European Commission releases Digital Single Market Strategy

Thursday, 10 December 2015 Books+Publishing

The European Commission (EC) has released a Digital Single Market Strategy as part of its competition inquiry into the ecommerce sector in the European Union, reports the Bookseller. The strategy proposes that European citizens traveling across borders should still have access to their digital content through services such as Netflix, Sky Sports, Spotify and ebooks, and that this ‘cross-border portability’ should become a new EU right in 2017. However, the EC also said the modernisation of copyright rules will be a gradual process and that some country exceptions will be allowed. A spokesperson for the EC said: ‘At present, Europeans travelling within the EU may be cut off from online services providing films, sports broadcasts, music, e-books or games that they have paid for in their home country. Today’s proposed regulation on the cross-border portability of online content services addresses these restrictions in order to allow EU residents to travel with the digital content they have purchased or subscribed to at home.’ Publishers Association CEO Richard Mollet said he was relieved with the EC’s decision to ‘move carefully and proportionately when proposing changes to copyright law’. ‘The commitment that the proposals will take into account relevant market situations and licensing practices is particularly very welcome,’ he said.

Category: International news