Update on the EU Copyright Directive

By EDRi · May 5, 2004

Eight Member States were referred by the Commission in December 2003 to the Court of Justice for failure to transpose the Copyright Directive (2001/29/EC) into national law. The deadline for implementation was 22 December 2002, but was only met by Greece and Denmark. Italy, Austria, Germany and the UK transposed the Directive into national law in 2003, while Ireland and Luxembourg implemented the Directive in 2004.

The remaining seven original states – Belgium, Spain, France, the Netherlands, Portugal, Finland and Sweden – have all published draft legislation. Controversy over the Directive has ensured a rocky ride for these laws, most of which have now been rewritten at least once after negative comment on the initial drafts. Implementation continues in the 10 new member states.

EDRi members FIPR and AEL have further information about the EUCD implementations on their websites. FIPR is organising a workshop on the future direction of European copyright law on 13 June in Berlin, directly following the Wizards of OS conference.

FIPR report about the EUCD-implementation (September 2003)
http://www.fipr.org/copyright/guide/index.htm

AEL wiki about implementation plans
http://wiki.ael.be/index.php/EUCD-Status

Copyright workshop (13.06.2004)
http://wizards-of-os.org/index.php?id=36&L=3

(Contribution by Ian Brown, FIPR