The Internet, wireless networks and mobile technologies allow ordinary people not only to consume media but to be it, the Media Center said Thurs. at the We Media conference in London. It launched a We Media Global Initiative aimed at encouraging investment in citizen-based media to give voice to marginalized groups, foster govt. accountability and incubate business and donor networks. The proposal envisions companies and individuals donating time, money, technology and airtime or distribution channels to “harness the power of information technologies and human ingenuity for the common good.” Panelists offered several suggestions. Recognize that future technologies will be just as revolutionary and those in use today, said Qualcomm Senior Vp Jeff Belk. Qualcomm believes that in 5-10 years what people do with their devices will be radically different from today’s uses and media will be just as different, he said. The voice missing at the 2-day conference was the consumer’s, said Katherine Von Jan of Infinia Group, a branding and communications consultant. Consumers must be considered as individuals creating their own “authenticity” and rejecting overly packaged, glamorous media presentations, she said. As people interact with the media, friends and family they develop a “digital aura” and leave footprints wherever they go. As people connect with each other, culture itself becomes the media, replacing objective journalism, she said. Scott Heiferman, founder and CEO of Meetup.com, gave a “shout out to the moms across America” who use the Internet to connect face-to-face; to the 200 Italian towns that have organized meetings by “using the Internet to get off the Internet”; and to India tech writers who used Meetup to plan after-work get-togethers that are leading to “union talk.” People don’t want to live their lives “in front of a screen,” Heiferman said. Vodafone Dir.-Global Content Graeme Ferguson reminded the audience that mobile operators and technology companies can create ways for people to connect but don’t have a good track record for guessing whether and how consumers will use them. Pay attention to the developing world, he said, because it, more than developed countries, is embracing mobile technologies. The most important action the media can take is to listen to experienced bloggers and watch how they work, fail, and handle the complex social interactions underlying their projects, an audience member said. During the conference, 2 companies committed to the initiative. Mobile software provider Picsel agreed to make its software available to noncommercial organizations. PDX.cn, a Chinese mobile blogging service, said it will provide mobile chat technology to a San Francisco project for Chinese-Americans.
Three trends will reshape the media business in the connected society, Nitin Desai, special asst. to the UN Secy.-Gen., said Wed.: The world’s shift in economic balance from developed to developing nations; more people exercising democratic rights; and emergence of new networking technologies. Real change will come from the Internet’s increasingly communitarian nature, Desai said at We Media 2006 London. The challenge is finding a business model that combines established media professionalism with the Web’s collaborative potential, he added.
The European Network & Information Security Agency (ENISA) was created legally, the European Court of Justice ruled Tues. The U.K. said otherwise, claiming national govts. should have created ENISA by unanimous consent after consulting the European Parliament, not by a qualified majority of ministers in co-decision with the parliament. But the court said the European Community Treaty’s single- market clause allows creation of EU agencies promoting a single European market even if basically nonregulatory. The opinion highlighted the close link between ENISA’s work and the EU e-communications regulatory framework, which share the goal of a single telecom services market. The European Commission said it will publish a strategic communique on network and information security at month’s end.
The European Parliament likely will urge govts. and telcos to speed work on a pan-European system intended to deliver emergency services automatic alerts of vehicle accidents. The “eCall” proposal is part of a move by the European Commission to use data and communications tools to boost road safety. After a debate at today’s (Thurs.) plenary session, lawmakers are expected to approve a road map to put the technology in new vehicles beginning in Sept. 2009.
The World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) should scrap plans to update broadcasting copyright protections, Intel said in an April 10 discussion draft posted Tues. Ahead of next week’s meeting of WIPO’s standing committee on copyright and related rights (SCCR), Intel said it opposes giving broadcasters -- and perhaps webcasters along with them -- new rights to control uses of content they broadcast that are separate from existing copyrights in the material. Proponents of the treaty “have not demonstrated that the benefits of creating new exclusive rights outweigh the burdens that these new rights impose,” Intel said. It said those burdens include: (1) Potentially giving broadcast organizations the right to control legitimate and noninfringing uses of content within homes by, say, forcing PVR makers to get licenses and agree to limitations imposed by broadcasters. (2) Requiring technical protection measures that limit design freedom. (3) Potentially exposing software developers, device makers and ISPs to secondary liability for infringements by unrelated parties. (4) Creating a denser thicket of copyright rights that content users must negotiate to obtain clearance from rights-holders. (5) Reducing royalties to copyright owners by making content users pay broadcasters as well as content owners. (6) Potentially limiting “fair uses” of copyrighted materials and restricting content otherwise in the public domain. Efforts to enact the treaty “should be abandoned,” Intel said. Its scope should at least be “dramatically narrowed” to signal theft, the company said. Intel has only recently “really taken a close look at this broadcast treaty” and decided to air some of the questions it raises, said Donald Whiteside, vp-corporate technology group. Many others in the industry -- companies that make TiVo, for example -- still aren’t aware the treaty could give broadcasters the right to say, “my content shall not be tivoed,” he told us. Intel has taken its concerns to nongovernmental organizations participating in the treaty talks and to the U.S. WIPO delegation, he said. The SCCR meets May 1-5 to discuss the latest treaty draft.
