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European Parliament Votes Not to Ban Geo-Blocking for Film and TV — For Now
(www.hollywoodreporter.com)
This is the best summary I could come up with:
On Wednesday, Members of the European Parliament (MEPs) agreed with the creatives and chose not to extend the geo-blocking ban to the audio-visual sector.
By licensing contracts for exclusive regional or linguistic rights — for a French film in Belgium, say, or a German soccer league match in Spain — producers and distributors can maximize their return for content.
Without geo-blocking technology preventing cross-border comparison shopping, they fear there will be widespread price dumping, with the lowest-value territory dictating the licensing fee for the entire EU.
Discovery, NBCUniversal, Sony Pictures, and Paramount joined forces with European giants Canal+, RTL, TF1, Sky, ProSiebenSat.1, Wildbunch and Leonine, representatives of major sports leagues, including England’s Premier League of soccer, Germany’s DFL and Italy’s Serie A, and distributors and exhibitor groups, including the MPA and European exhibitors organization UNIC, in a joint letter calling for the EU to reject the proposal and keep territorial exclusivity in place.
MEPs instead called for a “realistic timeframe” for the audio-visual sector to adapt its business models and adjust to a proper single digital market.
“It is also time to meet the demands of citizens by making it easier to access movies, series and sporting events in their native language,” said Polish MEP Beata Mazurek.
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