Europe Set To Unveil Digital Single Market

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http://news.sky.com/story/1478345/europe-set-to-unveil-digital-single-market

The European Commission's "digital single market" will tackle cross-border parcel delivery, simplify VAT and change media rules.

09:05, UK,Wednesday 06 May 2015

By Tom Cheshire, Technology Correspondent

The European Commission will today reveal plans for a "digital single market" - a unified and borderless regulatory framework for the internet across the continent.

It aims to be the online equivalent of the existing EU single market.

It could mean that on-demand TV services like Netflix, BBC iPlayer and Sky Go are available to everyone, regardless of which EU country they're in.

Currently these services are often "geo-blocked".

The commission says one of their objectives is that EU residents can enjoy "the same online content and services regardless of the EU country (they) are in".

Parcel deliveries may also be made cheaper, letting internet users browse foreign online stores without paying significantly more to have goods shipped.

And expensive data roaming charges incurred abroad could be abolished.

The plans will be announced by Andrus Ansip, the EU digital single market commissioner and former prime minister of Estonia, at a midday conference in Brussels.

The European Commission estimates that the plans could create up to €340bn (£250bn) in additional growth.

The EC estimates that only 7% of small businesses sell across EU borders and that more choice could save consumers

Eileen Burbidge, a partner at technology investment firm Passion Capital, told Sky News: "This definitely makes a tangible difference to consumers' lives, because it's going to make things much more efficient for the member states, which will transfer into better services and better products - because companies are investing in products, not in overseeing regulation.

"It will absolutely make consumers' lives better."

The digital single market also aims to boost Europe's home-grown technology businesses to compete better against the giant US internet firms like Facebook and Google.

Transferwise, a money transfer company founded four years ago, is a successful London start up, now worth $1bn (£658m).

But it found working across a fragmented European market challenging.

Nilan Peiris, vice president of growth at Transferwise, told Sky News: "Working across 26 countries across Europe, each with slightly different regulatory regimes, data privacy regimes, taxation regimes, definitely drove additional considerations as we were starting out.

"Any steps that the EU adopts to drive greater harmonisation of regulations - taxation, data protections should enable star ups to scale faster across the European market."
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Would be fantastic news! As an ex-pat living in the Netherlands, it annoys me that I am unable to use BBC iPlayer, for example, without messing around with IP addresses.

Will be interested to hear more about their plans.
 
What will this mean for football rights? Whatever happened to that landlady that had a german (I think) satellite subscription to show live EPL games?
 
Pexbo said:
What will this mean for football rights? Whatever happened to that landlady that had a german (I think) satellite subscription to show live EPL games?
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If memory serves she wasn't prosecuted or the prosecution failed, giving de facto legality to the whole thing. That was a while ago tho so could be wrong, or it may have developed further.
 
That would be awesome, it's a pain to try to order stuff over here in Finland, the delivery charges are insane half the time. Hope it gets done as quickly as possible.
 
Sounds like a cracking idea . It may ask more questions of the BBC and it's tv license
 
Silva said:
Presumably iplayer would become a paid service in the rest of the EU. So, not much of a question.
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The entire notion of TV Licence in this day and age is preposterous. It's akin to Window Tax in the 18th and 19th century.

I don't remember the last time I actually watched television, I have my iPad for streaming and a Television as my monitor which I play movies on. None of which has anything to do with the BBC. I reckon I watch probably 20 hours of BBC productions a year, Footy and Attenborough. Yet by law we have to pay a licence to keep them running. It's draconian.
 
Pexbo said:
The entire notion of TV Licence in this day and age is preposterous. It's akin to Window Tax in the 18th and 19th century.

I don't remember the last time I actually watched television, I have my iPad for streaming and a Television as my monitor which I play movies on. None of which has anything to do with the BBC. I reckon I watch probably 20 hours of BBC productions a year, Footy and Attenborough. Yet by law we have to pay a licence to keep them running. It's draconian.
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If you don't watch live TV you don't have to pay it. You can watch things on your TV without a TV licence, unless they're live.
 
Edgar Allan Pillow said:
Every TV owner needs that? Or only those who have BBC?
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If you have a device which brings in programs to your house via digital, analong, satellite, cable or via Internet, you must pay the licence. It doesn't matter if you don't watch the BBC. It's a crock of shit considering all the money goes to the BBC. Imagine being forced to pay for Sky when you don't even watch it.
 
Pexbo said:
If you have a device which brings in programs to your house via digital, analong, satellite, cable or via Internet, you must pay the licence. It doesn't matter if you don't watch the BBC. It's a crock of shit considering all the money goes to the BBC. Imagine being forced to pay for Sky when you don't even watch it.
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So you never watch any BBC TV programming, use their website or use BBC iplayer?
 
Pexbo said:
If you have a device which brings in programs to your house via digital, analong, satellite, cable or via Internet, you must pay the licence. It doesn't matter if you don't watch the BBC. It's a crock of shit considering all the money goes to the BBC. Imagine being forced to pay for Sky when you don't even watch it.
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Thast a shite tax to pay.

