French Publishers Association (Syndicat National de l'Edition)
The French Publishers Association (SNE) is France's trade association of book publishers.
ID: 54534356472-92
Lobbying Activity
Meeting with Michael Arentoft (Head of Unit Research and Innovation) and Federation of European Publishers and RELX
5 Nov 2025 · Copyright and academic freedom in the context of research
Response to Delegated Regulation amending Annex I of Regulation (EU) 2023/1115 (EU Deforestation Regulation)
13 May 2025
The French Publishers Association fully supports the goal of ensuring legal clarity for operators, traders and surveillance authorities on the categories of products falling within the scope of the EUDR. As representatives of book publishers, we particularly welcome further clarifications regarding the exclusion from the scope of packing materials and packing containers and of accessory materials (namely marketing materials), when not placed on the market on their own. This exclusion should encompass items such as boxes used to keep together a series of books in a collection, which are distributed and sold together with the books; and point-of-sale advertising displays made of cardboard, which hold or accompany certain books, and are distributed with the books and can be reused. The relevant part of point 2(kk) in the annex to the draft delegated regulation could be integrated to this end to read used exclusively to support, protect, carry, hold together or display another product. Any other clarification aiming at the same goal would be beneficial. We also welcome the intention to further clarify the situation of waste, second-hand and used products with a view to encourage circular and resource-efficient practices. Another specific feature of the book supply chain is the practice by retailers to return unsold books to publishers. These books are then destined to pulping (and recycling) or reintroduced into the commercial circuits. In both cases, they will have been already subjected to a complete chain of due diligence up until the retail stage. It would be disproportionately burdensome to keep goods at the end of their lifecycle, or unsold goods going back into commercial circulation to prevent waste, subjected to EUDR obligations well beyond a first completed chain of due diligence. We recommend integrating the relevant part of point 2(ll) in the annex to the draft delegated regulation to read not including used, second-hand and returned products. On a related note, we want to highlight the fact that books and other printed publications were not included in the original Commission proposal and therefore have not been included in the EUDR impact assessment. The complexities for a sector that is so far remote from the beginning of the supply chain and therefore was excluded from the EUTR have not been adequately assessed. The magnitude of the information requirements at the stage of book manufacturing and commercialisation is staggering and risks seriously disrupting supply chains, and possibly ending book imports altogether. Provisions such as allowing non-EU companies involved in supply chains to use the Information System to pass relevant data along to operators subjected to the EUDR is therefore essential. We also call for a sectorial dialogue with the Commission to address certain specificities of our sector.
Read full responseMeeting with David Cormand (Member of the European Parliament, Shadow rapporteur)
23 Apr 2025 · Journée Mondiale du Livre & Copyright & AI
Meeting with François Kalfon (Member of the European Parliament)
23 Apr 2025 · Ayants droits et Intelligence artificielle
Response to Evaluation of the Geo-blocking Regulation
7 Mar 2025
Le règlement géo-blocage prévoit que les détaillants vendant des biens et des services ne pourront pas opérer de discrimination en termes de conditions daccès (ce qui couvre notamment le prix) entre les consommateurs en fonction du pays dorigine de ces derniers. Il exclut les contenus basés sur le droit dauteur, tels que le livre numérique, et son application doit respecter les régimes de prix unique du livre. Bien entendu, lobjectif des éditeurs est la diffusion la plus large de leurs livres numériques. Or il convient de tenir compte de la taille modeste de ce marché (6% du chiffres daffaires du secteur de la littérature.) Aujourdhui, sauf cas exceptionnels, les livres numériques sont accessibles à lachat par tout citoyen ou bibliothèque en Europe, et les éditeurs nont jamais reçu de plainte en la matière. Lexamen initial de la Commission européenne indique clairement que la demande des consommateurs dans le secteur des livres électroniques est très sensible à la langue et peu sensible aux prix en ce qui concerne les services étrangers. Il affirme que les effets limités des différences de prix et la non-exclusivité des catalogues impliquent qu'une extension du règlement aurait des avantages limités pour les consommateurs (principalement en raison des faibles réductions de prix). Mais cela aurait des effets négatifs - principalement en raison des coûts de mise en conformité plus élevés - qui seraient particulièrement préjudiciables pour les petits opérateurs. Leurs parts de marché et leurs marges seraient plus faibles et leurs coûts d'exploitation et de mise en conformité pour les ventes transfrontalières plus élevés. De même, le rapport du Parlement Européen de 2023 a mis en avant le rôle du maintien du blocage géographique pour garantir la diversité culturelle. Il a également souligné les « progrès accomplis dans la mise à disposition des livres numériques à travers des catalogues sans limitation de frontières » (les cas où léditeur na pas les droits pour tous les territoires sont exceptionnels) et « que le blocage géographique dans le secteur du livre ne constitue pas une préoccupation pour la grande majorité des consommateurs ». En effet il n'y a pas de réel problème d'accessibilité transfrontalière des livres électroniques, notamment parce que la demande est principalement motivée par des considérations linguistiques, de sorte que la demande transfrontalière de livres électroniques est très limitée en dehors des zones