TV without frontiers law is compulsive viewing

By Anna McLauchlin

Date: 03/11/05

The publication next month of European Commission proposals to revise EU rules on regulating audiovisual services is eagerly awaited.

Public and privately owned broadcasters, publishers, film producers, telecom companies and internet service providers all have an interest. The proposals, which are highly controversial, are for rules that will apply to all media distribution, including movies conveyed through broadband or television watched on a mobile phone.

The Commission insists that the new rules - which will replace the 1989 'television without frontiers' (TWF) directive - will be a 'light touch' regime that will not burden new media providers but rather give a framework to a currently unregulated sector on issues like culture and protection of minors.

But the new media lobby still claims that any measures are likely to interfere with the existing e- commerce directive.

And while they are worried about being strangled by regulation, consumer organisations are equally fearful that the inevitable deregulation in the traditional broadcasting sector will have a detrimental effect on viewers.

The Commission has already touted scrapping TV advertising limits - currently 20% of total airtime - and it also plans to relax rules restricting product placement in TV shows.

Tessa Jowell, UK culture minister, warned at a conference on the subject in September that: "The job of all of us gathered here today is to ensure that television without frontiers doesn't turn into 'broadcasting without boundaries' or 'commerce without culture'."

Preserving European culture in the face of increasingly international media access is also a key issue and the proposal is likely to look at existing quotas for European broadcasting as part of the overall mix.

Article anticipates European Commission proposals for a revised Television without frontiers Directive, expected for December 2005. This article is part of a European Voice Special Report, 'New Media'.

European Commission: DG Information Society and Media: Audiovisual Policy: Regulatory Framework: The 'Television without Frontiers' Directive http://ec.europa.eu/comm/avpolicy/reg/tvwf/index_en.htm

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