good
this is the whole point of the single market. well done judge blokes!
The European Court of Justice has judged that Brits must be allowed to buy satellite TV smartcards and decoders from other single-market countries. National laws that forbid the importation and sale of such kit from other European nations are contrary to rules guarding the freedom of Europeans to trade across national borders …
Apparently. While punters are allowed to buy cards from foreign broadcasters for home use, there are copyright issues with public showing of the footage. The impression I got was that if Sky can get enough logos and other furniture on top of the image then the public showing will still be illegal. She's won the right for her punters to watch the footy cheaply at home. So a bit of an own goal, by the look of it...
At least that's what other news agencies are reporting...
The same laws would apply - if Sky have sold the rights to publicly show their logo etc in Greece, then it is illegal for them to restrict the transfer of those "goods or services" within the EU. That's exactly the same argument the premier league used - they'd only authorised the showing of their copyright material in Greece via that provider, and so argued that showing it in the UK was a breach of copyright.
You'd have a point, if it made any real difference.
Meanwhile, in the real world, the TV providers will still refuse to "officially" sell their services outside their own countries.
The problem is not the TV companies, it's the rights holders. If they flog the rights to film A, sporting event B or TV series C in country Z, they don't like to see someone in Z subscribing to country X's service in order to see it. More to the point, the advertisers on TV X (oops, analogy problem) have a cow.
In this case it's not Sky playing silly buggers, it's the Premier League. They're the ones whose asymmetric pricing means that Sky *have* to charge more than some Greek channel. I think the pub may have won the battle, but the war will start when said Greek TV company tries to renew its Premiership rights come contract time......
Trouble is, it's a not a "black or white" argument.
Now look at films, TV series' etc. As things stand in Continental europe, local markets usually gets a dubbed (sometimes subbed) version of same. If the people with a decent education (and that's usually those with cash that the advertisers are interested in) watch the thing on its release on a British, english-language service, where's the value in producing the local variant as and when? Having an open market for cross-border sales of TV services could have the rather nasty side-effect of crapping on the telly of the lower echelons of European society.
So, is this a straightforward freedom of choice issue or a murky Free Market vs. Social considerations issue?
As an expat with a Sky dish (which Sky believe is somewhere else), I'm with the free marketeers here.
"That model could be undermined if punters were allowed to buy content from the cheapest sources rather than be forced to use the provider in their own country."
Well then... In a nutshell. Reduce the prices in the Model to a competative level and then people, like this landlady, wouldn't need to source their services from elsewhere. Then the 'model' may show an increase of punters and either maintin a their profit or possibly increase their profits.
Slaps forehead..
The players you mention, in fact, any top-end, recognised player playing for a major team are not going to be affected.
If the PL cannot maximise their rights then it won't be Man U/City/Liverpool etc etc that suffer.
The fallout from this ruling may see a lot more (even more?) smaller clubs suffering, along with their players and staff.
"If the PL cannot maximise their rights then it won't be Man U/City/Liverpool etc etc that suffer."
Yes they will suffer (a bit). Premier league TV rights are divvied up partly depending on league position and viewing figures, partly split equally. So if the Premier league gets less money, Man Utd et al get less money. You're right that it will hit players at smaller clubs harder. After all, £100,000 a week vs £200,000 a week is much of a muchness, while the difference between £2,000 and £1,000 a week will be felt much more.
>Remember Sky started bidding without necessarily knowing that the market for subscription footy existed.
I would have said it was a fairly safe bet. There are a lot of people out there for whom their team is their life, they have garden gates with the team emblem embedded in them, windows with the emblem embedded in the glass (like a tacky church window), fences painted in the team colours and an overriding desire to make sure they see *every* game the team plays.
Those are the people who already spend £3k+ on a season ticket that actually doesn't get them into a game, it just reserves a seating allocation so they know they can then spend £50 to see the match. They are the people who would almost certainly still fork out £500/month to continue to see their team play.
Sky knew full well that these people existed and they knew that whatever they paid they can just crank up the subs to cover it. Sky are just the ones with the biggest pot of cash to spend in the first place.
The BBC probably could compete against Sky and put it on a top-up TV type of deal, but could you imagine how up in arms our somewhat dim-witted and Murdo-owned press would be?
"How come I can't buy as much wine & beer from France as I want then?"
Er, you can. People have been doing Booze cruises for years now. The illegal bit is if you then sell the beer and wine once you get back to the UK. For personal use there have been no limits since, I think, the very early 90s.
You can buy as much as you like - you simply have to prove it is for "personal consumption" and that you aren't going to sell or otherwise dispose of it any form of trade.
There is therefore an upper limit to what you might realistically consume, and anything above that is likely to raise suspicion.
I don't know what it is like these days, but didn't they go through a phase a few years ago of confiscating peoples' cars because they refused to believe it was for personal consumption? I don't remember exactly how much was involved but it didn't seem excessive.
