Yahoo filed a complaint with Germany's Federal Constitutional Court, Says German copyright law, which gives publishers exclusive rights to use their online content for commercial purposes, is unconstitutional.

Last year 8 The copyright law, which took effect this month, enables publishers to control their online content (Except for single words or small snippets of text) Have exclusive commercial rights. The small snippet exception was included in the bill to allow search engines and aggregators to continue displaying portions of news articles without infringing copyright.

however, Publishers interpret the act differently, And require search engines to compensate for it. The copyright law was controversial from the start. A group of news publishers 6 Launched legal action against Google in December, Asking Google to pay it a share of the revenue it earns from publishing summaries of news articles.

Publishers in 7 month 1 Japan filed a similar complaint against Yahoo. According to the fees association, which represents the interests of German news publishers VG Media That Yahoo has little interest in licensing negotiations, This makes the legal process necessary. A Yahoo spokesman said in an emailed statement: "We think "Subsidiary copyright law" (Ancillary Copyright Law) It's a fundamental violation of our constitutional rights as a search engine operating in Germany, We hope the court will decide in our favor, And to ensure that German users can benefit from the same vast space of online information as the rest of the world. "

General Counsel of Yahoo! Germany Helge Huffman In a statement released Friday, Yahoo said it believes the new copyright law places unconstitutional limits on Internet users' freedom of information, Because it is impossible to get specific information from the Internet without using search engines. Huffman Says the German constitution requires the state to protect freedom of information, Including structures to ensure that people have access to information.

He added that the new law would guarantee freedom of the press, The constitutional provisions of professional freedom and equality are incompatible. In addition, Yahoo also thinks the bill is too vague. Huffman It says its ambiguity leads to legal uncertainty. Because Yahoo is a digital media company, he said, It is also a search engine provider, It wants to protect quality journalism at the same time, Committed to fair competition in the search market. 　

(Compiled from pcworld. com) (source: China Intellectual Property Protection Network)