I have puzzled for years over how to explain the EC’s Human Brain Project. See The EC Brain if you need background on this ongoing farce.
While reading Reject Europe’s Plans To Tax Links and Platforms by Jeremy Malcolm, I suddenly understood the motivation for the Human Brain Project!
From the post:
A European Commission proposal to give new copyright-like veto powers to publishers could prevent quotation and linking from news articles without permission and payment. The Copyright for Creativity coalition (of which EFF is a member) has put together an easy survey and answering guide to guide you through the process of submitting your views before the consultation for this “link tax” proposal winds up on 15 June.
Since the consultation was opened, the Commission has given us a peek into some of the industry pressures that have motivated what is, on the face of it, otherwise an inexplicable proposal. In the synopsis report that accompanied the release of its Communication on Online Platforms, it writes that “Right-holders from the images sector and press publishers mention the negative impact of search engines and news aggregators that take away some of the traffic on their websites.” However, this claim is counter-factual, as search engines and aggregators are demonstrably responsible for driving significant traffic to news publishers’ websites. This was proved when a study conducted in the wake of introduction of a Spanish link tax resulted in a 6% decline in traffic to news websites, which was even greater for the smaller sites.
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There is a severe shortage of human brains at the European Commission! The Human Brain Project is a failing attempt to remedy that shortage of human brains.
Before you get angry, Europe is full of extremely fine brains. But that isn’t the same thing as saying they found at the European Commission.
Consider for example, the farcical request for comments, having previously decided the outcome as cited above. EC customary favoritism and heavy-handedness.
I would not waste electrons submitting comments to the EC on this issue.
Spend your time mining EU news sources and making fair use of their content. Every now and again, gather up your links and send them to the publications and copy the EC. So publications can see the benefits of your linking versus the overhead of the EC.
As the Spanish link tax experience proves, link taxes may deceive property cultists into expecting a windfall, in truth their revenue will decrease and what revenue is collected, will go to the EC.
There’s the mark of a true EC solution:
The intended “beneficiary” is worse off and the EC absorbs what revenue, if any, results.