A freer market for ideas
After 18 months of negotiations, the EU’s culture ministers agreed on Thursday to overhaul the bloc’s 18-year-old television rules to try to more closely reflect the fast-developing market.
Much of the focus has been on the loosening of the rules on product placement which is now permitted with restrictions but, more interestingly from the point of view of this blog, is that the TV Without Frontiers directive is to be the first EU law to apply the country of origin principle. Under this principle, broadcasters only haver to respect the rules of the country they are broadcasting from, not the country they are broadcasting to.
This means, of course, that the EU’s more regulation happy states will (hopefully) find themselves being undermined by their more liberal neighbours.
Monday 28 May 2007 | Paul | EU
