Pace of difference between the president and the candidate. After having relaunched, last January, the offensive against the Gafam (Google, Apple, Facebook, Amazon, Microsoft), Emmanuel Macron, now a candidate for his re-election, integrates the strengthening of the defense of the copyrights of artists and those of the press, called neighboring rights, in its programme. “The crises we are experiencing, the new forms of war show how much information, fiction, creation forge minds in open democratic societies and are subjects of sovereignty and independence,” he insisted on Thursday. , during a conference presenting his proposals for the presidential election in April.
The originality of the reasoning of the favorite of the presidential election today consists in linking the question of “cultural and informational independence” to the emergence of a European metaverse. “We will defend at European level, as we have done since 2017, copyright and related rights, and we will fight to build a European metaverse. This is a key subject both for creation and the ability to allow all our creators, whatever their cultural field, not to depend on Anglo-Saxon or Chinese players and aggregators who will be able to completely circumvent, otherwise, the current rules of respect for copyright and neighboring rights. It is therefore an essential subject to defend our ability to create and the rights of our authors, ”explained Emmanuel Macron.
This is a sign that press editors are heard.Jean-Marie Cavada (President of the Society for Neighboring Press Rights)
For Jean-Marie Cavada, president of the Society for Related Rights of the Press (DVP), the collective management organization which seeks to obtain fair compensation from digital platforms for press content, “this reminder of the importance of defending neighboring rights is very good news. This is a sign that press publishers are heard”. Former talk show host The Walk of the Century also welcomes the fact that the candidate president sees in the metaverse a content industry where the independence and the richness of the press are “essential subjects”.
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The question of a European metaverse is not insignificant. In these digital universes, we already buy virtual land, but also media in digital form. According to PwC, the metaverse market should bring 1,660 billion dollars to the world economy by 2030. On BFMTV, the Secretary of State for Digital, Cédric O, specified that it was not a question of not to create a public metaverse, but to help the development of underlying technologies, starting with 3D graphics engines. This sector is today dominated by the American groups Unreal Engine and Unity, the most used in the video game industry. But some French players are present in the niche such as the French Ubisoft and Dassault Systèmes.