Given the price difference why wouldn't someone bring a year's supply of wine back from their annual holiday? But I don't think customs would see it like that.
Single market only applies to goods which are normally liable to VAT only and do not have per-country specific taxation.
Excise goods which include all tobacco, wine or even cars for that matter are not subject to single market regulations.
The only reason you have been allowed to import "personal allowance" when traveling is that the EU governments have surrendered on the subject of enforcing that for small personal purchases.
Good news indeed, does this mean that Tesco can try to overturn the High Court ruling that stopped it importing jeans from cheaper parts of Europe. The two cases seem somewhat at odds with each other.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/2163561.stm
What annoys me is that big companies seem to be allowed to use globalisation to their benefit but individuals/small_business cannot.
Those apparently are (were, it's 9 years ago) jeans imported from outside the European Union. English Premiership football teams may be product of more than one country, but they are incorporated in the UK, although often owned by wealthy foreigners. If they play outside the EU then who knows... not I.
A few stories earlier, http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/the_economy/133676.stm
"Companies could only buy goods from sources other than the producer if they were within the European community", where "they" apparently means the sources from which you are buying. Otherwise you "violate EU trademark rules". "The court ruled on an Austrian case, where a company sold cut-price sunglasses of the Austrian manufacturer Silhouette, which it had bought in Bulgaria and re-imported into the EU. " That ruling was was in 1998; Bulgaria joined the EU in 2007 according to Wikipedia and presumably is now paying full price like everyone else. Evidently they were genuine Silhouette sunglasses but even so...
And Levi Strauss is in the United States, although I don't know where the actual manufacture of goods takes place.
I wonder if that means that Oxfam aren't allowed to sell second hand Levis either.
Second hand goods are different.
It's something called the First Sale Doctrine - once goods, even copyrighted goods, have been sold, the purchaser may resell without restriction from the supplier.
Wholesalers generally have goods on consignment or sale-or-return, and therefore have not completed the first sale by buying from the manufacturer.
This is why the grey market is grey - if they were buying at retail in another country (and thus assuming full risk if the goods do not sell in the EU) and then reselling in the EU - and paying import duties and VAT - then first sale doctrine kicks in, though they wouldn't be able to advertise the goods as "new".
Serves Sky right for charging Pub's so much for content in the first place. For smaller pubs it's just not worth the expense, unless they turn their nice venue into a horrible multi-screened venue which shows nothing but sport all the time.
I think TVs in pubs are the devil's work. But I can see the attraction of being able to show a couple of games a week to bring in some punters.
Although I suppose that isn't what you asked.
Anyone can be tried in the International Criminal Court, but someone has to catch them first. And then keep them. Obviously the arrest of Tony Blair or George Bush would be considered an act of war. I think anyone who thinks they have a case against Vladimir Putin is keeping quiet about it, too.
The Premier League should be able to maximise revenue from their assets, by selling viewing rights to the UK (its major market) and then by selling it to any other markets that want to access it. It is a quirk of how satellite TV is broadcast that European channels (Greek, In this case) can be accessed outside of their market.
I can see three outcomes from this:
1) PL combine UK and Europe into one market. The cost for UK users (Sky subscribers) will rise, as the PL will want to raise the same money as before, but from just one market.
2) PL only license the content to broadcasters using tightly targeted beams, so that only a single country/area is covered (or not covered).
3) PL incomes drop as they refuse to sell to Europe.
So, all so that a pub landlady can publicly display footy at a competitive advantage to other pubs in her area. She's no martyr, she's attempting to fleece the rights holder to make money.
"...all so that a pub landlady can publicly display footy at a competitive advantage to other pubs in her area." The other pubs in her area can do exactly the same thing and she has no problem with that. All this means is that Sky will have to be more realistic with there pricing in the UK now that we can legally source our football from other European suppliers.
...you work for a proprietary software company?
It's how markets operate. The price drops to the price people are willing to pay. If the price drops below the cost of production producers stop producing. If the price rises, more producers enter the market. No-one is forcing the premier league to give it away, just use FRAND like terms in Europe.
Plus, no-one will force you to go into a pub showing the Greek version. You can carry on supporting the higher price version.
And, BTW, this was a decision by the ECJ - perhaps you might want to qualify your use of the word "fleece"? Or do you only obey the law you agree with? And if so what is your basis, other than vitriol, for criticising the the pub landlady?
The cost to ordinary punters will not change - rest assured Sky will have these as high as they dare already. Sky are not losing money from small pubs because they can't afford the stupid feas anyway. Many pubs are actually losing money because punters want to watch football and don't go when matches are on, while they would do otherwise. They can't target satellite beams, they have a footprint. Any small pub can take advantage of the ruling, not just hers. My local village pub has been showing football from Greece (now Portugal) for a long time. I'm glad it is now legal and above board.
1) PL combine UK and Europe into one market. The cost for UK users (Sky subscribers) will rise, as the PL will want to raise the same money as before, but from just one market.