Broadband triple-play offers appear to turn the adage “you get what you pay for” on its head, a co-author of an Organization for Economic Cooperation & Development (OECD) report said today (Tues.) “Countries such as France and Japan, which have the lowest priced bundles, also offer the fastest speeds, best calling plans and the most included channels,” said economist Taylor Reynolds of the science, technology & industry directorate. But, he and colleague Yoshikazu Okamoto said, multi-play services could raise regulatory issues such as net neutrality and must-carry.
Deutsche Telekom’s (DT) sale of around 4.5% of its outstanding shares to private investment group Blackstone could signal further mergers among European incumbent telcos, Bingham McCutchen telecom attorney Axel Spies said Mon. The transfer from Kreditanstalt fuer Wiederaufbau (KfW), a state- owned bank that holds a large block of DT stock for sale on the market, to U.S.-based Blackstone will decrease to around 33% the combined share of the German govt. and KfW, DT said. As part of the contract, Blackstone agreed to hold the shares for at least 2 years. The govt. needs the money to pay off pensions owed to former govt. officials who worked for DT while it was still a monopoly, Spies said. Finance Minister Peer Steinbrueck, a Social Democrat, called Blackstone’s move a vote of confidence from international investors in Germany’s biggest telecom group, Spies said. Steinbrueck’s view is in marked contrast to that of former Social Democrat leader Franz Muntefehring, who last year described some foreign investors as “locusts” devouring German companies and destroying jobs. Blackstone’s actual influence on DT management will be relatively small, but the investor will presumably try to increase its stake in the future, Spies said. “I wouldn’t be surprised if we see similar deals in other EU countries in the near future, for instance in Denmark and in Portugal.” When investment funds such as Blackstone buy stakes in European incumbents, they increase pressure on management to “unite forces on a pan-European basis and weaken, at least in the long run, the national govts. that are still holding significant stakes in their incumbents.” DT rivals welcomed the deal on the ground that any reduction in the govt.’s stake in DT helps level the playing field, Spies said on behalf of the German Competitive Telecoms Assn. (VATM).
An alliance of blue-chip high-tech companies attacked a proposed European law that would regulate TV programming on the Internet. The measure is designed to update the European Union’s 1989 TV Without Frontiers directive. The 1989 version of the directive, requiring broadcasters to show a majority of European content, was considered biased against Hollywood. The new law contain no such quotas, but some groups fear the European Parliament may add them. The proposal would require broadcasters of news or children’s programs to have 35 min. between ads -- seen as discouraging production of such programming. The European Parliament’s culture committee reports on the new directive in June and a full parliamentary vote is expected this year. The high-tech companies’ effort Tues. suggests fierce lobbying to come in Brussels. Meanwhile, the U.K. broadcasting, telecom, technology, new media and advertising sectors said EU plans to extend TV regulation to on-demand services will hurt competition and consumers, said the. The new alliance -- led by high-tech trade association Intellect and the Broadband Stakeholder Group -- said it supports updating the TV Without Frontiers (TVWF) directive to boost Europe’s economy and protect consumers. But it said imposing traditional rules on on-demand services could confuse businesses, overwhelm regulators and disappoint consumers. “While we support deregulation within the current scope, and agree that definitions relating to ‘TV-like’ services need to be revisited, we oppose the extension of scope as defined,” the group said in a statement to Brussels. The proposed extension undermines the legal certainty of existing legislation such as the e-commerce directive, creates unenforceable definitions, and fails to allow self-regulatory approaches to develop, it said. The alliance recommended that: (1) The TVWF directive be revised to update regulation affecting scheduled ("linear") TV, but not be broadened to include “non-linear” programming. (2) The definition of linear TV be revamped to include services that are the same as traditional scheduled broadcast services except for the delivery platforms. (3) Self-regulatory mechanisms should be encouraged to work with non-linear services.
P2P technology, the music industry’s bane, is looking increasingly promising to Europe’s TV industry, according to industry observers. Following a Feb. workshop, the European Bcstg. Union (EBU) said the technology “certainly seems a very attractive solution for broadcasters.” Pilot projects in the U.K., the Netherlands and elsewhere are beginning to tackle P2P’s intellectual property issues. However much the cheaper distribution system may excite broadcasters, the question remains whether P2P TV is a viable business model, officials said.
Webcast signals could be protected on an opt-in basis under a draft treaty posted ahead of the May meeting of the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) standing committee on copyright & related rights (SCCR). The panel is trying to update a convention that protects broadcasters’ copyright in their transmission signals to account for new technologies such as cablecasting. U.S. webcasters -- with support from the EU and Japan -- want to include webcasting signals, which has sparked strong opposition from many other quarters. Publication of the draft text prompted one civil libertarian to ask how webcasting and other controversial provisions seem to have made the final cut, while more popular elements may have fallen by the wayside.