Media News - Friday, June 29, 2007

EU’s Reding to support European mobile TV standard

The European Union's telecoms chief said on Thursday she would favour the European mobile television broadcasting standard over U.S. and Korean rivals, when the Commission decides which to back next month. Mobile operators hope mobile TV could encourage users to spend an extra EUR 5 to 10 a month, compensating for declining revenues from voice calls. The lack of a single technology has held back wider take-up for television broadcasts on cellphones, but the EU's support for digital video broadcast handheld (DVB-H) technology could be the decisive factor in the battle between half a dozen standards. ‘We have a European standard ... so lets go for it,’ EU Information Society Commissioner Viviane Reding said, adding that the European standard is also the only one that has been globally deployed. The Commission's strong support for Nokia-led DVB-H would be a major blow for U.S. company Qualcomm and Korean vendors, which have promoted their own technologies to be used in Europe. (Reuters)

CNN drops paid-for video service

CNN.com is to drop its paid-access live video service from Sunday as part of a major overhaul of its international website. The revamped site will be entirely free, featuring new personalisation options, user-generated content, links to other sites and aggregated comment, with the aim of making the cable news network a ‘good web citizen’. The subscription service Pipeline, which currently costs USD 0.99 a day or USD 2.95 a month, will become free and the site will focus on advertising revenue. Future mobile services, including video, will also be supported by advertising. Nick Wrenn, CNN's managing editor for Europe Middle East and Africa, said that research showed the site needed to provide services for different types of users such as scanners, browsers and sceptics and that users navigated to stories through RSS readers and search engines rather than through the home page. The new site will invite users to submit text, photos and video, and build a personalised homepage from a choice of headline and weather feeds. Selected content from CNN's 27-year video archive will also be accessible for free. (Media Guardian)

China mine boss jailed over death

Seven men have been jailed over the beating to death of a journalist outside an illegal coal mine in China, state media reports. The head of the mine, Hou Zhenrun, was jailed for life for ordering the attack that killed reporter Lan Chengzhang outside the mine in Shanxi province. Some officials at the time said Mr Lan was not an accredited journalist and may have been trying to extort money. The case triggered an outcry and a rare intervention by President Hu Jintao. He ordered a swift investigation into the attack on the Beijing-based China Trade News journalist and his colleague. Five men were given sentences of between five to 15 years in jail for carrying out the attack, while another man received a year sentence for harbouring the suspects. The court in Shanxi sentenced Hou to life in prison for causing the death of another by malicious injury. Mr Lan's family were also awarded CNY 300,000 (EUR 29,300) in compensation from the defendants. (BBC News)

Warner Music and Sony BMG start digital music venture in Russia

Warner Music Group, Sony BMG and the billionaire Len Blavatnik on Thursday announced the creation of a digital music venture in Russia to sell products in one of the world's biggest markets for pirated content. The venture, Digital Access, will be based in Moscow and offer ‘full-track audio downloads, ringtones, ring-back tones, video clips and full color images’ in Russia and the former Soviet region, Blavatnik's holding company, Access Industries, said in an e-mailed statement. Blavatnik, a native Russian with U.S. citizenship, contributed two of the biggest Russian music labels, Soyuz and Nikitin Records, to the venture, which will start operating this autumn, according to the statement. The company will work with rights owners, content providers, mobile operators and online stores in making music available from the companies' extensive catalogues rather than dealing with consumers directly. (Bloomberg News, Reuters via International Herald Tribune)

Sweden-Bonnier: Bonnier penetrates Dutch market

Bonnier AB is establishing operations in another European country. On June 28, the successful magazine Illustrerad Vetenskap will be launched in the Netherlands under the name Wetenschap in Beeld. This will mark Bonnier's first step into the Dutch market. If everything proceeds well, additional titles will be launched later. The aim is to establish a broad portfolio of magazine issues in the Netherlands within a couple of years. The launch of Wetenschap in Beeld will be based on cooperation with partners, including Audax Publishing and Betapress. Illustrerad Vetenskap is one of the most successful publications of the Danish magazine publisher Bonnier Publications. This popular science magazine has more than two million readers, based on a combined circulation of 425,000 copies in all of the Nordic countries, Greece and Latvia. (Intermedios Europe)

Spanish press agency specializes in gender equality

A group of women journalists have launched Ameco Press, the first Spanish press agency specialized in gender equality issues. Ameco will cover all general news ‘topics that are relevant to women.’ ‘It is necessary information but it is invisible in the eyes of other media,’ said Cristina P. Fraga, director of the agency. The agency distributes free written and audio content to Spanish news groups (and plans to launch into video content starting next year). Ameco Press counts eight journalists in Madrid and about thirty contributors in Spain. All of them are women but Fraga is open to the idea of male staffers. She also says that coverage will ‘avoid any sexist interpretation.’ (Le Monde through Ifra Executive News Service and Editors Weblog)

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