Commercial sites, not all sites. My private homepage doesn't need it, since I don't have ads and don't advertise my own products or services on it.

There are a lot of uncertainties in this area. For example, if you provide journalistic content on your website (e.g. regular blog postings, even for free),then this could be interpreted as an opinion-forming activity, which in turn requires an imprint.

(Source [German]: https://www.e-recht24.de/artikel/datenschutz/209.html )

The Bundesministerium der Justiz und für Verbraucherschutz seems to give a similar opinion:

http://www.bmjv.de/DE/Verbraucherportal/DigitalesTelekommuni...

I'm reading from the English translation here, but it suggests that "businesslike" also includes something that is ongoing / sustained. So if your personal blog is posted every Tuesday, it could be said that is "businesslike" (geschäftsmäßig). They also specify that profit is not a requirement.

The "I have a blog and now I need an imprint" faction is essentially FUD.

Geschäftsmäßig doesn't require Gewinnerzielungsabsicht (intent to make a profit), but does actually require an intent to make business, in whatever form, but not necessarily on the site itself. For example, a business owner having a very simple website just stating what his business does will require an imprint on that site, because obviously the intent of the website is to inform about his business. If, on the other hand, you have a blog with no ads about your kittens then you don't need an imprint.

Just because something is an unbestimmter Rechtsbegriff (non-exhaustively defined law term) doesn't mean you can just go ahead and act as if it means anything you like.

I've given you an upvote, as that does seem to make sense.

But to confirm, the particular quote from the BMJV that I was going by on that page is this one, does it match with your understanding? (My German comprehension isn't great.)

"Die Anbieterkennzeichnungspflicht muss praktisch von jedem, der ein Online-Angebot bereithält, erfüllt werden. Etwas anderes gilt nur bei Angeboten, die ausschließlich privaten oder familiären Zwecken dienen und die keine Auswirkung auf den Markt haben. Im Zweifel sollten Sie davon ausgehen, dass die Anbieterkennzeichnungspflicht besteht."

The first sentence seemed to say that "in practice everyone offering something online must comply", and I took "privaten" in the second sentence to imply private as in "password protected / not publicly accessible". But as someone learning German I've probably interpreted those too narrowly, and I'd love to be corrected on the nuance!

> die ausschließlich privaten oder familiären Zwecken dienen und die keine Auswirkung auf den Markt haben

which exclusively cater to private/family needs/affairs and [thus] have no impact on the markets.

> I took "privaten" in the second sentence to imply private as in "password protected / not publicly accessible".

No, privaten Zwecken here refers to personal affairs.

Holy wow, that seems draconian! Is it solely so they can find you and prosecute you for your opinions? (serious question)

That has nothing to do with opinions but being able to contact someone if laws are broken etc.

Playing devil's advocate, it can be argued in some cases that even if your private homepage met that criteria, its purposes could be to advertise/establish/further your personal "brand" thus is for business purposes. For example, if you blogged about technical topics that could benefit your employment opportunities in the technical fields and get you speaking engagements. There's examples of people who have built careers solely from personal blogs/homepages.

Domain != website

Because you publish yourself, you can change it yourself, and you can take it down again yourself.

And as a reminder, the German rule only applies to commercial sites — a site with no ads and no way to pay such as quasseldroid.info does not need an Imprint.

> And as a reminder, the German rule only applies to commercial sites — a site with no ads and no way to pay such as quasseldroid.info does not need an Imprint.

I wouldn't be too sure. There is, unfortunately, a lot of room for interpretation with this law. Rather cautious adviser urge you to have one as long as your website isn't private in the sense that can't be accessed by the public (i.e. a website for family members that can only be accessed with a password).

This law (IANAL) is just horrible.

How is it horrible?

The law just requires a way to contact a person within of a few days, and a way to be able to get the person behind a site to be able to sue them.

The alternative is sites that you can't do anything against if they act illegally against you, e.g. through libel and slander.

I agree that you should be able to get in contact with the website owner. However, I believe it'd be better if a person had to at least query denic to get your address. That's easy enough if you have to resolve a serious matter and the website owner is also a bit more protected against abuse of their data.

To get whois info for .de you already have to solve a captcha and write a paragraph about who you are and why you need it.

Email address is enough for that.

An email address is no Vorladungsfähige Adresse. You can't sue that, you can't send a Gerichtsvollzieher to it, and you can't seize the owners assets with it.

If I want to send an Abmahnung to a website owner, because they publicly defame me — as has happened before — then I need something stronger than an email address. Or I need to invoke the right to be forgotten, but I don't want to do so, I prefer having a way to eliminate the source.

You are talking about an Impressum. No need for that info in the whois.

The topic was Impressum. The user starting this subthread complained about Impressum.

Unless you provide journalistic content. Then you could be required to have an imprint as well.

I was always wondering if they overturn this at some point. I don't know of any other country requiring it and I doubt that it helps taking down illicit content. If anything, it helps consultants for offshore companies.

I hate this law with a passion. It doesn't seem proportionate to me at all. The main beneficiaries are folks who want to sell addresses in bulk and dodgy lawyers ("Abmahnanwälte").

I'd be fine with depositing my personal date somewhere so that people with legitimate concerns can contact me but it should require some effort so that the function can't be abused.