linguistiques homogènes. D'autre part, la localisation d'un client a de nombreuses implications pour un vendeur, et ce d'une manière totalement indépendante du caractère actif ou passif d'une vente : mise en place de systèmes de paiement sécurisés, application du taux de TVA, de la devise et du droit de la consommation du pays de destination, ce qui représente des investissements significatifs. Ainsi il n'est pas forcément rentable de vendre dans davantage de territoires et dans certains cas, cela n'est même pas conseillé d'un point de vue juridique (ex. : concept trop large de la diffamation). Les éditeurs et les libraires peuvent donc préférer, dans certains cas exceptionnels, limiter les ventes aux territoires où cela se justifie, juridiquement et économiquement. Une interdiction du géo-blocage dans le secteur des livres électroniques risquerait fort de produire l'effet inverse de celui recherché, en forçant un grand nombre de petits opérateurs à se retirer complètement de la vente en ligne et en renforçant la position déjà dominante d'un petit nombre de grands acteurs. Cela engendrerait donc des coûts largement supérieurs aux bénéfices, ne résisterait pas à un test de proportionnalité et ne ferait que nuire à la compétitivité des entreprises de notre secteur. Il serait donc plus pertinent de sintéresser aux questions de découvrabilité.
Read full responseMeeting with David Cormand (Member of the European Parliament, Rapporteur) and Axel Springer SE
5 Mar 2025 · Copyright/authors’ rights and broader Intellectual Property Policy
Meeting with Aurore Lalucq (Member of the European Parliament) and Federation of European Publishers
13 Feb 2025 · Enjeux prioritaires pour le livre au niveau européen, dont l'IA
Meeting with Pierre Jouvet (Member of the European Parliament)
9 Sept 2024 · enjeux pour le secteur du livre
Meeting with Stéphanie Yon-Courtin (Member of the European Parliament) and Association Française des Entreprises Privées / French Association of Large Companies
1 Feb 2024 · Late Payments
Meeting with Anne-Sophie Pelletier (Member of the European Parliament)
11 Nov 2023 · Retards de paiements dans l'industrie du livre
Response to Evaluation of “Marrakesh” Directive and Regulation
9 May 2023
In France, disabled persons, including dyslexics, may ask an authorized entity (AE) to adapt a book in an appropriate format, in application of the copyright exception for the needs of the disabled. The exception to the reproduction and making available rights allows accredited associations representing handicapped people, public libraries, archives as well as documentation and cultural centers to: - to scan a paper book to adapt it without asking permission to rights-holders (200 accredited associations) - ask publishers to provide their digital files corresponding to books published less than 10 years ago to a one-stop shop for their adaptation for the needs of disabled people (90 accredited associations). The French national Library is the trusted third party to which the associations accredited by a committee (including the French Publishers Association/ SNE) can require to have access to the electronic file of the book. Files are collected and kept on a dedicated platform hosted by the BNF (PLATON), with a view to favor their circulation among associations and cross-border exchanges. Textbook publishers are required to systematically provide their files. With the adoption of the European Accessibility Act, all e-books sold in June 2025 in the EU will have to be accessible to people with different disabilities (back catalogue by 2030). AEs foreseen by the implementation of the Marrakesh Treaty should then be able to focus on further cooperation with stakeholders. For printed books, there is currently an offer for dyslexics. For ebooks, the incorporation of accessibility features in e-books is work in progress, on the basis of the accessible format called ePUB 3. French publishers are strongly committed to facilitating accessibility and contributed to the creation of the LCP DRM allowing accessibility. However, some mainstream e-readers such as the Kindle are not interoperable, while some disabled people oriented devices do not seem ready to fulfill their accessibility obligations due to their proprietary formats. The Commission should encourage AEs to focus on the adaptation of the books for which it is too difficult to provide a born digital version. One can mention the French law as a best practice : the French exception only applies to people prevented, because of their disabilities, to access the work in the format the author makes it available to the public (article L 122-5§7 of the French Intellectual Property Code). Ensuring a good articulation of the production of born accessible e-books and the production of adapted books by AEs in application of the copyright exception is precisely of the actions planned by the French interministerial steering committee Strategic plan for the development of an offer of accessible e-books, which notably includes SNE. https://www.culture.gouv.fr/Thematiques/Livre-et-lecture/Les-politiques-de-soutien-a-l-economie-du-livre/Accessibilite-des-livres-numeriques Against this framework, the French administration is currently building a common portal for born accessible ebooks and adapted ebooks to be ready by 2025. Regarding cross-border exchanges whether with EU or third countries, we do not have information about the flow of adapted works. It would be useful to have more transparency about these practices, as these were the main rationale of the Marrakech Treaty. In France, authorized entities can be asked to report about their cross-border activities, but such requests have not been put forward yet. It is also essential to have a smooth articulation between the offer of born accessible e-books and the offer of adapted books by AEs within the EU and at international level, as e-books are by default available online for consumers of every country. Indeed, it is fundamental that exceptions for persons with disabilities should respect the Three-Step-Test and in particular should not conflict with a normal exploitation of the work.
