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The European Commission recently approved under EC Treaty state aid rules four aid schemes meant to support film making in Poland and Ireland, music recordings by new talent in France and newspaper distribution in Denmark. All four schemes were found to entail no undue distortion of competition within the Single Market. The Danish plans sought to give publishers of certain newspaper-like publications direct grants totalling EUR 1.3 million. The aid will enable publishers to freely choose their distributors in their efforts to distribute these publications. In deciding to favour this scheme, the...

The Commission for Communications Regulation (ComReg) has granted a research group at Trinity College Dublin 50 megahertz of radio spectrum to enable it to carry out real time experiments in dynamic spectrum allocation. Until now radio stations, mobile phone operators and such like have only been entitled to use the spectrum they have been granted for specific purposes. In 2004, the OX Report (see IRIS 2005-2: 16), commissioned by the Irish Government, included in its recommendations that better use should be made of the spectrum. The grant of spectrum for research has been made under ComReg’s...

The High Court on 24 January made an order requiring three ISPs to hand over to four record companies the names, addresses and telephone numbers of 49 alleged file-sharers. The first such order had been made by the Court in July 2005 (see IRIS 2005-10: 15). The file-sharers in the recent case were all alleged to have downloaded between 500 and 5,000 files, in breach of s.140 of the Copyright and Related Rights Act 2000 (see IRIS 2000-8: 13). The music companies intend to take infringement proceedings against the file-sharers. Mr. Justice Kelly described the activity as a modern form of thieving....

In December 2005, new codes were launched on alcohol advertising on radio and television, in the cinema and in outdoor media. The codes, which are voluntary, were agreed between the Department of Health and Children, the drinks industry, the association of advertisers and representatives of the media. The purpose of the codes is to address Department of Health concerns in relation to alcohol advertising and young people. A monitoring body to oversee the implementation of the codes was also established. It will report annually to the Minister for Health and, if it becomes apparent that the system...

The Broadcasting Act 2001 (see IRIS 2001-4: 9) made provision for the Irish-language television station, TG4, to become independent of RTÉ, the national public service broadcaster. TG4 had been established under the legislation governing RTÉ. The move towards independence has now begun with the appointment by Government of consultants to develop an implementation plan. The Government has also announced its plans to pilot Digital Terrestrial Television (DTT) in Ireland. The introduction of DTT in Ireland was provided for in the Broadcasting Act 2001 (see IRIS 2001-8: 11) However, initial attempts...