In 2009, the French government launched HADOPI.  The HADOPI is the institution responsible to handle the graduated response to copyright infringement via three escalating strikes.  Three years later comes the time of the first bilan.

HADOPI sent out one million warning emails (first strike level) and 99,000 registered letters (second strike level) which resulted to 134 cases examined for prosecution.   Today, no case reached the ultimate strike level, i.e. disconnection of the infringer from Internet.  The reported cost is of 12M€.

In a recent interview to French newspaper “Le nouvel Observateur”, the French minister of culture, Aurélié FiLIPPETTI severely judged the results of HADOPI.

Ca coûte quand même 12 millions d’euros, 60 agents travaillent, pour un résultat qui me semble au final bien mince. Dans un contexte budgétaire serré, il faut avoir un souci d’efficacité, de réconciliation entre les artistes et les publics, et trouver des solutions qui soient réelles et qui permettent vraiment de financer la création et non plus se payer de mots.

A possible English translation is

This costs 12 million euro.  60 agents work for a result which seems to me light. In a tight budget context, it is mandatory to be efficient,  to reconciliate the artists and the audience, and to find solutions which are real and that really fund creation and not to talk a lof of rubbish.

The minister claimed that she’d rather reduce the cost of solutions that do not have proven efficiency.   Thus, what is the future of HADOPI?

The interview can be found here and here.  Sorry, it is in French.