The European Commission and the UK are once again set on a collision course. Forget constitutions, euros or Maastricht. This time it’s about something you care about: television, and particularly the future of TV and new media over the internet. The complex row between the UK government, the Confederation of British Industries (CBI), UK technology companies and the EC revolves around the cheerily named “TV Without Frontiers” directive. It’s a proposed piece of European legislation intended to bring television in line with recent changes in technology.
The name might imply that it will remove frontiers from TV viewing. But there’s another side to the coin: the directive means that anything that appears to be television and travels over the internet is television, and therefore becomes subject to TV regulations.
Anything else must abide by four principles: internet content should be governed by regulations that apply in the country it was transmitted from; it should apply minimum standards for the protection of minors; if it contains advertising it must be clearly identified; and content should not include incitement to racial hatred.
