Verheißungen der Zivilgesellschaft

The European integration process mainly consists of the development of a European Single Market. Its political regulation is contradictory and conflicting as it is managed by a committee of the governments which - on a different level - operate against each other as representatives of competing nations. Beyond market and states the national citizens expect a culture of consent-orientated acknowledgement from a European civil society. This expectation has been very distinct in those countries which joined the European Union in 2004. In this contribution results are reported from a survey on representatives of Middle and East European networks of social work. They had been questioned about their experiences with aspects of the eastward expansion of the EU. It becomes apparent that the promises of the civil society are overdone and that it comes down to a balance of civil liberty, welfare state and the self-regulation of the civil society.

Limitations: The Centerpiece of Copyright in Distress

After the exclusive rights in copyright have been consolidated in a century-long historical development, limitations and exceptions have become the main instrument to determine the exact scope of copyright. Limitations and exceptions do not merely fine-tune copyright protection. Rather, they balance the interests of authors, rightholders, competitors and end-users in a quadrupolar copyright system. Understanding this is of particular importance in the digital and networked information society, where copyrighted information is not only created and consumed, but constantly extracted, regrouped, repackaged, recombined, abstracted and interpreted. However, serious doubts exist whether the present, historically grown system of limitations adequately balances the interests involved in the information society. Both the closed list of limitations allowed under Art. 5 of the EU Information Society Directive 2001/29/EC and a narrowly interpreted three-step test contained in Arts. 13 TRIPS and 5 (5) of the Information Society Directive appear as obstacles in the way of achieving the appropriate balance needed. This brief article outlines the issues involved which were discussed at the International Conference on “Commons, Users, Service Providers – Internet (Self-) Regulation and Copyright” which took place in Hannover, Germany, on 17/18 March 2010 on the occasion of the launch of JIPITEC.

The Legal Classification of ISPs - The Czech Perspective

This Article is a comprehension of the lecture held at at the International Conference on “Commons, Users, Service Providers – Internet (Self-) Regulation and Copyright” which took place in Hannover, Germany, on 17/18 March 2010 on the occasion of the launch of JIPITEC. It summarizes the current issues concerning ISP liability in the Chzech Republic.