Germany

[DE] ZDF Amends Youth Protection Guidelines

IRIS 2003-10:1/9

Carmen Palzer

Institute of European Media Law (EMR), Saarbrücken/Brussels

At its meeting on 10 October 2003, the Television Council of the public service broadcaster ZDF revised ZDF's internal guidelines on the protection of minors.

The guidelines firstly contain detailed provisions on the treatment of films that have been rated by a regional ratings authority or a voluntary self-regulatory body. They also ban the transmission of programmes with the same content as certain listed media; the ban also applies if the content has been significantly altered. The guidelines also include rules on exceptions made for specific reasons to the watershed provisions set out in Article 5.4 of the Jugendmedienschutz-Staatsvertrag (Inter-State Agreement on Youth Protection in the Media). For example, a programme may be shown before the normal watershed for reasons of outstanding informational, documentary, historical or artistic value. Other rules deal with programme announcements, programme labelling and ZDF's telemedia services. ZDF television programmes, like those of the broadcasters that make up the Arbeitsgemeinschaft der öffentlich-rechtlichen Rundfunkanstalten der Bundesrepublik Deutschland (Union of German Public Service Broadcasters - ARD) are subject to the provisions of the Jugendmedienschutz-Staatsvertrag (see IRIS 2002-­6: 13). However, the Kommission für den Jugendmedienschutz (Commission for Youth Protection in the Media - KJM), which was set up on the basis of the Agreement, is not responsible for this part of the dual broadcasting system, but only for private broadcasters and telemedia providers.