Brussels, 28/01/2016 (Agence Europe) - Geo-blocking must be tackled and an economy based on collaboration requires an innovative regulatory approach that promotes innovation. This is the message delivered by the Ministers for Industry on Thursday 28 January, during an informal meeting in Amsterdam. These calls were further boosted by the preliminary results from two public consultations published on Wednesday.
Geo-blocking.
Support from member states. In its strategy for the digital single strategy the Commission is committed to working towards the eradication of “unfair geo-blocking”. This practice consists of imposing restrictions or applying different conditions to customers that purchase online, on the basis of their country of residence or nationality. During the course of the informal meeting, ministers backed the Commission's approach. They used this event to share their experiences and exchange their views on fair and unfair blocking and what form the Commission's future proposal should take. Addressing the press, the Vice President for the Single Digital Market, Andrus Ansip, explained that the Commission had no intention of forcing companies to make deliveries abroad or impose the same price throughout the European Union. The Vice President, however, expressed his annoyance and asked why this is prohibited for traditional purchases but not for digital purchases abroad and said: “We need an obligation to sell abroad in the same way as we do at home”.
Public consultation: for a legislative solution. The Commission also presented ministers with the preliminary results from its public consultation on geo-blocking (carried out from 24 September-28 December). According to a flash analysis of the 450 responses received, it would appear that 90% of respondents are firmly opposed to different prices or products that change according to the place of residence. A large majority of them also call for a legislative solution. Companies working in the sector acknowledge that consumers living in a different member state should not, in principle, be refused access to an offer available to another consumer living in another member state. Nonetheless, they are firmly opposed to sellers being requested to sell or deliver a product outside the area in which they normally do business. It should be pointed out that two thirds of the responses received by the Commission came from consumers or consumer associations, although almost 60% of position documents were sent by companies and industry representatives. Citizens from Germany (21%), Belgium (10%), United Kingdom/Austria (9%) were the most active participants in this survey, which did not cover geo-blocking linked to copyright or practices or granting licences on content.
Collaborative economy.
Dutch context. The Dutch Minister for the Economy, Henk Kamp, said that the “collaborative economy is no longer a choice but a fact. Consumers have made their choice”. With these words, he concluded the informal “Competitiveness” meeting, before acknowledging that this change of paradigm also provoked a number of questions, particularly in the area of responsibility, taxation, etc. The Presidency chose two themes on which to organise the discussion: the transition from “property to sharing” and the lifting of traditional barriers between companies and consumers (with the emergence of the term “prosumer”). Ministers mainly discussed the opportunities and challenges created by the collaborative economy, as well as future developments, such as the most appropriate power levels for taking action. They also shared their experiences: Estonia therefore highlighted its tax collection system and the way in which it applied to companies like Uber, as well as others, and the United Kingdom described its platform for entrepreneurs. The Dutch Presidency presented a framework project “to assess the regulatory problems in the collaborative economy in a clear and structured way”. This tool was defined by Vice President Jyrki Katainen (Employment, Growth, Investment and Competitiveness) as the “best he had ever seen” and is proposing to only take action when the public interest is threatened and to try to ensure that an appropriate level of power is used in the event of intervention.
It should be pointed out that the European Commission launched three external studies and that the complete report will be published online in spring 2016.
Public consultation: more transparency. The public consultation involves platforms, online intermediaries, data and cloud computing, as well as the collaborative economy and took place from 24 September to 6 January. 1,036 responses were made (including one representative and 10,559 individual responses).
On the issue of the collaborative economy, a large majority of respondents identified the uncertainty regarding rights and obligations (for users and providers) as one of the main obstacles to development in the sector. The “traditional” service providers appear to support the new rules on the collaborative economy. The majority of consumers questioned consider that platforms for the collaborative economy provide sufficient information regarding service providers, consumer rights, the characteristics and modalities for supply and mandatory rights.
On the issue of platforms, the majority of respondents believe that platforms should be more transparent, particularly with regard to the results from research and identify the actual provider and mechanisms for making criticism. They also believe that online platforms do not provide sufficient information regarding personal and non-personal data or the terms and conditions for the way in which they are used. The platforms indicated that they considered sufficient information was provided. Consumers and platforms support a combination of regulatory solutions, self-regulation and those linked to the market.
On the question of intermediaries, there was a convergence of views among those that consider that the E-commerce directive (2000/31/EC) responds to current needs and those who would like clarification regarding implementation, as well as those that want a recalibration of interests by way of introducing new categories for intermediaries. The majority of respondents consider that different categories exist for illicit content that should be subject to different treatment when notification procedures and action in this collection are involved.
On the issue of cloud computing, the majority of respondents call for a clear distinction between personal and non-personal data. Again, a majority considers that the current legal framework is obsolete when it comes to tackling the issues linked to responsibility for the Internet of things and/or services, based on data and the objects concerned. (Original version in French by Sophie Petitjean)