(Disclaimer: I'm an EU citizen living in the UK, and I obviously don't like the whole Brexit happening. Due to this I moved my UK hosted .eu domain back to Hungary. On the other hand, if the new EU copyright proposal passes, I'll join the Brexit camp.)
This (and many more) effects were clear to anyone wishing to look into them before the Brexit vote, and so nothing is happening that couldn't have easily been anticipated.
As a side note, I don't believe that the Brexit decision is legal under UK law, as it's a parliamentary democracy, and as such the referendum was non binding. For a decision like this to be made, parliament has to vote on it, and as far as I'm aware, parliament has done no such thing yet.
well you haven't been paying much attention then, as Parliament voted to allow the Government to invoke Article 50 in early 2017
http://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2017/9/pdfs/ukpga_201700...
Isn't there a precedent that we don't break urls on the Web? I think I remember top level country domains persisting after the countries changed?
Withdrawing .eu domains works both as a last-minute threat to prevent Brexit and as revenge and compensation in case Brexit goes through. At the very least, Britain shall be made an example of.
Millions of non British EU citizens living in the UK would likely beg to differ
When you cancel your membership at a club, they should not hold you hostage for arbitrary crazy fees: see 100 Billion fantasy Euros invented out of thin air by European nations on 'Brexit bill'
Also free trade benefits both parties. It's not a club you pay dues to.
NAFTA is the world's largest customs union that requires no 'freedom of movement' and no 'fees' for membership.
If the .eu domain is a 'benefit' of 'membership', well then surely the EU can keep that.
But punishing the UK by forgoing a decent trade deal reveals the EU to be the 'bad deal' that it is. That they would need to 'punish' parties for leaving - to the detriment of everyone is crazy. Remember that everyone will pay more for UK goods and UK purchaser orders from EU countries will fall. Nobody wins but the elites in Bruxells trying to maintain their barely arbitrary hold on power.
E. Europe is on a tear, Italy just elected an EU hostile government, Germany and the ECB overthrew a previous government in Italy (and Greece), nationalist are in in Austria, Denmark, basically Norway, and on the rise in Sweden, Finland and Germany - and the entire world's press had to rally around a nobody to keep the FN down in France ... while EU's 2cnd strongest economy flees and the Euro oppresses Southern European states ...
And EU leaders are still not listening ...
The EEC was great, and EU has some nice ideals but the elite there are utterly and completely out of touch, and it's not going to work. Deep fiscal integration is not possible (Greece, Sweden, Spain et. al. to agree on pensions, benefits, retirement and healthcare spending? Never ...) meaning that the Euro itself is untenable (creators of the Euro knew it needed fiscal integration in order to work).
Consider EU's fear of offering UK a 'good trade deal' - then others might want that as well, right? Well then why not give everyone that!. If everyone wants a more commercial relationship, probably with some nice friendly border and citizenship stuff ... then why not have that? The 'fear' is having a Europe that Europeans want ... but that is not the EU? And that's a bad thing how?
It's time for the EU to take a look in the mirror, this much is obvious. If they had the ability to bend with the times, there would be no Brexit, there would be no big right-wing uptick.
Due to it's tiny size in land, I believe Europe should be a single country. I still believe in the idea of EU: what it stands for, what it means.
However, the past couple of years have been terrible. The whole Brexit vote only gone through because one can't fight lies with logic and nobody from the Remain side realised this. (Yes, lies, admitted by Leave campaign faces, see morning TV interview the next morning). Everyone sat back, completely ignorant to the option that people will believe those who show up in their village halls with a speech, even if it's mostly made up. The whole reaction of the EU to Brexit is that Britain made and idiotic decision and the EU will not bend due to this. Divorces happen, sometimes it's stupid, like in this case, but that doesn't mean the sides need to be assholes towards each other.
Apart from Brexit, there is still no central response or governing to the immigration through the Mediterranean and it's been a serious problem for years; it gave enough ground for the Hungarian governing party to build a hate driven election campaign around it and win with it.
And than suddenly that complete madness copyright law idea pops up.
This is not the EU I voted to join as a Hungarian in 2004. I might have been under-informed, and the EU might always have been like this, but if it does, something needs to change.
So, answering your question: no, one law is not enough. It's a long series of "wth?" reaction from my side, including no decision decisions, stiff attitude, pitiful procedures like .eu termination, which goes way beyond mere politics - think of personal domains -, and genuinely bad law ideas. Enough of these can drive someone away from an originally beautiful and invaluable union.
May I suggest you complain about .edu domains being just for US higher education instead, and no other institutes in the entire world?
And what has Germany to do with this?
It wasn't intended to be offensive, sometimes those rigid procedures save lives, and it's very much possible the whole idea has nothing to do with a single German.
Sorry for my wording.
Presumably the answer is to just use a proxy register based in the EU, if this even becomes an issue?
My employer's database has a few hundred email addresses ending .eu. The vast majority are scientific institutions, local government, or EU institutions.
I don't think there are many businesses that want to show they're European, which probably means they're fairly large, but don't also want local websites for each country they operate in.
There are a few British businesses like hauliers and removal companies using the domain, but none big enough to be called "important".
https://www.airnewzealand.eu/ is one example. https://www.flyturkmenistanairlines.eu/ too.
According to this, there are over 300,000 UK registrations of .EU domains: https://ec.europa.eu/digital-single-market/en/news/10-years-...
Too much uncertainty as to whether the UK will be receive a 'Swiss pass' or not. Actually .ch is a good stable ccTLD.
EU: "leave.eu to leave .eu", leaving .eu to EU
For individual registrants, it hinges off residency, not nationality. So if you are British but resident in the EU you are fine as long as you are using your non-UK address to register. If you are a citizen of an EU country but registered with your UK address then you'll also be caught up.
[1] https://ec.europa.eu/info/sites/info/files/notice_to_stakeho...
