Europe considers internet copyright law that would kill your favorite gifs and memes

Say goodbye to Doge and Grumpy Cat.

The European Parliament legal branch voted to pass a new copyright laws today that could possibly kill internet culture as we know it: no more memes and no more gifs.

The new set of laws dubbed the Copyright Directive is still a draft and awaits a vote from the full European Parliament, but internet experts and advocacy groups are concerned that it will become the first step of mass online censorship and surveillance.

The most controversial part of the proposoal is Article 13, which would require websites to monitor everything uploaded from the EU to ensure the content does not include copyrighted material. This is akin to YouTube's practice of filtering every video for possibly using media that the creator did not give the uploader permission to use. Read more...