Archive for ofcom
Ofcom criticises 5 TV channels for breaking rules in favour of Tower Hamlets Mayor
The Docklands & East London Advertiser reports: Broadcasting watchdog Ofcom has censured five Bangladeshi television channels for carrying an advertisement amounting to a party political broadcast for Mayor of Tower Hamlets Lutfur Rahman. The advertisement, taken out for two weeks in January 2012, was broadcast as many as 15 times a day across five channels… [...]
Should local TV stations have to run local election broadcasts?
Ofcom's current consultation into the rules for party election broadcasts on TV (the free slots political parties and candidates get for short films) raises an intriguing question about local TV licensees. What should they have to broadcast?
5 things you shouldn’t miss: the bots behind Wikipedia, spotting cancers and more
Welcome to the latest of my monthly collections for the Engine Group of five links that you shouldn’t miss. The bots that edit Wikipedia http://bbc.in/PtlLTJ Behind the scenes of the international encyclopedia which anyone can edit is a small army of automated programs that keep the site going. An app – to check for [...]
Ofcom rejects complaint from Lord Ashcroft over reporting of his tax status
Ofcom’s judgement summary reads: On 17 December 2009, BBC Radio 4 broadcast an edition of Today, its early morning news and current affairs programme, which included an item looking back at the preceding day’s activities in Parliament and discussed questions put to Ms Harriet Harman MP (who was standing in for the Prime Minister) during [...]
Ofcom publishes draft code for internet piracy
At the end of last week the regulator Ofcom published a draft of the code to be followed for taking action against online copyright infringement following the passage of the Digital Economy Act.
As Rory Cellan-Jones points out, some aspects of the draft code deal with concerns raised during the passage of the Act. In particular, [...]
People increasingly prefer to do business online
Ofcom’s latest ‘Media Literacy’ survey is out and it includes some significant findings for firms wishing to sell to the public: Communication preferences have changed since 2005 – for example, adults are now more likely to prefer to check their bank balance online (30% vs. 22%) and less likely to prefer to check their bank balance [...]
Ofcom rejects SNP/Plaid objection to TV debate
A message from Ofcom brought this news today:
Ofcom today announced it has not upheld complaints received from the Scottish National Party (SNP) and Plaid Cymru about The First Election Debate broadcast on ITV1 at 8.30pm on Thursday 15 April 2010. The political parties complained that the programme was not impartial and was also misleading.
The complaints were [...]
Illegal file-sharing: what does the public think?
The latest Ofcom survey of internet users in the UK shows that less than half believes downloading shared copies of copyright music and films should be illegal. 42% say it should be illegal, against 33% who believe it shouldn’t be illegal and 25% who don’t know.
I’m not aware of comparable figures for other laws, but [...]
Social networking in the UK: Facebook soars, Bebo and MySpace drop
Cross-posted from the Mandate blog: The latest Ofcom survey of internet usage is packed full of useful statistics and – even more helpfully – they are based on (a) proper research and (b) people in the UK. Many of the figures quoted are American – or American masquerading as global – and not infrequently are [...]
