Joint position - Must be Found Regulation is Not an End in Itself

Digitisation and convergence offer new opportunities for content providers and grant more control to viewers

The supporting organisations – ANGA Verband Deutscher Kabelnetzbetreiber e.V. (Association of German Cable Network Operators), Bundesverband Informationswirtschaft, Telekommunikation und Neue Medien e.V. (Bitkom) (The Federal Association for Information Technology, Telecommunications and New Media), Cable Europe, DIGITALEUROPE and ZVEI – Zentralverband Elektrotechnik- und Elektronikindustrie e.V. (German Electrical and Electronic Manufacturers’ Association) – do not consider it appropriate to indistinctly transfer the existing rules and regulations – especially not some very specific national regulations – into the world of digital, converging media and information. They specifically reject the introduction of a so-called “must be found” regulation.

For a few years, the amendment and revision of existing must carry regulation and the introduction of a “must be found” regulation has been discussed in Germany, especially in view of the digitisation of broadcasting and the growing use of online media. On the EU level, the creation of a digital single market is picking up pace: Traditional regulation of the media and telecommunications sector is being questioned, in part due to the differentiation of the Internet supply chain, and to companies operating globally and at various stages of the content value chain. This discussion regarding media politics in Germany has essentially split into two camps. One calls for an expansion of media regulation, both in terms of what is to be regulated and to whom the regulation should apply. The other camp rejects any undifferentiated extension and expansion of the regulation, given the variety of choices and options that exist for viewers and 2 users in terms of media content, reception channels, and devices. This viewpoint is what unites the authors of this paper.