There is no hope!
The man hasn't got a clue.
The incoming EU Commissioner for all things digital, Günther Oettinger, was quizzed by the European Parliament on Monday night. Truthfully, most of the questions lacked teeth. While the answers to his written questions were bland and lacking in any real content, Oettinger seemed to have decided that saying “infrastructure” …
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In a leaked diplomatic cable from the United States embassy cable entitled "Lame Duck German Governor Kicked Upstairs as New Energy Commissioner in Brussels," Deputy Chief of Mission in Germany, Greg Delawie notes that
"Chancellor Angela Merkel nominated Baden-Wuerttemberg (BW) Minister President Guenther Oettinger as EU Energy Commissioner primarily to remove an unloved lame duck from an important CDU bastion.
In 2020... Nobody is disadvantaged but if you want to download at more than 1Mb/s, you will have to have to pay more so that culture is not disadvantaged too. A part goes to the ISP, a part goes to a pool for approved EU 'culture providers', and finally the rest is tax.
I'm just throwing that out there.
The EU is, at least by Germany, largely seen as a way to protect German interests from the rest of the EU, and to prevent a strong opponent to the US which might "damage the good relationships".
People who are competent make that harder, what you need is marionettes wearing suits. If Oettinger would understand what he's supposed to do he would realize that strengthening copyright, for example, is not a good idea. He would probably come to the conclusion that to re-establish the balance between rights owners, creators, and the public there must be a ban on digital restriction systems. He would understand that regional national broadcasts licenses are not in the spirit of a united Europe, but counteract it.
In short he'd understand that he'll probably hurt both Europe and its people. Someone with even a scrap of brain left could simply do the right thing. This is a risk Merkel and Co cannot take, so here we have Oettinger.