On 8 June 2007, the Hans-Bredow-Institut cooperated with the Alcatel Lucent Foundation in organising a conference at Universität Hamburg on new opportunities for the distribution of content and its effect on media and telecommunications law.
The conference’s point of departure was the circumstance that digitalisation of the media has come a long way and that provides in principle the opportunity to distribute content by almost all channels and platforms. Concepts like Triple-Play, which were not much more than phantoms at conferences over the last few years have become products for purchase or, as with mobile television, at least technically realisable options. Already in 1997, the EU Commission hadposed the question in its Green Paper on "Convergence” as to what the merging of previously separate media and telecommunications markets means for the policy frameworks in the Member States.
The conference made an interim assessment of the German situation: following an overview of law, economy and technology „after the convergence” came talks and panels with researchers and practitioners on the changes to content production and distribution. Finally, experts described the consequences for the affected areas in the law. As the management of convergence also represents a regulatory task, a panel on the topic of coordinating commerce and the regulatory authorities formed the last part of the event.
Project Information
Overview
Duration: 2007-2007
Research programme: RP2 - Regulatory Structures and the Emergence of Rules in Digital Communication