They'd have to charge everybody [in europe] the same otherwise people will go and get the cheaper foreign option so your argument doesn't make sense
2) PL only license the content to broadcasters using tightly targeted beams, so that only a single country/area is covered (or not covered).
AFAIK there aren't any of the type your thinking off (to country level). It doesn't make commercial sense (cost of satellite) to do this. Even the Satellites that Sky use are targetted (smaller footprint) but they can still be picked up with a big enough dish in the canary isles!!
3) PL incomes drop as they refuse to sell to Europe.
Not a chance in hell of this happening.
Sky are broadcast over Astra 2D, which has quite a wide, unsophisticated narrow beam - you can pick it up in Spain quite easily -
Astra 2D will be replaced over the next few years by 1N, 2E, 2F, all of which will have much more sophisticated narrow beams. In fact, 1N is currently moving to 28.2E, and has a much tighter narrow beam that solely covers the British Isles, and will be used by ITV's HD channels when it gets into position.
1N has three beams, see this page for maps of the beam footprint.
http://www.astra2d.com/astra1n.html
This ruling is great for pubs, unfortunately it doesn't help people at home much. A subscription to any EU based premier league football will set you back more than a sky subscription so isn't worth shopping around.
I don't think Sky will lose too much sleep over it. 1 pub is only equivalent to 10 homes in terms of revenue. Also most pubs I go to that have an alternative satellite system have it just so they can show the 3pm games and they also have a UK sky system for everything else.
The down side of this ruling is the new found legality of allowing matches to be shown at 3pm on a Saturday afternoon. Currently no live matches may be shown at that time so as to not discourage football fans from attending lower league football by giving them the opportunity to watch 'better' football. This will no longer be the case.
"... on the plus side, cheap pay-TV, on the down side global financial meltdown, troughing politicians and bureaucrats and bankers issuing undemocratic dictats to the proles.
Toughie..."
And that makes the EU different from UK - country with a government that precisely nobody voted for - how exactly?
Am I the only one seeing the link here.
The only thing the Greek Goverment need to do now is to sell enough of these cards throughout Europe to pay off their debt.
I feel empowered. If I buy one of these cards, not only do I contribute towards easing the EU Debt crisis, I get to watch footy at 3pm at home. Win-Win!
Now all I need to do is work out how to get the card to work in a Vu+ Duo anyone? Or maybe a cheap OpenBox S10?
@Tom 38 - Can't agree, if the product is on offer throughout Europe, then preserving the same revenue in a single market at least logically and prior to taxes/duty would mean that the price paid would be the same throughout. In other words, the price at the top of the range would come down, whilst at the bottom of the range, the price would go up.
Either there is a single market or there isn't. Vendors at the moment are cherry picking what aspects of the single market they choose to implement and making a mockery of the rest. The big losers historically have been British resident buyers on just about everything they've been able to buy. It's not possibe to make the argument that as an example a product such as a CD, DVD or Blu Ray disk should cost more here than elsewhere in Europe as an example, and still keep a straight face. Tobacco and booze of course are subject to different duty througout Europe, but as pointed out, if it's for personal use, tough luck for whichever member state it ends up getting used in. Governments have had to take the hit, companies should be learning likewise.
Either put in place equitable prices throughout Europe or have the good grace to shut up if somebody gets what they want form another member state because they are milking citizens in their own.
Fleecing the rights holders ? She's accepted Greek tech support and billing, foregone an English language commentary but paid the going rate for an EU member state. Are you saying, that whilst on holiday abroad you buy no product that would be cheaper in that state than back here in Blighty ? I smell BS.
Lastly, you don't work for Rupert do you ?
In fact the Pub Landlady has lost. You wouldn't believe it reading BBC News coverage! The court has ruled that some aspects of the Premier League coverage are copyright (not the actual game itself but things like Logo's and music associated with the product). So if she shows Premier League games in her pub FOR GAIN then she is infringing copyright and can be prosecuted.
What no one seems to understand is this changes the game for all TV content. Films can no longer be restricted to just the UK (for example) but have to include EU coverage. The same applies to TV shows.
As always Lawyers will make a LOT of money from this ruling if it's approved in the UK Courts.
But she is not showing games "For Gain"! Now if she was charging an entry fee on the door, that would be "for gain", but she's offering them for *free* and anyone coming into the pub can buy a drink if they want, just as they could before, however that has nothing to do with the football.
I've encountered a number of instances of companies claiming they are the "exclusive UK agent" for XYZ software/hardware (which is legally dubious and I've had discussions with several american companies over the liabilities of setting up exclusive distribution agreements) and then throwing their toys out of the cot when $orkplace buys said software/hardware from elsewhere in the EU for half the money.
A lot of the time we do that simply because of the sheer arrogance displayed by the sales teams involved - trying to dictate terms is a fast way of permanently losing a client.
It has gotten as far as legal threats a couple of times, but once our own lawyers reply along with a threat to involve OFT all the resellers involved have slunk off with their tails between their legs.