£150 multiplied by everyone who has a TV is some serious tax money :eek:
 
Silva said:
So you never watch any BBC TV programming, use their website or use BBC iplayer?
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I said I do, about 20 hours a year. Sport and whatever Attenborough puts out that year. £7.50 an hour, bargain.
 
Pexbo said:
I said I do, about 20 hours a year. Sport and whatever Attenborough puts out that year. £7.50 an hour, bargain.
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Then I fear you might be understating it. If you log down how much you use BBC services over the next year, I wouldn't be surprised if that 20 hours wound up being a small fraction.
 
Tv licences should be abolished, its ridiculous, here in Ireland the government came up with a new law so RTE can get everyone who has a sky Subscription basically making a mockery of the data protection Law and the commissioner will let it all happen, i my self have never paid for the shit RTE show, you couldn't make me watch Fair city or the late late show.
 
Silva said:
Then I fear you might be understating it. If you log down how much you use BBC services over the next year, I wouldn't be surprised if that 20 hours wound up being a small fraction.
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I barely watch TV so your assumptions are way off.
 
Silva said:
Presumably iplayer would become a paid service in the rest of the EU. So, not much of a question.
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Their ultimate aim would be to have digital products cost the same across across the whole of the EU so I'm not sure how'd they handle this.
 
Pexbo said:
I barely watch TV so your assumptions are way off.
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You were refreshing their twitter/website every few minutes last summer waiting for Vidal news though.
 
The BBC is by far and away the best television service out there in my opinion. That it does not have to bow to commercial pressures means that it's quality and integrity of content is unparalleled.

I am more than happy to pay my license fee and would be gutted if the BBC was forced to go commercial.

As for this EU directive - is there anything the Germans won't do to weaken The Premier League!? Might have to start voting UKIP at this rate!

Jokes
 
Silva said:
Presumably iplayer would become a paid service in the rest of the EU. So, not much of a question.
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Makes it all the more reason to scrap the outdated tv licence .They can become a subscription channel.
 
Locka said:
You were refreshing their twitter/website every few minutes last summer waiting for Vidal news though.
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I actually only really read the Twitter thread during the summer and on my mothers life I can't remember the last time I visited the BBC website but that doesn't matter anyway as they don't get a licence fee for me visiting their website.
 
Pexbo said:
I actually only really read the Twitter thread during the summer and on my mothers life I can't remember the last time I visited the BBC website but that doesn't matter anyway as they don't get a licence fee for me visiting their website.
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But the fee pays for the website which is the point. If we lost the BBC then we would lose BBC News and that leads to Sky News. I watch few BBC programs but I am glad to pay £3 a week to feck Murdoch right off from ever owning the news channel I do watch.
 
Don't Kill Bill said:
But the fee pays for the website which is the point. If we lost the BBC then we would lose BBC News and that leads to Sky News. I watch few BBC programs but I am glad to pay £3 a week to feck Murdoch right off from ever owning the news channel I do watch.
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That is exactly how I feel Bill. I feel it is important to have a news and information service free from the pernicious influence of commercialism.

I would recommend BBC Radio 4 which as an information and news service is outstanding. A service like that just couldn't exist in the commercial world, it would be denigrated by the pursuit of ratings and sponsors. You only have to look at the American news services to see the horrors that we could be subjected to.
 
Classical Mechanic said:
That is exactly how I feel Bill. I feel it is important to have a news and information service free from the pernicious influence of commercialism.

I would recommend BBC Radio 4 which as an information and news service is outstanding. A service like that just couldn't exist in the commercial world, it would be denigrated by the pursuit of ratings and sponsors. You only have to look at the American news services to see the horrors that we could be subjected to.
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But does that extend so far as to justify a mandatory fee even for people who dont use the BBC? After all its one thing for you to be prepared to pay such a fee, its very different to demand that everyone pay that fee for you to have access to that service.

I don't ever watch the BBC (since its not on my streaming box) & the website is far from the beacon of quality it was 10 years ago. But I still have to cough up to subside those that do.
 
bishblaize said:
But does that extend so far as to justify a mandatory fee even for people who dont use the BBC? After all its one thing for you to be prepared to pay such a fee, its very different to demand that everyone pay that fee for you to have access to that service.

I don't ever watch the BBC (since its not on my streaming box) & the website is far from the beacon of quality it was 10 years ago. But I still have to cough up to subside those that do.
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Well, if the country's better off for it, it's not really any different to all the taxes you pay which go on stuff which you may or may not end up using, right?

If we didn't specifically pay for it, and it was just simply money taken from general taxes, I'd be interested to see if so many would be so passionately against it - I doubt it.
 
Locka said:
Well, if the country's better off for it, it's not really any different to all the taxes you pay which go on stuff which you may or may not end up using, right?

If we didn't specifically pay for it, and it was just simply money taken from general taxes, I'd be interested to see if so many would be so passionately against it - I doubt it.
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You can't compare a television channel and website to the publics need for access to health services, education, the police, etc.

