There has been a lot of fuss and consternation over proposed EU legislation that could, if fully implemented, effectively disable the internet as we know it, according to critics. That’s nonsense, but let’s play along.

This began in May with the implementation of the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), which hampers marketing schemes where you, the user, are sliced and diced and categorized so the Googles and Facebooks of the world can serve up targeted ads.

Knowing all these things about you, even if you are part of a larger group, is an invasion of privacy, Europeans say. GDPR came on the heels of the so-called and ludicrous “right to be forgotten” edict, which forced search engines in the region to pull certain data from search results upon request.

In the meantime, the EU has been working on various “hate speech” initiatives, all of which are nebulous and draconian and, thus, subject to abuse.

These trends in Europe are strong, but the rationales are debatable. One thing that is not debatable is that the EU senses some sort of danger stemming from the internet. The proposed solution is known as Article 11 and Article 13, which are part of a revamped copyright strategy.

Article 11 proposes a permissions test to use summaries of content and perhaps moves towards a link tax, which obviously targets Google (again).

This idea dates back to the 1990s when critics of the internet claimed a URL was copyrighted and could not be employed without permission. Back then the problem was something called deep-linking—people would skip ahead of a process and link deep into a system to save time. Because there was really no reason to even have a browser if you could not freely link from here to there, this complaint was widely seen as idiotic and weird and the initiative went nowhere. But it did get some lingering attention.

Over the years, and perhaps for good reason, distrust of Google has resulted in attempts to create rules targeting the company so that, if all else fails, Google could be fined billions of dollars, over and over.

The tech community is handling this problem all wrong. They literally see Article 13—the second bad boy—as an attempt to ban memes, those stupid celebrity photos with some gag wordage written over them. Creating them is covered by any interpretation of Fair Use.

In fact, Article 13, requires a more thorough search and comparison of all content against known copyrighted material. Critics say it will put a burden on blogs and smaller sites, but nothing that cannot be overcome using third-party authentication services, if necessary.

So, forget Article 13. It’s Article 11 that harkens back to the “illegal copyrighted link usage” issues of the 1990s. This is really the thing that can muck things up. But muck things up for who?

Again, this targets Google for doing such a good job of indexing an otherwise impossible-to-navigate modern internet. Freaked-out Americans are of course writing about how these two articles will wreck the internet. Which isn’t possible without these rules being adopted in the US, which will never happen.

Perhaps this is a simple anti-American trade strategy? That’s obvious.

Who is affected by these new rules? Google? Microsoft? Yes and yes. These two behemoths have been targets of EU rage for decades. This is not about the internet at all. Then there is Facebook, Twitter, Reddit, Instagram, Snapchat, and Tumblr. All are targets.

This is all about big American companies dominating in the EU.

If anyone thinks that some blogger posting a picture of a surprised Captain Kirk with the wordage “OMG! Spock Naked!” to create a so-called meme is going to be targeted by the EU law, get a grip.

Most genuine copyright violations are already illegal here in the US. The internet mostly plays its games in the arena of Fair Use and people should read about how that works.

These EU laws are targeting American success on the net. They are not targeting the “little guy,” as some would suggest. The EU doesn’t have its own Google, Bing, or Facebook, but it will bleed these companies if at all possible. That’s what this is about.