Submission to BBC Trust Review of YouView
September 2013
BBC Trust Review of YouView
Introduction
1) Pact is the UK trade association representing and promoting the commercial interests of independent feature film, television, digital, children's and animation media companies.
2) The UK independent television sector is one of the biggest in the world. Despite the difficult economic climate, independent television sector revenues have grown from £1.3 billion in 2005 to nearly £2.4 billion in 2011.1
3) It is important that YouView continues to provide an open platform to stimulate the independent TV sector and creative industries more broadly by offering open access to a wide range of non BBC services, whilst simultaneously offering a wide array of choice for the consumer to access content on demand
4) For further information, please contact Pact’s Interim Head of Policy, Rosina Robson, at [email protected] or on 020 7380 8232.
1 Pact Census Independent Production Sector Financial Census and Survey 2012, by Oliver & Ohlbaum Associates Limited, August 2012 2
BBC Trust Review of YouView
Previous ‘Project Canvas’ consultation
Pact submitted its views on the original YouView consultation (formerly Project Canvas) in April 2009. Pact was, on the whole, supportive of the project and the key points we made at the time were as follows, many of which are still relevant:
• YouView offers an opportunity to stimulate the creative industries by providing a platform for innovative on-demand and interactive services for the public • Pact expressed concern around the risk that YouView could accelerate the decline of the secondary TV market by increasing the availability of VoD services via the TV rather than a PC • We called for YouView to be open to a wide-range of third-party services and content, including from non PSBs so as to not restrict consumer access to new services • Companies developing their own on demand services should be able to make their services available to the public via YouView on a reasonable basis. This would stimulate the creative industries by providing a platform with considerable reach whilst simultaneously increasing choice for the public • Included in the point above, YouView should be able to accommodate services with different business models and different payment and revenue models. YouView should enable commercial players to monetise viewing effectively alongside any free BBC content.
Current Review
The key points and principles that Pact would like to put across in response to this Review, and in respect of the future of YouView, is the following:
1. General approach: Overall, Pact is supportive of the YouView offering continuing as a free to air service via the internet. This contributes to two of the BBC’s public purposes, to help the licence fee payer benefit from digital technology and to stimulate the creative industries.
2. Diversity: It is important that the service continues to offer diversity and a range of programmes; it should provide open access to a wide range of non BBC services rather than marginalising them in any way. YouView should also importantly, continue to provide choice for the consumer, in the sense that they can access a range of content when is convenient to them.
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BBC Trust Review of YouView
3. Driving competition: YouView should continue to be a positive influence in the role that it plays to drive competition on price and subscription. Pact has the option of seeking more detailed information and feedback from individual members if any specific products or services are impacted in a negative way.
4. Purchasing content: Pact would have concerns in the future if the scenario is that all content can be viewed for no charge. The industry is protected by IP rights that have been negotiated and agreed. There should be opportunities in the future for some content to be purchased in order for the consumer to maximise on programming and choice, whilst protecting producer rights. A situation where content was allowed to be installed on hard drives for an unlimited amount of time or allowed to be copied would not be positive for the industry. The Digital Rights Management framework should operate so that programmes cannot be retained permanently. There should be some ability and opportunities in the future to monetise content, in the same way as ITV Player and others are doing.
Response to consultation questions
1. Does YouView provide the full range of accessibility and usability features that were envisaged at launch and do these deliver all of the intended benefits?
Pact cannot really take a view here and will leave to other organisations and individuals that are better placed in this debate to provide comments.
2. Does YouView have any effect on the incentives of joint venture partners to syndicate their content to other platforms?
Pact has no particular knowledge on this issue to offer here.
3. Does YouView provide appropriate information and signposting to enable viewers to make informed choices about the content they watch?
Pact does not have any particular views to share in response to this question and thinks this question is more for audiences to answer.
4. Is the BBC cross-promotional code working effectively in relation to YouView?
It is difficult for Pact to judge the answer to this question so we will make no comment here. We have no particular intelligence on whether the BBC is promoting YouView to the detriment of other channels. 4