OPINION: French digital revolution
By Paul Sweeting -- Video Business, 4/10/2009 12:05:00 PM
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The cut-off provision, a.k.a. “graduated response” or “three strikes,” is part of a broader bill officially known as the Creation and the Internet Act but referred to generally in France as HADOPI, the French acronym for the High Authority for the Distribution and Protection of Works on the Internet, a quasi-governmental agency that would administer the three-strikes provision.
The bill, which is a major priority of President Nicolas Sarkozy’s government, was passed unanimously by the French Senate last October, but ran into serious opposition in the National Assembly, particularly the three-strikes provision.
In a surprise move earlier this month, supporters of the measure from Sarkozy’s UMP party called a vote on the three-strikes measure in the middle the night, when only a handful of tipped-off members were in the chamber, and got it passed.
Last week, however, the opposition Socialists turned the tables.
After the amended bill passed the Assembly, it went to a conference committee with the Senate, where a final text was hammered out.
At the urging of French ISPs, however, the committee stuck back in a provision that had been stripped from the Assembly version requiring people whose Internet access is cut nonetheless to continue paying their ISP bill.
With final passage still widely expected, and fearing public backlash, most of the 557 members of the National Assembly failed to show up for the scheduled vote, including many members of UMP, again leaving only a dozen or so MPs on hand for the roll call.
When the vote was called, however, a group of Socialist MPs, who had apparently been lurking about outside the chamber, suddenly rushed in to cast deciding non votes, sending the bill down to defeat by 21 to 15.
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