EU wants iPlayer and Now TV Access Across Europe

New PageEU wants iPlayer and Now TV Access Across Europe

| Source: BBC Author: Mark Campbell

EU wants iPlayer and Now TV Access Across Europe

One of the most important concepts behind the EU is the idea of a single European digital market, which allows anybody to buy and sell within the entire EU and not just within their own nation. Digitally this has never been the case and the EU want to address that, and in doing so modernize the market to facilitate growth and take away any an discrimination from the market and take on issues like copyright law and Geo-Blocking.

Right now the EU has asked Television providers to allow users to access their TV "catch-up" services across the EU, including BBC's iPlayer Service and Sky's Now TV service.

The EU wish to remove all Geo-Blocking within the EU and change copyright law in order and modernize it to today's digital age. The EU will also be looking to improve their data protection laws and review the current rules for telecoms.

Here is what European Commission had to say with the BBC:

"The Commission wants to ensure that users who buy films, music or articles at home can also enjoy them while travelling across Europe,"

"The Commission will also look at the role of online intermediaries in relation to copyright-protected works."

"[And there will be] a review of the Satellite and Cable Directive to assess if its scope needs to be enlarged to broadcasters' online transmissions and to explore how to boost-cross border access to broadcasters' services in Europe,"

The BBC confirmed it would look into the possibility of easing its iPlayer restrictions.

"We note the Commission's interest in making services more portable to UK users while temporarily travelling in Europe, and will begin work to look at the technical and legislative implications,"

The European Union's Single Digital market Strategy set's in place a lot of idea's which companies like Netflix have been crying out for for years, by allowing content providers to provide their services on a more international basis, instead of the traditional geographical basis, to which most licencing deals are made.

Netflix wholeheartedly supports the idea of the Single European Digital Market, as tearing down digital boundaries will drastically reduce the need for VPN use or Piracy as digital content, media and eCommerce will no longer be limited by your geographical location within Europe.

Netflix and other content providers say that the solution to VPN piracy is simple, for the rights-holders for movies and TV shows to sell Global licencing agreements for the distribution of digital media rather than today's limiting geographical agreements. The EU wish to create this ecosystem, at least in Europe, but the question now is if the rights-holders are willing to make this change.

You can join the discussion on the EU's single European Digital Market on the OC3D Forums.

The EU wants iPlayer and Now TV Access Across Europe as part of their "Single Digital Market Strategy". Perhaps a United... Posted by OC3D on Wednesday, 6 May 2015 The EU wants iPlayer and Now TV Access Across Europe. Is an United EU Netflix inbound? http://t.co/TPrVpt0BIT pic.twitter.com/0l1JIzXSCe — OC3D (@OC3D) May 6, 2015

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