The European Commission says European media businesses should be able to offer creative content in a single legal environment. It has launched a consultation that calls for multi-territory licences and interoperable digital rights management (DRM) systems.
Digital media rights activists, though, have warned that the plan covers much more ground than just copyright, and that consumer rights could be damaged by it.
The Commission has said that the fact that Europe has a large number of national laws on copyright and other intellectual property rights is holding its music, film and games industries back. It wants to "facilitate" multi-territory copyright licences in response to the problem, though it has not identified how this should be done.
"Europe's content sector is suffering under its regulatory fragmentation, under its lack of clear, consumer-friendly rules for accessing copyright-protected online content, and serious disagreements between stakeholders about fundamental issues such as levies and private copying," said Viviane Reding, EU Commissioner for the Information Society and Media.
"We have to make a choice in Europe: Do we want to have a strong music, film and games industry? Then we should give industry legal certainty, content creators a fair remuneration and consumers broad access to a rich diversity of content online," she said.
The Commission has launched a consultation to help it form a new strategy which it hopes will eventually lead to a Europe-wide copyright licensing regime.
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