Read full responseMeeting with Eleonora Ocello (Cabinet of Commissioner Thierry Breton)
28 Apr 2023 · DMA, DSA, Copyright, AI
Meeting with Laurence Farreng (Member of the European Parliament)
26 Jan 2023 · Priorités du secteur de l'édition
Response to Enabling factors for digital education
13 Sept 2022
The first criteria for the choice of education tools should not be their format but their added value in terms of pedagogy. Cf recent report of the French High Curriculum Council which highlighted the risks and limits of digital tools for education: https://www.education.gouv.fr/media/115735/download. It notably recommends “in the absence of rigorous and converging scientific studies allowing to acknowledge the added value of certain tools, to apply a precautionary principle by maintaining the use of proven teaching methods”. Besides the French curriculum should include the principle of “digital sobriety” in the future.
For the development and provision of digital content, resources professionally produced by publishers are the best guarantee for fulfilling the requirements of curricula and specific learning objectives, thus allowing teachers to save a lot of time and resources, making their life easier while taking into account the needs of national education systems.
Publishers fulfil this role in a competitive environment, investing their resources and taking risks, while ensuring the remuneration of authors and other contributors. Digital improvements yield increased value, but they come at a significant cost.
In general, the massive production of educational resources with public funds with a view to substituting textbooks by being made available for free would constitute unfair competition to educational publishers and seriously endanger the whole sector, while at the same time being a very inefficient use of resources. Even mere online courses can end up covering the same content as books.
This sort of unfair competition could drive publishers out of the market, thus resulting in publishers stopping their investments, most likely leading to worse quality and service, and the end of innovation, both digital and pedagogical.
An open market and a plurality of publishers is a good guarantee not only of the quality of materials, but that content will be as much as possible not influenced by commercial interests or political interference.
The elements for the best education, in brief, are independent publishers, respect for free speech and academic freedom, free and fair competition also on behalf of the state, and the will by public authorities to invest in innovation and in the resources produced by publishers.
In particular, the Commission to encourage Member States to dedicate proper funding to infrastructure, pedagogical content, and teacher training, and to cooperate with publishers, who are experts in the content field. For instance, French Higher education libraries lack appropriate resources to acquire digital educational ressources, in particular at undergraduate level. In 2018, the amount spent by universities on digital resources for undergraduate students (excluding those acquired for researchers) represents around 30% of the universities' digital acquisition budgets and amounts to €9 per student per year. Source: https://data.enseignementsup-recherche.gouv.fr/explore/dataset/fr-esr-enquete-ressources-electroniques-etablissements/table/
Finally, The EU could bring its added value by supporting the development and adoption of technology for the creation of platforms and learning management systems by European players, in particular professional content creators. The EU should pursue a European way to deal with data. The EU should encourage Member States to cooperate with educational and academic publishers at national level, and to dedicate adequate resources to the acquisition of learning resources. Finally, the EU should support further research into the effects of digital reading and learning on education.
Read full responseMeeting with Ilana Cicurel (Member of the European Parliament)
15 Jun 2022 · Position des éditeurs sur DSA, DMA et Data Act
Response to Data Act (including the review of the Directive 96/9/EC on the legal protection of databases)
12 May 2022
The French Publishers Association (SNE) welcomes the opportunity to provide a feedback on the European Commission’s proposal for a Data Act.
SNE is France's trade association of book publishers. It represents approximately 788 member companies whose combined business endeavors account for the bulk of French publishing and whose total turnover amounted to 2.7 billion € in 2020 (3.7 billion € expressed at the retail selling price). The SNE represents the French publishing profession as a member of the Federation of European Publishers (FEP) whose position on this initiative it fully supports.
Publishers are providers of copyright-protected content that present an interest for actors involved in data, and they create and administer themselves a number of original databases. As such, SNE calls for further clarification on certain parts of the Data Act proposal.
