EDITORIAL

摘要

The Audiovisual Media Services Directive (AVMSD) is the centrepiece of media policy in the European Union. From its beginnings as the 1989 Television without Frontiers Directive, it has been driven by a vision of a borderless yet culturally diverse common EU audiovisual media market. Over multiple revisions in the last two decades it has been extended, first to on-demand audiovisual services and most recently to video-sharing platforms (VSPs) that disseminate user-generated content. This policy journey has so far been a remarkable one, characterized by the balancing of economic and cultural policy objectives through various policy innovations. It has resulted in liberalization in member states (MS) whose media markets suffered from oppressive and politically driven regulatory regimes, but it has also taken a toll on smaller markets distressed by the major transnational audiovisual content providers better able to take advantage of the removal of barriers to dissemination.