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Home » Latest news » Report published on digitisation and online exploitation of broadcasters' archives

Report published on digitisation and online exploitation of broadcasters' archives

Digitisation and Online Exploitation of Broadcasters' Archives,a new report from the European Audiovisual Observatory(EAO), has been published. It examines current challenges for television archives in the digital era of online content. The report is the result of a workshop co-organised in April 2010 by the Observatory and its partner organisation, the Amsterdam-based Institute for Information Law(IViR).

The BBC's recent announcement about the 2011 launch of the new global iPlayer hosting content from other UK broadcasters demonstrates the continuing commercial value of television archives. Clearly, nostalgia is big business in terms of television entertainment. Indeed, programmes using archive footage from the 1940s onwards - the birth of broadcasting - continue to attract high audience ratings, whether they be serious historical documentaries or more populist programmes. One would have imagined that the technical possibilities of digitisation would have allowed Europe's television archives to free up access to their wealth of material to the general public and filmmakers for the greater good of all. However the twin obstacles of financial and logistical means, on the one hand, and copyright considerations on the other, mean that this process has not been as problem-free as one may have imagined. Digitisation and content offered online clearly raise a whole new challenge in terms of copyright legislation.

Adrian Sterling of the University of London opens the report by recommending that 'collecting societies should establish a global internet licensing agency to which prospective users of protected material on the Internet [] can apply for the necessary global licences without territorial restriction.'

Further details and the full reportcan be downloaded from the European Audiovisual Observatory's website.

Publication date: 13 Dec 2010