July 3, 2012 – Free-to-air TV broadcasters must pass all of their content through all other platforms in the Kingdom without any conditions, the National Broadcasting and Telecommunication Commis-sion says.
The NBTC’s broadcasting committee yesterday approved the draft of “must carry” rules to prevent non-availability of free-TV programmes on some platforms because of copyright restrictions.
This follows complaints by TrueVisions subscribers that they could not watch live Euro 2012 soccer matches carried on free-TV signals.
Under the must-carry rules, transmission frequencies for radio or television broadcasting and telecommunication are considered national resources for the public interest. Therefore, free-to-air TV operators must be responsible for public broadcasting services on any platform.