EU opens door to hidden TV adverts

[Crvena zvezda]

EU opens door to hidden TV adverts

25.05.2007 - 09:28 CET | By Renata Goldirova
EUOBSERVER / BRUSSELS – More frequent commercial breaks as well as product placements, where a sponsor's product is featured in the show, are to be a part of European television screens in the future, after EU culture ministers on Thursday (24 May) agreed to overhaul the bloc's 18-year-old television rules to fit the fast-developing market.




"We have made a decisive step towards a true internal market for audiovisual media services and to a more competitive European audiovisual content industry," EU information society commissioner Viviane Reding said after the so-called TV without frontiers directive was approved.

The move has ended 18 months of political wrangling between all three EU institutions, with US-style product placement, where the hero drinks, drives or collects whatever sponsors of the programme tell them to, causing the most controversy.

Under the package, product placement "shall be admissible unless a member state decides otherwise." Viewers must be "clearly informed" about it at the start and at the end of programme, while the practice remains fully banned in children's and news programmes.

The TV without frontiers directive is to be the first EU law to apply the so-called country of origin principle – a principle that proved too controversial in the recent debate about free movement of services.

Under the contentious principle, broadcasters only have to respect the rules of the country where they are based and not into which they broadcast. In practice, for example, German public broadcasters will be free to ban product placement, but if a French programme giving high profile to a certain product comes to Germany, it cannot be blocked.

According to commissioner Reding, the new rules will "secure a better level playing field in Europe for such [audiovisual] services."

Product placement – now illegal in most EU states - is expected to provide European broadcasters with additional funding and boost their competitiveness, especially against American media firms, where featuring certain products accounts for a significant part of advertising revenues. The new rules are also expected to boost their competitive standing against digital channels.

On a global scale, product placement grew by 37 percent in 2006 and is now forecast to grow 30 percent this year.

More TV ads
TV companies have also won more powers over the timing of commercial breaks, as the current "once every 45 minutes" limit is to be cut to "once for a period of 30 minutes," with broadcasters being permitted to choose the best moment to insert ads in programmes.

The current three hours per day cap on advertising will also be dropped because "no non-specialist TV channel in Europe comes near it," Brussels says, although the 12 minute upper limit per hour will remain in place.

On average, every European watches TV two hours a night – an enticing fact for industry. Private TV channels in Europe get 90 percent of their revenue from advertising, while it accounts for 29 percent in the case of public channels.

[Arthur Gordon Pym]

On average, every European watches TV two hours a night – an enticing fact for industry. Private TV channels in Europe get 90 percent of their revenue from advertising, while it accounts for 29 percent in the case of public channels.

That is terrible. Boob tube has become the most terrible and efficient tools of indoctrination. Let us not then not be astonished at the fast spiritual decay of Europe's inhabitants.