<div dir="ltr">This is such a great project - thank you, Jeremy and EFF.<div><br></div><div>There is a lot of interesting material at the juncture of "private agreements" and state action. Several current EU proposals could fall in this bucket. The Code of Conduct is one big example, the <a href="http://cyberlaw.stanford.edu/blog/2016/05/can-new-broadcasting-law-europe-make-internet-hosts-monitor-their-users">Audio-Visual Media Services draft directive</a> is another. I see shades of this in the Copyright Directive as well. The common pattern is government actors pressuring private platforms to "voluntarily" go beyond legal obligations in order to remove content. </div><div><br></div><div>The government-initiated agreements are intriguing as a litigation matter, since it is easier to formulate a claim where state actors are in the mix. There are some pretty strong statements against these agreements in the Council of Europe Blocking <a href="http://www.coe.int/en/web/freedom-expression/study-filtering-blocking-and-take-down-of-illegal-content-on-the-internet">report</a> from last spring. Pasting a few below. And in the US there is Dart v Backpage. </div><div><br></div><div>Annemarie Bridy has some good scholarship digging into the terms of some purely private agreements in the US copyright context. However bad the US Copyright Alert System is, the others she's looked at would seem to be worse in terms of due process for alleged infringers. </div><div><br></div><div>Daphne</div><div><br></div><div>- - -</div><div><br></div><div>Pasting - there is more interesting material in the report but the PDF doesn't copy/paste well for some reason.</div><blockquote style="margin:0px 0px 0px 40px;border:none;padding:0px"><div><p class="gmail-Default">In respect of this problem, the
Committee of Ministers formulated recommendations in 2011:</p></div><div><p class="gmail-Default">The companies concerned are not
immune to undue interference; their
decisions sometimes stem from direct political pressure or from politically
motivated economic compulsion, invoking justification on the basis of
compliance with their terms of service. </p></div><div><p class="MsoNormal">...</p></div><div><p class="MsoNormal"><span> </span></p></div><div><p class="MsoNormal">Therefore, a blocking system based exclusively on
self-regulation or voluntary agreements risks to amount to a non-legitimate
interference with fundamental rights.</p></div><div><p class="MsoNormal"><span> </span></p></div><div><p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:calibri"> ...</span></p></div><div><p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:calibri"><span><br></span></span></p></div><div><span style="font-family:cambria">In addition, there is the question whether governments that encourage (or even just allow)
such systems can claim not to be responsible for them, or for the restrictions on
information that are the practical results of the systems, simply because those
systems are not underpinned by law. In terms of international human rights law,
states are responsible if, within their jurisdiction, there are systems in place
that effectively restrict the freedom to seek, receive and impart information and
ideas regardless of borders for most of its inhabitants. </span></div><div> </div></blockquote><div>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span></span></p>
</div></div><div class="gmail_extra"><br><div class="gmail_quote">On Fri, Sep 30, 2016 at 3:05 PM, Jeremy Malcolm <span dir="ltr"><<a href="mailto:jmalcolm@eff.org" target="_blank">jmalcolm@eff.org</a>></span> wrote:<br><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0 0 0 .8ex;border-left:1px #ccc solid;padding-left:1ex">Some of you may find this interesting. Most people don't understand<br>
what multi-stakeholder processes are meant to achieve, because the<br>
phrase "multi-stakeholder" is misused so much and because there is so<br>
much variation between purportedly multi-stakeholder processes.<br>
<br>
At the Best Bits meeting last year, I presented a paper that I'd written<br>
which attempted to define a normative ideal of multi-stakeholderism<br>
based on a set of simple criteria.[0] But even that paper wasn't simple<br>
enough that ordinary people would read it, so I've distilled it still<br>
further and filtered it through EFF and here is the result:<br>
<br>
<a href="https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2016/09/fair-processes-better-outcomes" rel="noreferrer" target="_blank">https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/<wbr>2016/09/fair-processes-better-<wbr>outcomes</a><br>
<br>
We'll now be using this to critique processes that don't come up to<br>
snuff, and we hope that others may adopt and use the infographic too.<br>
Comments welcome.<br>
<br>
<br>
[0]<br>
<a href="https://policyreview.info/articles/analysis/criteria-meaningful-stakeholder-inclusion-internet-governance" rel="noreferrer" target="_blank">https://policyreview.info/<wbr>articles/analysis/criteria-<wbr>meaningful-stakeholder-<wbr>inclusion-internet-governance</a><br>
<br>
--<br>
Jeremy Malcolm<br>
Senior Global Policy Analyst<br>
Electronic Frontier Foundation<br>
<a href="https://eff.org" rel="noreferrer" target="_blank">https://eff.org</a><br>
<a href="mailto:jmalcolm@eff.org">jmalcolm@eff.org</a><br>
<br>
Tel: <a href="tel:415.436.9333%20ext%20161" value="+14154369333">415.436.9333 ext 161</a><br>
<br>
:: Defending Your Rights in the Digital World ::<br>
<br>
Public key: <a href="https://www.eff.org/files/2014/10/09/key_jmalcolm.txt" rel="noreferrer" target="_blank">https://www.eff.org/files/<wbr>2014/10/09/key_jmalcolm.txt</a><br>
PGP fingerprint: FF13 C2E9 F9C3 DF54 7C4F EAC1 F675 AAE2 D2AB 2220<br>
OTR fingerprint: 26EE FD85 3740 8228 9460 49A8 536F BCD2 536F A5BD<br>
<br>
<br>
<br>______________________________<wbr>______________________________<br>
You received this message as a subscriber on the list:<br>
<a href="mailto:bestbits@lists.bestbits.net">bestbits@lists.bestbits.net</a>.<br>
To unsubscribe or change your settings, visit:<br>
<a href="http://lists.bestbits.net/wws/info/bestbits" rel="noreferrer" target="_blank">http://lists.bestbits.net/wws/<wbr>info/bestbits</a><br></blockquote></div><br><br clear="all"><div><br></div>-- <br><div class="gmail_signature" data-smartmail="gmail_signature"><div dir="ltr"><div><div><div>Daphne Keller<br></div>Director, Intermediary Liability<br></div>Center for Internet and Society<br></div>Stanford Law School<br></div></div>
</div>