French Appear Ready to Soften Law on Media Piracy (The New York Times)
The government of French President Francois Hollande appears poised to shut down the agency created to enforce a 2009 law aimed at curbing unauthorized file-sharing and billed as the toughest anti-piracy law in the world.
Illegal Downloading Could Become Punishable With Prison Time in Russia (The Hollywood Reporter)
The Russian government, in response to filmmakers’ longtime complaints, is developing new regulations under which users of torrent tracking websites could be punished with up to five years in prison for downloading pirated content.
French Court Orders Apple to Pay $6.5M Copyright Tax on iPads (paidContent)
A Paris court ruled that Apple must hand over 5 million euros in copyright fees it collected on iPad sales in 2011. The ruling on the fees, which were eliminated in 2012, comes at a time when France is considering whether it should impose new cultural taxes on connected devices as a way of subsidizing artists.
Keith Kupferschmid is General Counsel and SVP, Intellectual Property Policy & Enforcement at SIIA.