Abstract
Creators of news and literary works of a journalistic nature are the backbone of any ‘information society’. They provide fast and reliable information for the general public and keep in check the power that be. Yet, despite the abundance of demand for information and the popularity of old and new media outlets, newspapers have seen their profitability plummet in the last 20 years. By controlling the main revenue sources of this industry, digital platforms have gained a position of superior bargaining power vis-à-vis press publishers. The EU legislature has resolved to rebalance the bargaining power between them by granting an ancillary right to press publishers, whereby press publishers can demand the payment of copyright licenses to digital platforms. This should increase their bargaining power and thus lead to fairer agreements.
What is at stake here is not only the survival of the press industry (or at least part of it) but the integrity of the right to information that the public derives from the principle of freedom of speech. This article posits that copyright alone is insufficient to protect free speech and the right to information by unpacking the nature and history of the new neighboring right introduced by the EU Directive 790/2019. Moreover, the article considers the relationship between copyrights and competition law in this area. It postulates that competition law, despite its essential role as an effective remedy against anticompetitive abuses, can have little structural effects in this industry in the long term. At the national level, the EU Directive 790/2019 will need to be combined with other regulatory solutions, which are here briefly surveyed.
What is at stake here is not only the survival of the press industry (or at least part of it) but the integrity of the right to information that the public derives from the principle of freedom of speech. This article posits that copyright alone is insufficient to protect free speech and the right to information by unpacking the nature and history of the new neighboring right introduced by the EU Directive 790/2019. Moreover, the article considers the relationship between copyrights and competition law in this area. It postulates that competition law, despite its essential role as an effective remedy against anticompetitive abuses, can have little structural effects in this industry in the long term. At the national level, the EU Directive 790/2019 will need to be combined with other regulatory solutions, which are here briefly surveyed.
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Publisher | SSRN |
| Number of pages | 42 |
| DOIs | |
| Publication status | Published - 22 Aug 2023 |
Publication series
| Name | SSRN Electronic Journal |
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Bibliographical note
Declaration of Conflicting InterestsThe author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship,
and/or publication of this article.
Funding
The author(s) received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of
this article.
