On February 13, the European Parliament and the Council reached a long-awaited deal on the proposed Copyright Directive, including Article 11, which would create a Publishers’ Right in the European Union. The compromise version of Article 11 sticks closer to the Council’s proposal, with “individual words and short extracts” falling outside the scope of protection. However, the negotiators inserted a sentence ensuring that the exclusion of short extracts is not interpreted to weaken the effectiveness of the Publishers’ Right. The right may also be available to non-European publishers. This is an excellent result for news publishers who worked diligently over the last few years to secure the inclusion of a strong and enforceable Publishers’ Right in the Directive. The negotiators, who have been meeting since October, reached the compromise just before the February 14 deadline. The text will now be translated and then both the Council and the full European Parliament will vote on the deal by April. The Alliance will continue working with our European partners to encourage the member states and the members of the European Parliament to adopt the Directive as soon as possible. Read the text of Article 11 here, and the Alliance’s statement on the final deal here.
Members of the News/Media Alliance staff have contributed to this post.
