Legal Regulation On Network Content Aggregation Service

Network content aggregation service refers to the network technology that integrates the file resources scattered in the cyberspace through network technologies such as search engine,data mining,hyperlinks,transcoding,etc.,so that network users can access the file resources through a one-stop platform.Aggregation sites are blocked by aggregated websites for intercepting the traffic of their users while obtaining business success.Since the emergence of network content aggregation service,there have been a series of legal disputes.The most typical one is whether the deep linking and transcoding technology used in the network aggregation service infringes on the right to communicate works to the public over information networks and the right of reproduction.The analysis of the above problems should be judged by whether the behavior itself falls into the scope of exclusive rights,rather than directly from the effect of the act.The behavior of destroying technical measures and shielding advertising can not affect the judgment of infringement of deep linking and transcoding.The damage caused by the web content aggregation service to the agglomerated website is mainly reflected in the way of providing the content to the public by destroying the technical measures of the website,thereby reducing the revenue of the paid subscription and reducing the advertising revenue by blocking the advertisement of the website.Therefore,in the network content aggregation service,the behavior of destroying technical measures and blocking advertisements should be the behavior of key regulation,while deep linking and transcoding is technically neutral.The thesis is made up by four parts.The first part introduces the background of network content aggregation service.Network content aggregation service is the product of information overload in a digital environment.Aggregating service providers use technologies such as deep linking and transcoding to filter information from multiple dispersed sources.And it transfers the traffic of the users of the aggregated website to its own,which damages the interests of the aggregated website and leads to copyright disputes.The two most controversial issues are whether providing deep linking infringes the right to communicate works to the public over information networks and whether transcoding infringes on the right of reproduction.The second part discusses the legal nature of deep linking.For the definition of deep link behavior,there are four standards at home and abroad: server test,substantive presentation standard,user perception standard and new public standard.This paper argues that the definition to deep linking should based on the legal provisions and the behavior itself,and the server test standard is most consistent with this.According to this standard,if the actor does not store the work on its server,the act of providing deep linking does not infringe the right to communicate works to the public over information networks.The third part discusses the nature of transcoding.First of all,as far as the relationship between transcoding and right to communicate works to the public over information networks is concerned,transcoding itself can not provide works to the public,only the act of "transcoding and link" can constitute the act of providing works,and then violate the right of information network communication.The key to judging at this time is whether the site stores the work in their own server.As to whether the temporary copy in the transcoding process infringes on the right of reproduction,because the temporary copy in this process is only a technological phenomenon incidental to the realization of the format conversion of the web page,it does not have independent economic value,so it does not violate the right of reproduction.The fourth part discusses the regulation path of network content aggregation.The behavior of network content aggregation can be regulated in the following ways: firstly,the behavior of destroying and shielding the technical protection measures of websites can be regulated according to the prohibition and circumvention of technical measures in copyright law;Secondly,the behavior of network content aggregation,including deep linking,transcoding,blocking advertising,destroying technical measures and so on,can also be regulated according to the anti-unfair competition law.Finally,the legislator may also consider drawing lessons from the experiences of Germany and European Union,introducing special provisions to regulate the behavior of network content aggregation,in order to balance the interests between network aggregation service providers and content providers.