We have a 1st win! On 5 July, the European Parliament plenary voted against the mandate to start negotiations with Council. However, the battle to defeat the Article 13 Censorship Machine is far from over: it must now be won in the European Parliament plenary in September. The site will be rethought and rebuilt to support you in facing the next stage of the battle. This is not over and your efforts will continue to lead to a balanced & positive outcome!
Next milestone: 12 September
Your voices were heard by many Members of the European Parliament (MEPs). A lot of them did not have the copyright reform on their radar screen. Now thanks to your efforts, they do, and they have become aware of the many sensitivities surrounding the copyright debate, especially regarding the Article 13 #CensorshipMachine proposal.
On 5 July, a majority of MEPs voted against the JURI Committee negotiation mandate. 318 MEPs decided to reject the Report by Rapporteur MEP Axel Voss (EPP, Germany) to #SaveYourInternet! The vote was a so called 'Roll-Call Vote', which implies that it MEPs voting behaviour was electronically recorded and will be made public: once available you'll be able to find here.
The battle continues, and we need your support more than ever. All 751 MEPs will now get a chance to scrutinise this copyright reform and table amendments, before the original JURI report and these amendments are being put up to a vote in the September Plenary session of the European Parliament, which takes place in the week of 10 September.
MEPs will now soon go on 'summer break' until the end of August. We will need to continue to encourage them do the right thing and to push back against an Article 13 #Copyright #CensorshipMachine.
Many actions will still need to be undertaken, both at EU and at national levels, to ensure our voices are heard up till the end. We are working on adapting this site to the new challenges ahead so stay tuned!
Stand up and ask Europe to protect Your Internet
The Internet lets us access more information than ever before, find a rich diversity of news sources, keep in touch with our friends, find new music and videos, and more. Why is it so awesome? Because what you see and do online is up to *you* not some big business or bureaucrat.
The European Commission and the Council want to destroy the Internet as we know it and allow big companies to control what we see and do online. Should Article 13 of the Copyright Directive proposal be adopted, it will impose widespread censorship of all the content you share online. The European Parliament is the only one that can step in and Save your Internet.
We are preparing for the next step to allow you to tell your policy makers you need copyright laws that protect your Internet, an Internet where you can share news and culture with your friends and family, where you can expect to be treated fairly and where your rights as EU citizens are protected.
Article 13 threatens EVERYTHING you do on the Internet
Thank you for your amazing mobilisation! More to come soon.
