Have your say on geo-blocking and the role of platforms in the online economy

Today the European Commission is launching a public debate with two consultations: one on geo-blocking and the other one on platforms, online intermediaries, data, cloud computing and the collaborative economy. The consultation on geo-blocking and other forms of geographically-based restrictions will gather opinions on unjustified commercial barriers which prevent from buying and selling products and services within the EU. It covers, for example, customers who are charged different prices or offered a different range of goods depending on where they live, but it does not cover copyright-protected content and content licensing practices. The second consultation launched today will look at the economic role of online platforms, which include, for example, search engines, social media, video sharing website, app stores, etc. It will also explore the liability of intermediaries as regards illegal content hosted online and how to improve the free flow of data in the EU and to build a European Cloud. It will look as well into the possibilities and potential issues raised by the rise of the collaborative economy. Both consultations will run until late December 2015. Views expressed and information gathered from these consultations will help the Commission assess the need for, and prepare legislative and policy initiatives where necessary, as part of the Digital Single Market Strategy and the upcoming Internal Market Strategy for Goods and Services. A press release can be found online in EN, the FR and DE versions will be available soon.