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The media policy section of the coalition agreement signed by Germany’s new ‘traffic light’ coalition parties, i.e. the SPD (Social Democratic Party), Bündnis 90/Die Grünen (Alliance 90/The Greens) and the FDP (Free Democratic Party), begins by highlighting the indispensability of free, independent media at public and private levels in a democracy, no doubt in response to an increase in defamatory statements linked to the refugee and coronavirus crises in Germany, as well as undesirable recent developments in EU member states, such as Poland and Hungary. This matter...

On 22 October 2021, the heads of the governments of the German Länder adopted the draft 2. Medienänderungsstaatsvertrag (second amendment to the state media treaty – 2. MÄndStV), known as the Barrierefreiheitsstaatsvertrag (state accessibility treaty), which transposes Directive (EU) 2019/882 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 17 April 2019 on the accessibility requirements for products and services, and therefore strengthens the provisions of the Medienstaatsvertrag (state media treaty – MStV) to protect people with disabilities from discrimination. The...

In a ruling of 6 July 2021 (case no. KZR 11/18), the Kartellsenat (Cartel Division) of the Bundesgerichtshof (Federal Supreme Court – BGH) decided that a public service broadcaster’s failure to pay feed-in fees to a cable network operator breached the anti-discrimination rules of the Gesetz gegen Wettbewerbsbeschränkungen (Act Against Restraints of Competition – GWB) and therefore created a compensation liability if (and because) payments were made to other cable network operators. In a previous case, the BGH followed an action brought by a cable network operator to the...

On 1 October 2021, new rules establishing an appeal procedure for social networks and video-sharing platform services entered into force in Germany. The rules were introduced as part of the latest reform of the Netzwerkdurchsetzungsgesetz (Network Enforcement Act – NetzDG) under the Gesetz zur Änderung des Netzwerkdurchsetzungsgesetzes (Act to Amend the Network Enforcement Act) of 3 June 2021. For video-sharing platform services, the appeal procedure has been applicable to user-generated videos and programmes since 28 June 2021. Since 1 October 2021, as well as social networks, video-sharing...

In a press release of 12 October 2021, the Landgericht Köln (Cologne regional court – LG Köln) announced that it had decided in summary proceedings (case nos. 28 O 351/21 and 28 O 350/21) that YouTube had unfairly deleted two user-generated videos, featuring reports and interviews concerning COVID-19, on the basis of its general terms and conditions. As part of the “#allesaufdentisch” campaign, which went viral at the end of September this year, various German artists uploaded onto the YouTube video-sharing platform video clips of interviews with comments by so-called...