In a surprise vote on July 5, 2018, the European Parliament has rejected the problematic copyright proposal made by the JURI (Legal Affairs) Committee, mainly because of concerns about Article 11 (about ancilliary publisher rights) and Article 13 (platform liability related to copyright infringements in uploaded materials). On September 12, 2018, the proposal will be discussed and voted upon in plenary session,  after which the so-called 'trialogue negotiations' between the Council, the European Parliament and the European Commission will take place to reach an agreement on the entire Copyright Directive. This will be followed by a final vote in the European Parliament at the end of 2018 or the beginning of 2019 (there is no formal timeline yet). 

What's at stake?

• More background information on Article 11 and 13, and why they're such bad news: http://copyright4creativity.eu/
• Save the Internet has a useful tool for you to contact your local European Parliament Member and ask them not to agree with Article 13: https://saveyourinternet.eu/. On September 26 there were 27 on-the-ground protest events in 11 EU countries against the terrible Article 13.
• MEP Julia Reda, who opposes to the proposed Copyright Reform Directive, gives a useful overview on her website: https://juliareda.eu/eu-copyright-reform
• More background information about the surprise rejection of the JURI proposal by the European Parliament on July 5th: https://www.politico.eu/pro/parliament-committee-power-grab-crowds-out-most-meps/
• Prominent academics protesting against Article 11: 169 scholars [of whom 100 are full professors] working in the fields of intellectual property, internet law, human rights law and journalism studies at universities all over Europe write to oppose the proposed press publishers’ right. Article 11 of the proposal for a Directive on Copyright in the Digital Single Market:  https://www.ivir.nl/nl/academics-against-press-publishers-right/
• More information and opinions about two other controversial aspects in the proposal:
  • Text and Data Mining
  • Exceptions for education
• Read what OpenAIRE has previously written about the Copyright Reform: https://www.openaire.eu/the-eu-is-alive-with-the-sound-of-copyright-reform and https://www.openaire.eu/openaire-calls-on-the-european-parliament-to-halt-potentially-harmful-copyright-reform

What can you do? 

• A copyright action week is planned for 4-11 September, which will bring together organisations and individuals working on a variety of copyright issues, including Article 13, Article 11 and others including the proposals having to do with text and data mining and educational exceptions to copyright. Let's use this final opportunity to voice our concerns to MEPs and re-highlight productive changes to the reform text that will benefit creators, users, and the public.
• The 'Save your Internet' campaign has made it very easy for you to contact your local MEP about the September 12 vote: https://saveyourinternet.eu/
• Of course we will follow this campaign via our own @openaire_eu account, but if you want to be kept in the loop about the September vote, author rights and copyright reform, there are several specialised accounts (with varying levels of activism) that can be useful to follow: for example: Communia Association, Copyright 4 Creativity, CREATE, Andres Guadamuz (Technollama), The IP Kat, Glyn Moody and EDRI. 
• The hashtag used by opponents of the current proposal is #fixcopyright and #saveyourinternet