There's a proposal in the works to replace Notre Dame's spire — which was a relatively modern addition — with a new, starchitect-designed "statement" spire, which will be copyrightable under the same French rules that prohibit commercial photos of the Eiffel Tower at night (and other French landmarks).

The European Commission's "copyright modernisation" plan is an unmitigated disaster, but there's one particularly insane section of it that I want to call your attention to: the "link tax," which entitles publishers to payment when people link to them on the internet.

The European Commission's "Copyright Modernisation" effort has wrapped up, and it's terrible.

Some EU countries' copyright laws allow rightsholders to make claims against street photographers who capture potentially copyrighted works, from the facades of buildings to public art. The EU's plan to harmonize a "right of panorama" (previously) would protect those of us who document the public world and upload our images to public places, from social media to Wikipedia to news-sites.

German MEP Julia Reda's brilliant recommendations for reforming EU copyright have passed the European Parliament, and the dastardly attempt to make it illegal to take "commercial" photos in public places has been killed.

The "Freedom of Panorama" is the right to take pictures in public spaces, even if you incidentally capture copyrighted works, from building facades to public sculptures to images on t-shirts and ads — and on July 9, the EU will vote whether to abolish it.