The proposed definition of “data” could cover data derived from copyright-protected works. While it is indeed possible to use data derived from copyright-protected works, the acquisition of copyright-protected works, to use or transform them into data, should be made in accordance with copyright law. The conditions for the use of copyright protected works as data are already covered by copyright law, either through a licence or through an exception, including under the recent Copyright Directive. As such the Data Act should recall that as far as data derived from copyright protected works are concerned, their acquisition and use should be without prejudice to EU copyright law. This would be consistent with the explanatory statement of the Data Act, which states that the proposal “does not affect existing rules in the areas of intellectual property.
SNE also welcomes the targeted approach chosen in the revision of the Database Directive and specifically the sui generis right it provides. The proposal recognises that the sui generis right fulfils its objective and does not hamper legitimate use of data. Publishers rely on the sui generis right as a legal protection for their innovative databases. Databases indeed require significant investment, particularly when they provide innovative services, thus justifying a legal protection under copyright. The sui generis right provides publishers with the incentive to invest in databases as well as the means to both negotiate licences for their use and fight unauthorised uses.
However, in a context where technology and practices evolve fast, SNE would recommend changing the approach on the treatment of machine-generated data, to avoid unforeseen consequences on the market in the future. One should not exclude databases containing machine-generated data all-together from the scope of the sui generis right. Indeed, in the data-driven economy, it is fundamental the database right may cover the investment on the creation, enrichment and verification of data itself, as it is more and more difficult to distinguish between the activity (and the related investment) to obtain the data and the activity to create data. Today, legal publishers for instance are developing second-generation databases, including search tools and decision-making assistance solutions based on artificial intelligence (AI).
If it were proved to be of utmost necessity for the purposes of this regulation, databases containing machine-generated data could just be made eligible to an exception to allow for the use of machine generated data without completely denying of any copyright protection such databases, particularly in the case of mixed databases not containing machine generated data exclusively. Obviously such an exception should have a scope limited to the sole interests of the user in the context of the Data Act, and be subject to safeguards, in particular its neutrality towards copyright and the respect of the Three Step Test of the Berne Convention (special cases, no conflict with normal exploitation of the work and no prejudice towards legitimate interests).
Read full responseResponse to Data Act (including the review of the Directive 96/9/EC on the legal protection of databases)
25 Jun 2021
Members of the French Publishers Association, in particular legal, scientific, technical and medical publishers obviously rely on the database right, as a complement to Copyright. For instance :
- legal databases often comprise raw data, not protected by copyright. However, the use of these data does not exempt the publisher from making heavy investments to obtain, verify or present these elements, particularly in terms of high value-added manpower, sophisticated computer equipment and creation of algorithms that will process these data;
- copyright is sometimes difficult to rely on when the originality of the work is hard to prove.
The notion of parasitism is difficult to use due to the complexities related to the demonstration of the existence of a damage.
Database rights protect the investments, bring legal certainty and achieve a good balance between the rights and the interests of the right-holders and the users, in particular thanks to the new exceptions foreseen by the 2019 Copyright directive and the restrictions concerning public sector bodies stipulated by the 2019 Open data directive. Database producers can agree on uses via contracts, but they still need a legal framework in cases of infringements, not only to act as a deterrent, but also to reassure them when it comes to making investments.
Practically speaking, this right does not often lead to litigation: it has a strong deterrent effect and all the extractions/ reproductions are not known by the right-holder. Moreover, conflicts do not always end up in court as this could contribute to breaking trade secrets. Publishers also rely on contracts. In fact, it is only recently that technologies have allowed recurrent mass extractions which ensure the continuous update of the database and thus the interest of the data, but also make it easier to hack databases.
Today, legal publishers for instance are developing second-generation databases, including search tools and decision-making assistance solutions based on artificial intelligence (AI). In fact, the sui generis right has recently and increasingly become more essential due to the development of AI.
It is fundamental that the European Commission should preserve the sui generis right granted to database producers. This regime does not prevent free flow of data, but contributes to creating growth by encouraging investments in quality data, which are necessary for very promising sectors, such as AI and assistance to decision-making. Its abolition would therefore come completely at odds with the emergence of a data-driven economy. The absence of this right would need to be compensated by additional technical measures, to the detriment of investments on services themselves.
In order to modernize this regime, the Commission should actually:
- clarify the notion of substantial investment
- extend the database right to the investment on the creation of data itself, as it is more and more difficult to distinguish between the activity (and the related investment) to obtain the data and the activity to create data.
- protect investment on machine-related data. AI and machine-related data (automatic translations and summaries, Legal tech and prediction of court decisions) requires significant investments, which need to be protected so as to foster innovation.
Read full responseMeeting with Szabolcs Horvath (Cabinet of Commissioner Tibor Navracsics)
8 Jun 2016 · Copyright reform