CEPIC News

Letter to The EU Commissioner Reding

Oct 06. 2009
12:10
by
CEPIC
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ICOMP meetings and lunch hosted by Viviane Reding

On the 5th and 6th October 2009, Christina Vaughan, Dominique Delouis and Sylvie Fodor accepted an invitation to Brussels for the Council Meeting of ICOMP, who CEPIC became a member earlier this year.

It was important for CEPIC to have a strong presence for the following reasons:

(1) It was the first time CEPIC sent a delegation to the Council and presented itself and the Membership Goals

(2) This was a follow up of the common action undertaken together against the Google Book Settlement on September 7th

(3) A high profile lunch of over 150 guests was organised at the EU Parliament, CEPIC was invited by Lord Watson of Richmond, CBE with Viviane Reding, European Commissioner for Information Society and Media as the Keynote speaker and Alexandre Alvaro as our host - which positioned CEPIC as a leading voice for the Photography Industry in Europe. CEPIC had the possibility to meet with various MEPs during the lunch and to open the doors for our lobbying activities in the new parliament.

(4) On behalf of CEPIC Christina presented a letter to Ms Reding's office, presenting our position on the rights of artists and creators vis-avis the disputed Google settlement. ICOMP formally presented their White Papers on Openess and the Internet : the role of Transparency in Online Search and Search Advertising and Imperatives for a Healthy, Secure and Competitive Internet.
A copy of the letter may be found as an attachment to this article.

(5) There was a chance to meet various MEPs during the lunch and so to start a lobbying activity towards the new parliament highlighting CEPIC's position.

Viviane Reding's speech may be found as an attachment to this article. She sees the Internet Economy asbeing crucial for European Recovery and is committed to a widening of Broadband Access across all EU States.

A hearing on Orphaned Works has been scheduled by the European Commission on 26 October. More information here.

At present, there is a lot of uncertainty following the Irish vote and Polish signature. One of the consequences will be to change the number of commissioners. Another consequence of the treaty is also that the European Parliament eill play a more important role in governance and will now be in charge of 70% of the issues. This considerably modifies the balance of power and why it is more important than ever that CEPIC has a voice in Europe.

File Attachment

AttachmentSize
Letter_Reding.pdf250.51 KB
Speech_Reding.pdf42.11 KB