Deutsche Telekom and NetCologne have challenged the German antitrust authority’s approval of Liberty Global’s acquisition of Kabel Baden-Wuerttemberg, Boersen-Zeitung has reported. Concessions accepted by the watchdog don’t guarantee market competition for contracts with housing associations, which often reach long-term agreements with cable operators, the German newspaper reports Deutsche Telekom as saying.
The BBC is creating a charter for the use of data on the web. The charter is due to be unveiled within a couple of months and will allow viewers to choose if they want the BBC to delete information the corporation has collected about them via websites such as the iPlayer. BBC director of […]
The UK government’s forthcoming communications green paper (draft law) will suggest broadcasters who commit to showing more public service programmes such as news and children’s programmes could be rewarded with a higher slot on digital TV EPGs. Ed Vaizey, the broadcasting minister, said the regulatory implications of the scheme will be researched by the Department […]
Neelie Kroes, Vice-President of the European Commission responsible for the Digital Agenda, has supported the decision by US legislators to put a hold on the contentious SOPA and PIPA bills and seek a better anti-piracy solution. She also confirmed that the Commission would present a European ‘Cloud’ Strategy, as well as issuing a paper on […]
Virgin Media’s chief executive Neil Berkett has called on the Government to rip up the rules on licensing film and television content and disband the BBC Trust. Berkett warned that content providers will fall behind the pace of change in the way people are watching films and television unless the forthcoming Communications Bill is used […]
EU Justice Commissioner Viviane Reding has called for governments to strike a balance between policing the Internet to protect copyright and upholding freedom of expression. “The protection of creators must never be used as pretext to intervene in the freedom of the Internet,” Reding told the DLD conference on innovation, digital media, science and culture […]
The sponsors of both the Stop Online Piracy Act and the Protect IP Act anti-piracy measures have halted progress on their respective bills through the US legislature. Lamar Smith, who sponsored SOPA, said that he had “heard from the critics and I take seriously their concerns regarding proposed legislation to address the problem of online […]
The US Justice Department and the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) have shut down file sharing site Megupload.com. In one of the largest criminal copyright cases in US history, seven individuals responsible for operating Megaupload.com and their associated companies, Megaupload Limited and Vestor Limited, have been charged in the United States with engaging in a […]
Satellite provider Eutelsat has suspended a Kurdish TV station that was found guilty of breaching Denmark’s anti-terror laws. Roj TV is appealing a Copenhagen City Court ruling that said its programmes incite terrorism, and fined it and its parent company 2.6 million kroner ($445,000) each. In a statement, Eutelsat said “under these circumstances, Eutelsat has […]
Ofcom has backed VoD regulator ATVOD’s ruling that three Viacom companies – Nickelodeon , Paramount and MTV Networks – are responsible for the VoD content of Nickelodeon, Comedy Central and MTV respectively on the Virgin Media platform. The broadcasters had notified ATVOD last year that they considered Virgin Media to have “editorial responsibility” for the […]