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On 30 March 2006, the Republic of Italy and the Republic of Turkey signed a film co-production agreement. The aim of the agreement is to improve the basic conditions for film co-productions between the two countries in the film, television, video and new media fields. The agreement is based on the idea that co-productions benefit the partners from both the technical and the artistic point of view. Financially, its purpose is to help both film producers and distributors. The parties are convinced it will help to foster the ongoing development of their cultural relations. It provides for a number...

The support measure contained in the Italian Law 296/2006 of 27 December 2006, which grants an income tax deduction to consumers who purchase television sets with integrated tuner and digital decoders during 2007, has been found to be compatible with EC Treaty state aid rules. The income tax reduction amounts to 20% of the price paid for the equipment (up to a maximum deduction of EUR 200 per decoder) and represents a total budget measure of EUR 40 million. Though the measure was found to give an indirect advantage to broadcasters using digital technologies (who benefit from state-subsidised means...

At the end of 2006, the Italian Communications Authority (AGCOM) adopted two decisions (no.169/06/CSP and no.170/06/CSP) imposing fines on two Italian commercial television broadcasters, Retequattro and Italia 1, which were found to have acted in breach of the rules governing the number of advertising breaks allowed in the course of audiovisual works. To this effect, Article 37(4) of the Italian Broadcasting Code (Legislative Decree, 31 July 2005, no. 177) transposes Article 11(3) of the Television Without Frontiers Directive insofar as it stipulates that audiovisual works such as feature films...

The Italian Ministry for Communications has recently signed a new decree aimed at combating child pornography on the internet by obliging Internet Service Providers to block sites displaying illicit content within 6 hours of notification by the competent organ, the Centro Nazionale per il contrasto della pedopornografia sulla rete Internet (the National Centre for combating child pornography on the internet). This organ was created by a previous act (2006), and operates within the Italian Postal and Communications Police, a specialised branch of the Italian Police force. The Centre is invested...

On 22 January 2007, the Italian Corte Suprema di Cassazione (Supreme Court) ruled in favour of file sharing activities where no lucrative intent is involved. The decision caused an initial commotion among Italian users because it was first interpreted as being a revolutionary change of stance. It nevertheless quickly became evident that the Supreme Court’s decision did not actually present any change of stance, rather it derived from the Court’s consideration of the law in force at the time when the events relating to the case occurred. The case concerned the creation, in 1999, on a university...