By Angela Gunn, Betanews
When last we checked on HADOPI, the French law that would bar citizens from accessing the Net for up to a year after three file-sharing accusations, the French Constitutional Council had ruled the "three strikes" provision unconstitutional, and the Council of Europe had likewise stated that "fundamental rights and Council of Europe standards and values apply to online information and communication services as much as they do to the offline world." Now the Sarkozy administration is working on a new version of the law that addresses the constitutional issues.
If it succeeds in creating something that passes constitutional muster, there's a good change we wouldn't be able to call it HADOPI anymore. That was, or is, the name of the organization that was to administer the program and its three-strikes punishments. In a press release, Minister of Culture Christine Albanel said that the new version would instead put the penalty phase in judges' hands, leaving HADOPI itself to prevent piracy and promote legal downloading.
Meanwhile, the "three strikes" provision wasn't just a French malfunction, and the European Parliament -- which will convene in July with many new members -- will need to take another look as well, since the "three strikes" concept forms a part of a telecommunications bill currently on hold. Once Parliament has reconvened, the Council of Ministers will need to review everything that's been decided about three strikes and begin the process of bringing everything into accord.
Copyright Betanews, Inc. 2009