All video content distributors should contribute to creation, says CSA’s Boyon

The growth of online and connected TV services presents a challenge to the finance of domestic content creation that must be addressed by regulators, according to French media regulator the CSA’s president Michel Boyon.

Speaking at the Avignon Forum, Boyon said that the ability of international content suppliers, including the Hollywood studios, to use connected TVs to reach consumers directly was “particularly worrying for the future of content creation in France” as it would disintermediate the distributors on whom the content creation industry depended for support.

While it was up to channel providers to combat this threat by investing in local content themselves, Boyon said that connected TV services could also potentially distort competition because local service providers and channels were subject to greater fiscal obligations, including the need to support local creation.

Boyon said that one principle that should be adopted was that any provider that made money from distributing audiovisual content should contribute to the finance of content creation. “I don’t have the impression, in saying that, of being a dangerous protectionist, but rather of enacting one of the most basic elements of the market,” he said.

Boyon said that it would also be necessary to maintain vigilant in the face of exclusive content by online providers and device manufacturers. “We need to watch out that tomorrow the market doesn’t develop in vertical ‘silos’ and that the viewer becomes the victim of alliances between globalised giants,” he said.