The Federal Communications Commission wants US broadcasters to suspend regular programming and instead show a public-service ad about the digital transition for three five-minute periods on May 21st as part of an effort to make sure Americans are ready for the switch. The US was originally scheduled to switch to digital-only TV on February 17th, […]
Google and Apple are being investigated by the US Federal Trade Commission over a possible breach of US anti-trust laws, according to reports. The FTC is scrutinising the working relationship between the two companies, specifically the influence of Google CEO Eric Schmidt and Apple Corporate Director Arthur Levinson, both of whom sit on each other's […]
UK regulator Ofcom has said Project Canvas, the broadband TV joint venture between BBC, ITV and BT, could face a competition investigation. Ofcom, in its submission to the BBC Trust, has warned that the venture could find itself the subject of the same regulatory scrutiny that earlier this year spelled the end for Project Kangaroo. […]
German financial watchdog Bafin has launched a probe into possible insider trading and market manipulation involving shares in German pay-TV broadcaster Premiere. The investigation focuses on trades that may be related to a correction of Premiere subscriber numbers last year, a Bafin spokeswoman said. Premiere also confirmed that the probe was under way but declined […]
Moves by European public sector broadcasters to expand their activities into new areas, such as mobile TV and video on demand, could be subject to more prior scrutiny under revisions to controversial proposals published by Brussels. The European Commission is in the process of revising its 2001 guidelines for applying EU state aid rules to […]
An MPs committee has heavily criticized the BBC's commercial arm for damaging independent company's business with an aggressive sales tactics and a low priority on the bottom line. It was particularly scathing of the recent acquisition of the Lonely Planet guides. The committee was also deeply sceptical about the proposed tie up between BBC Worldwide […]
According to German press reports the federal compeition authorities are set to block any putitive merger of the country's major operators. There has been much specualtion that the major three networks, KDG, Unity and Kabel BW – all owned by private equity and all derived from the former Deutsche Telekom network – want to 're-merge' […]
The Chinese government has ordered a crackdown on online video and audio content which could result in a tightening of internet censorship and limit the broadcasting of western films and entertainment programmes on the web. In a notice published on its website earlier this week, the State Administration for Radio, Film and Television (Sarft) published […]
Owners of the controversial Swedish BitTorrent website the Pirate Bay – currently embroiled in a copyright trial in Sweden – have announced they’re going to start using VPN (virtual private network) technologies to make its users harder to track. In typical 'pirate style' the unlogged VPN service will be called IPREDator, named after a new […]
About 200 reactions to the interim Digital Britain report have been published. Among highlights are Sky's call for Virgin's network to be opened up to third party services, Virgin's caution on Canvas and general skepticism on anti-piracy plans and the Digital Rights Agency. Sky says it is “increasingly anomalous” that the cable network is a […]