some island beyond the reach of the law. And, ho ho, Internet Service Providers are NOT allowed to block rogue websites from being accessed. And, hee hee, this is a GOOD thing, because there will always be scapegoats and helpless fall guys in this world, and copyright owner is the N-word of the World.
The E.U. would like normal countries, like America, England, France and Germany, to use technology to block "matched" content. That's not asking much is it? Google's YouTube, miraculously, does this. If an uploader wants to make money by hoisting a song or a TV show that just came out, they get a message: "Your content matches copyrighted material." This needs to be done with Google's blogs, with forums, with torrents. Those that resist get blocked or taken down. This includes "streaming" sites that offer the latest PPV fights for a fee, or in return for suffering banner ads all over the page and sometimes even the image.
I think it would be nice if people didn't bootleg my books on eBay and charge $3.99 for a download off a GOOGLE CLOUD, making more for NOTHING than I would on the royalty from Amazon. I think it would be nice if a blogger or some jerk in a forum didn't give my stuff away, assuming I'm a millionaire, or that it's "good publicity" for me and that somebody will buy the next book...which they won't because it'll be available free. I think it would be nice if I, and all singers, songwriters, writers, actors, etc., didn't have assholes who aren't "in the business" telling us how we should run our business. And no, we don't want to give our work away free and charge for a fucking t-shirt, and we do NOT want to be fucking panhandlers begging for donations via GoFundMe or a "Paypal tip."
The current toothless DMCA rules don't work. It shouldn't be up to me to surf eBay every week to find the bootlegs and intellectual property violations...and, too often...report the same jerks over and over. It shouldn't be up to a mid-level singer/songwriter who does tour and sell her indie label CDs at gigs, to spend time and money contacting idiot retired bloggers and say, "Hey, it's really me, please do not give away my music with a stupid photo of Mr. Natural next to the album jacket, and a notation, "DIG IT" or "ENJOY!" or "IF YOU LIKE IT, LET ME KNOW!"
Some European countries have sued Google, and Google has laughed. Paying fines that are maybe 2% of their profits don't bother them at all. That the E.U. may come up with some watered-down bill is hardly great news, as it still doesn't mean that all countries will comply, or that there won't be loopholes. What's happening is just a "start." As for Nerdy Nazi Julia Reda, maybe she should STOP. Because if piracy continues, maybe there won't be anybody making the bestiality porn she probably loves, and she won't get paid to appear in any, either. "Hey, Julia, don't expect to get paid for being gangbanged by Schnauzers and Dobermans, just enjoy doing it for the fun of it, and keep your day job getting paid by the German government.
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