Censorship on Félix Tréguer

Towards the Automation of Political Censorship

Fri, 22 Feb 2019 15:45:14 +0000

We are at a turning point in the long history of censorship. This turning point is that of private and automated censorship. It marks a radical break with the guarantees associated with freedom of expression that the democratic struggles of the 19th century left us as a legacy.

The democratic-liberal heritage trampled underfoot

The 1881 law on freedom of the press—now interpreted in the light of the European Convention on Human Rights—is certainly full of loopholes, and we too often tend to exaggerate its liberalism. Nevertheless, it remains a fundamental compass for freedom of expression, providing, for example, [special procedural rules] for judging abuses of this freedom after the fact and establishing the exclusive jurisdiction of the courts in public proceedings.

Copyright Directive: the fake confrontation between the two heads of information capitalism

Mon, 10 Sep 2018 07:15:14 +0000

Opinion piece originally published in French in Le Monde Idées on September 9, 2018.

For a quarter of a century, we have been watching the same bad movie, in which the cultural industries use the law to wage war on their audience. At issue this time is Article 13 of the Copyright Directive currently under review in Brussels, on which the European Parliament will vote on September 12.

In its current form, this provision requires digital platforms (YouTube, Facebook, and the like) to use automated filtering tools as part of agreements with rights holders (such as Sacem). The aim? To identify content published by internet users and block any that includes copyrighted works. A form of prior, automated, and privatized censorship.