歐盟草擬激進版權改革方案向谷歌等施壓
European News publishers will be given the right to levy fees on internet platforms such as Google if search engines show snippets of their stories, under radical copyright reforms being finalised by the European Commission.
根據歐盟委員會(European Commission)正在擬定的激進版權改革，歐洲新聞出版商將被授予向谷歌(Google)等互聯網平臺收費的權利——只要搜索引擎顯示了他們的報道片段。
The proposals, to be published in September, are aimed at diluting the power of big online operators, whose market share in areas such as search leads to unbalanced commercial negotiations between search engines and content creators, according to officials.
歐盟官員們表示，定於9月發表的這些提議，目的是爲了稀釋大型在線運營商的實力，它們在搜索等領域的市場份額導致了搜索引擎與內容創作者之間在商業談判中處於不對等的地位。
The move will heap further pressure on the strained relationship between Silicon Valley and Brussels, which are embroiled in increasingly fractious arguments over issues covering competition, tax and privacy. This week, the US Treasury department attacked commission moves to levy billions of euros from Apple for alleged underpayment of taxes in Europe.
此舉將給硅谷和布魯塞爾之間的緊張關係帶來更大壓力；近來雙方在競爭、稅收和隱私等問題上越來越談不攏。本週美國財政部抨擊了歐盟委員會以蘋果(Apple)涉嫌在歐洲少繳稅爲由、可能向該公司徵收數十億歐元稅款之事。
Under the draft copyright plan, news publishers would receive “exclusive rights” to make their content online available to the public in a move that would force services such as Google News to agree terms with news organisations for showing extracts of articles.
根據版權計劃草案，新聞出版者將擁有把它們的在線內容提供給公衆的“獨家權利”，此舉將迫使谷歌新聞(Google News)等在線服務與新聞機構就顯示文章片段商定條款。
Citing dwindling revenues at news organisations, the commission warns that failure to act would be “prejudicial for . . . media pluralism”, according to one internal document.
歐盟委員會的一份內部文件提到新聞機構的營收不斷減少，警告稱，不採取行動將“有損……媒體多元化”。
Critics of the idea argue that similar efforts to charge Google for aggregating news stories have failed in both Germany and Spain. Google responded to a mandatory levy in Spain by shutting down Google News in the country.
批評者指出，德國和西班牙曾經發起的向谷歌收取聚合新聞報道費用的類似努力都失敗了。谷歌對西班牙強制性收費的迴應是在該國關閉谷歌新聞。
In Germany, many publishers opted to waive the charge in order still to appear on the search engine’s news results after suffering big drops in traffic.
在德國，很多出版社在遭受流量大跌後選擇放棄收費，以便仍能在該搜索引擎的新聞搜索結果上出現。
Julia Reda, a German MEP and copyright reform activist, said: “They recognise that German and Spanish rights did not work well, but structurally they are trying to do the same thing.”
德國歐洲議會議員、版權改革活動家朱莉婭•裏達(Julia Reda)表示：“他們認識到德國和西班牙的權利制度沒有很好發揮作用，但從結構上說，他們正試圖做同樣的事情。”
But she said the size of Google would make it hard for publishers to reach a deal even with the exclusive right. “It is insane to believe that [they] would win this battle,” she said. Google declined to comment.
但她表示，谷歌的規模意味着，出版社即使具備獨家權利，也很難達成協議。“瘋子纔會相信他們能打贏這場戰鬥，”她說。谷歌拒絕置評。
Under the proposals, news publishers would not be obliged to levy a fee for an aggregator to show a segment of content, and could offer it free. Officials have made clear that simply linking to publicly available content is not covered by the EU’s copyright rules — a fact that will not change under the proposals.
根據版權改革提議，新聞出版商將不會被強制向聚合商收取顯示內容片段的費用，而是可以免費提供。官員們明確表示，僅僅是鏈接到可公開獲得的內容是不受歐盟版權規則約束的——改革提議不會改變這個事實。
Christian Wigand, a spokesperson for Brussels, said: “Let's be clear; granting such rights to news publishers would not affect the way users share hyperlinks on the internet. It would recognise their role as investors in content.”
布魯塞爾方面的發言人克里斯蒂安•威根德(Christian Wigand)表示：“讓我們說清楚：賦予新聞出版商這類權利，並不影響用戶分享互聯網上的超鏈接。出版商作爲內容投資者的角色將得到承認。”
Elsewhere in an impact assessment of the proposed reforms, Google was held up as an example to be followed. Under the new rules, user-generated video sites would have to introduce tech-nology to identify copyright-protected work, similar to that which Google-owned YouTube already employs.
與此同時，在評估擬議改革的影響的一份報告中，谷歌被列爲一個效仿的榜樣。按照新版規則，用戶生成內容的視頻網站將必須引入技術來識別版權保護的作品，類似於谷歌旗下YouTube已經採用的做法。
