Faced with the inclusion in the Draft Sustainable Economy Law of
legislative modifications that affect the free exercise of the
freedoms of expression and information and the right of access to
culture through the Internet, we journalists, bloggers, users,
professionals and creators of the internet state our firm
opposition to the bill, and declare that…
1.- Copyright cannot be placed above the fundamental
rights of citizens, such as the right to privacy, to
security, to the presumption of innocence, to effective judicial
protection and to freedom of expression.
2.- The suspension of fundamental rights is and must remain
the exclusive competence of the judiciary. Not one closure without a ruling.
This draft bill, contrary to what is established in article 20.5 of
the Constitution, places in the hands of a non-judicial body -an agency
answerable to the ministry of Culture- the power to prevent
Spanish citizens from accessing any web page.
3.- The new legislation will create legal insecurity throughout the Spanish
technology sector, harming one of the few fields of development
and future in our economy, hindering the creation of companies,
introducing obstacles to free competition and slowing down its
international projection.
4.- The new proposed legislation threatens new creators and
hinders cultural creation. With the Internet and the successive technological
advances the creation and
broadcasting of content of all kinds has become extraordinarily democratized; it no longer comes predominantly
from the traditional cultural industries, but from a multitude of different
sources.
5.- Authors, like all workers, have the right to live from
their work with new creative ideas, business models and activities
associated with their creations. Trying to sustain with legislative changes
an obsolete industry that does not know how to adapt to this new environment is
neither fair nor realistic. If their business model was based on
controlling the copies of the works and on the Internet that is not possible without
violating fundamental rights, they should look for another model.
6.- We consider that the cultural industries need, in order to
survive, modern, effective, credible and affordable alternatives that
suit the new social uses, instead of limitations as
disproportionate as they are ineffective for the end they claim to pursue.
7.- The Internet must work freely and without political
interference sponsored by sectors that aim to perpetuate obsolete
business models and make it impossible for human knowledge to remain
free.
8.- We demand that the Government guarantee by law the neutrality of the Net
in Spain, against any pressure that may arise, as the framework for
the development of a sustainable and realistic economy facing the future.
9.- We propose a genuine reform of intellectual property
law oriented towards its purpose: giving knowledge back to society,
promoting the public domain and limiting the abuses of the collecting
societies.
10.- In a democracy laws and their modifications must be passed after
the appropriate public debate and having consulted beforehand all
the parties involved. It is not acceptable that legislative changes
affecting fundamental rights are made in a non-organic
law that deals with another subject.