And given the bbc gets about £3.6bn a year in license fees I suspect that if that came direct from the public coffers it would face more scrutiny not less. no reason to think it would have avoided the cuts that every other dept has faced.
 
What about football? Will we be able to watch saturday 3pm
Games?
 
bishblaize said:
You can't compare a television channel and website to the publics need for access to health services, education, the police, etc.
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Well, sure, but taxes go on far more than just those essentials. Taxes go into all sorts of stuff and fund all sorts of projects - what about things like youth centres? I mean, keeping kids off the street, isn't that what we're continually complaining about TV doing? Obviously, the amount of your taxes that go into youth centres is going to be miniscule in comparison, but there's a whole load of stuff that your money goes into that may have no tangible effect or even intangible influence on you.

It offers far more too. A unbias news outlet which has a responsibility to stay neutral and hasn't got the influences of commercialization (atleast, not to the extent it would have) is massive I think. Britons have this superiority complex over their American counterparts when it comes to being sensible and tolerable and television news has such a broad reach and influence that if you agree you'd have to attribute portions of that to the BBC? No? Even if you wanted to claim that the others are similar in nature and don't suffer far down that route, could you not argue it's because the BBC set the original standard? Just look at the rubbish you see in newspapers, I've always thought there was a danger of this creeping into television news. True or not, US news outlets seem to be a good example of why it's good to have the BBC around free from all that comes with being a commercial product.

What about all the education sources it offers too? Childrens programming on the BBC is massive, and they produce lots of educational content for young'ns. Plenty there for adults aswel.
 
Locka said:
Well, sure, but taxes go on far more than just those essentials. Taxes go into all sorts of stuff and fund all sorts of projects - what about things like youth centres? I mean, keeping kids off the street, isn't that what we're continually complaining about TV doing? Obviously, the amount of your taxes that go into youth centres is going to be miniscule in comparison, but there's a whole load of stuff that your money goes into that may have no tangible effect or even intangible influence on you.
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I work in the sector of commissioned public services (Ive also run a youth service), and its just untrue to say that services like that have no tangible benefits. If they had no tangible benefits their funding would get cut by their commissioners. There are methods for showing the impact of those services, and demonstrating impact is a contractual requirement for continued funding.

It offers far more too. A unbias news outlet which has a responsibility to stay neutral and hasn't got the influences of commercialization (atleast, not to the extent it would have) is massive I think. Britons have this superiority complex over their American counterparts when it comes to being sensible and tolerable and television news has such a broad reach and influence that if you agree you'd have to attribute portions of that to the BBC? No? Even if you wanted to claim that the others are similar in nature and don't suffer far down that route, could you not argue it's because the BBC set the original standard? Just look at the rubbish you see in newspapers, I've always thought there was a danger of this creeping into television news. True or not, US news outlets seem to be a good example of why it's good to have the BBC around free from all that comes with being a commercial product.

What about all the education sources it offers too? Childrens programming on the BBC is massive, and they produce lots of educational content for young'ns. Plenty there for adults aswel.
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That's not a relevent argument because news and educational soures don't represent the bulk of the BBCs output. We're not talking about solely funding the BBC News Service. Across all channels and radio stations, entertainment is their number 1 priority and represents the majority of what they produce. You need to show that East Enders, Top Gear or The Voice represent public services that are so desirable that its acceptable to mandate that everyone pays for them, regardless of whether they would ever watch them or not.
 
bishblaize said:
I work in the sector of commissioned public services (Ive also run a youth service), and its just untrue to say that services like that have no tangible benefits. If they had no tangible benefits their funding would get cut by their commissioners. There are methods for showing the impact of those services, and demonstrating impact is a contractual requirement for continued funding.
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I didn't say they don't. I said they might not to you as an individual, and there will definitely be plenty of by-products of your taxes that you get little to no use out of.

If you think that was my comparison, are you telling me you don't think the BBC offers these sorts of benefits?
 
Locka said:
I didn't say they don't. I said they might not to you as an individual. I'd argue it's just as ridiculous to say that the BBC doesn't offer those benefits.
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That was a side point. The substantive point I made was that news and education represents a minority of what the BBC produces. You need to show the benefits of entertainment, and show that those benefts are appreciably better than the alternative that Sky/ITV/etc produce to justify forcing everyone to pay.
 
bishblaize said:
That was a side point. The substantive point I made was that news and education represents a minority of what the BBC produces. You need to show the benefits of entertainment, and show that those benefts are appreciably better than the alternative that Sky/ITV/etc produce to justify forcing everyone to pay.
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Well, Sky's subscriptions fees in comparison are massive, and it's not like you can just pay for what you watch on those either. Sure, you don't have to pay for it, but having a service like BBC that everyone does guarantees that everyone has atleast some opportunity to high quality stuff. Providing they can pay for the license that is.

Plus, imagine the knock on effect if BBC opened itself to commercialization? Don't you think a lot of smaller TV channels would struggle as a result? I'm sure even the likes of ITV would much prefer BBC to stay as it is, and not a direct competitor for marketers. Nevermind the much smaller outlets.
 
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