The digital evolution of parody. The purpose of online parody in copyright law and freedom of expression.

The thesis aims to focus on parody which has always been tied to art, marked by stinging irony. This form of artistic expression is gaining significant relevance on today’s internet, where, thanks to technological development, it actively facilitates peoples’ participation in the information society. The advent of digital technology has renewed the ancient parodic technique, so that the online parody is perfectly embedded in today's society, with a great many sectors using messages that are based on parodic rhetoric. Online parody presents peculiarities of online interactions, such as the speed and nature of online artistic productions, and problems that cannot always be engaged with using traditional legal theories and categories. The background of the legal analysis is divided into private and public interests. The dissertation will present the reconstruction of parody exception within European Directives on Copyright law. This part of the thesis will study how and when the law has predicted some kind of protection for parody and what are the differences for the regulation of this art form between a well-known model in the offline world and a still unsure model in the online world. In this regard, online parody will be described as a symbol for a shared digital economy of the creativity, aligning with the necessary rethinking of copyright law. The thesis will also dedicate on the study of the critical spirit inside the Internet. Freedom of parody will be pointing out the public interest, the relevant fundamental rights and the necessary limitations to which any expression is subject. The outline will include the analysis of the content-sharing providers and their role in regulating user-generated parody; the social media are get used to intervene in online parody through policies aimed both at contrasting hate speech and fake news and at maintaining a free and democratic platform.