Copyright Levies
The Copyright Levies group gathers and analyses data and facts relating to the archaic and dysfunctional copyright levies systems operated in most EU Member States. It promotes viable alternatives to the current systems, alternatives which would provide superior means for ensuring fair compensation to right holders in the digital arena.
The primary focus of the group is to engage industry and interested stakeholders in a dialogue in each of the member states and in Brussels, to raise the profile of this issue with consumers, who are impacted by the current unfair levies system, and businesses across Europe. The group is actively working towards a reform of the way the levies system operates across Europe.
The Digital Economy, Copyright Levies and the Borderless Economy
The digital age is here and it is driven by digital platforms which are being increasingly used to deliver goods and services via the internet. A borderless environment, or single market, stimulates demand for higher speed access, which intern triggers investment in faster broadband networks. The deployment and take-up of faster networks leads to new services based on higher speeds.
The so called virtuous cycle of the digital economy is well documented and is proven to be a successful driver of productivity growth in other regions of the world. By 2020 the exponential growth of the digital economy is expected to result in digital content and applications being delivered mostly online.
Europe is at a critical cross road; currently the opportunity to extract economic value from the digital economy is severely restricted due to the lack of a digital single market. One impact of this lack is demonstrated in the significant differences between the digital music market in Europe and in other regions - the EU digital music market represents only 33% of the US market despite have the same market capacity (500 million consumers).
The forthcoming Collective Rights Management Directive (CRM Directive), which aims at ensuring easier, more uniform and technologically neutral solutions for cross-border and pan-European licensing in the audiovisual sector, is an excellent opportunity for Europe to address and resolve the long running negative economic impacts of the current fragmented way of operating.
The European Commission acknowledges that issues related to copyright licensing in the European Union are multi-dimensional. Solving those issues requires investigating the entire system of content distribution: licensing systems, geographical scope of licenses, private copy exception and the rules governing the role of intermediaries.
In the wake of the financial crisis, emerging economies unshackled by constraints are enjoying far higher growth rates than us; high growth is critical for Europe in these tough economic times. Europe must take bold decisions boost growth and ensures our economy stabilizes.
A fully operational digital single market will deliver 4% growth in GDP in ten years, equivalent to €500bn. If Europe gets its policies wrong, there is a significant risk that we will struggle to catch-up with faster moving digital economies elsewhere.
Download DIGITALEUROPE's Policy Paper:
Input to the Framework Directive on Collective Rights [PDF 907Kb]