Recent Articles

“an eminent body that enforced the law”*: the Commission’s amended proposals for the telecoms-package

November 12, 2008 10:34

I have not come around yet to examine in detail the amended proposals for the telecoms-package that were tabled by the Commission last week, and so I’ll just post the links to the texts and the procedure files of the European Parliament. We’ll see what the Council will make of this when ...

“one person working the bleeping machine”: FCC v. Fox transcript

November 04, 2008 23:01

Just as a quick update to yesterday’s post on FCC v. Fox beofre the US Supreme Court: here is the transcript - and it is not particularly compelling reading - even if there are nine instances of “Laughter” noted in these 61 pages, such as when Justice Scalia states “I mean,...

“Fruity language” on TV, Radio, and before the Supreme Court?

November 03, 2008 23:47

The day of the presidential election in the US is the day when an obviously very serious issue will be argued before the US Supreme Court: is it ok to say cow shit (instead of “cow manure”, as scripted) and “fuckin’ simple” (instead of “freakin’...

Updated: pending telecoms/broadcasting-cases before ECJ and CFI

October 30, 2008 13:12

Once again, a list of possibly interesting cases concerning telecommunications and broadcasting currently pending at the European Court of Justice: C-301/06 Ireland v. Council and European Parliament (annulment of the data retention directive); the advocate general’s opinion was delivered...

CFI on Danish TV2: licence fee revenue “state resources”, but no adequate reasons for Commission’s overcompensation-claim

October 22, 2008 15:00

In its judgment in the joined cases T-309/04 TV2 v. Commission, T-317/04 Denmark v. Commission, T-329/04 Viasat Broadcasting UK v. Commission, and T-336/04 SBS and SBS Danish Television v. Commission, handed down today (see also the press release), the Court of First Instance of the European ...

“a well-deserving pillar”: advocate general sees Community pillar ok for data retention

October 14, 2008 10:53

  “The boundary between measures coming under the Community pillar and those which must be adopted within the framework of Title VI of the EU Treaty” (the “third pillar”) is at issue in the case C-301/06 Ireland v. Parliament and Council before the European Court of Justice. ...

ECJ: striving for greater efficiency is no justification for delayed implementation

October 09, 2008 14:21

Just a brief note: the European Court of Justice today handed down judgment in the infringement case C-230/07 Commission v Netherlands concerning caller location for calls to the 112 European emergency number. Art 26 paragraph 3 of the Universal Service Directive states that “Member States ...

“The advantage of the time prompts me aloud / To call for recompense”

October 08, 2008 14:31

The title of this post, taken from Shakespeare (Henry VI, Part III, Act III, Scene 3),  could have been the motto of Bouygues Télécom in the case C-431/07 P before the European Court of Justice, in which advocate general Trstenjak today delivered her opinion (at the moment available only in French, ...

“But weakly guarded, where the breach was made”*: was T-Mobile’s loss of data a “breach of security”?

October 06, 2008 08:30

In May this year, Deutsche Telekom CEO Oberman was ”shaken to the core” by allegations that there were “cases of misuse of call records at Deutsche Telekom in 2005″: it seems Deutsche Telekom had been a bit too keen to know how confidential information on the company had f...

“mingled with regards that stand aloof from the entire point”*: EP-Resolutions on the media

September 26, 2008 22:58

After the hard core legislative acts of the “telecoms package” had been voted on by the European Parliament on 24 September 2008 (see here), the next day Parliament approved two resolutions that contain a lot of big words (as shown in the images here that were created by feeding the...