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By Ian Jones, 10 February 1999 18:14

COMMENT Yesterday I thought I lived in an entirely different world to pop stars like Robbie Williams and the Spice Girls. While they go to parties and swan up and down the King's Road in their Range Rovers, I sit here slaving away at my PC. But today, news reached Silicon.com that their decision to lobby the European Parliament on copyright laws has had an effect - and the result has been one of the most ridiculous bits of legislation since Oliver Cromwell banned eating Christmas pudding on Christmas Day. In response to pressure from powerful lobby groups like All Saints, Euro-MPs have endorsed an 82 page document which could effectively outlaw Web caching. The idea behind the proposal was to prevent people duplicating and reusing information without first getting the approval of the copyright owner. That's fine in principle, but the unfortunate side effect is that it also makes storing content without the prior permission of the owner illegal, and that could seriously cripple the development of the Internet. No longer will browsers be allowed to cache Web pages and no longer will Internet service providers be able to store temporary copies of popular sites to ease congestion. If the proposals do get passed into law, and the law is enforced, then those annoying 'Net congestion' messages and creepingly slow 'downloading' bars will dominate your every online move. But here we come to the crucial point - 'if the law is enforced'. The EC may press ahead and legislate, but will Excite and Yahoo! really sue UUNet or Demon? The phrase 'biting the hand that feeds it', springs to mind. So how have we managed to get into a situation where the biggest policy-making body in Europe has not only come up with a deeply counterproductive proposal, it has also managed to make it totally unenforceable? Some light was shed on the matter when Silicon.com interviewed Robert Barzanti - the man behind the infamous 82 page tome. He admitted that as a former literature expert, the world of technology is a new and complex one for him. While it is worrying that the proposed law is now just two stages away from becoming an EU directive, that's the least of our concerns. What is more frightening is the total lack of understanding of the Internet - and IT in general - among these policy-makers. Should they be allowed to base their decisions on the wisdom of Jean-Michel Jarre? The answer has got to be no, and IT companies, the media and IT professionals need to join forces and make themselves heard. And we need to do it now.