Intellectual Property Law

The BBC's iPlayer Goes to Parliament, by Sean Daly

By Pamela Jones et al.

The BBC's iPlayer Goes to Parliament
~by Sean Daly

The British Broadcasting Corporation officially launched its ambitious iPlayer client, a video-on-demand "catch-up" service limited to UK residents, on Christmas Day with a massive promotional push which resulted in a million viewers watching over 3.5 million viewed programs. Launch TV advertising notwithstanding, this is unquestionably a sign that the era of "time-shifted on-demand" video over the Internet has arrived.

Amid the celebrations however, Mark Thompson, Director-General of the BBC, faced stiff questioning last week before the UK Parliament House of Commons Public Accounts Select Committee which wanted to know more about the Beeb's efforts to cut spending and in particular the costs of the massive iPlayer project. The hearing followed the publication of a National Audit Office report [PDF] on BBC Procurement.

Full post as published by Groklaw on January 20, 2008 (boomark / email).