BBC director general Mark Thompson has warned Brussels against extending TV-style regulation to the new generation of online and mobile phone content.

Mr Thompson told politicians and industry executives that it was unrealistic and undesirable to oversee new media in the same way as traditional broadcasters are regulated.

"Some public interest objectives - like the protection of children - will certainly remain relevant and regulators will have a responsibility to work with industry and governments to address problems and identify solutions," he told the i2010 European Broadcast convention in Liverpool.

"But our own research suggests that public expectations of BBC online content are very different from their expectation of what they see on BBC Television - they simply do not feel they need, or want, the same level of protection.

"Even if the technical means could be found to enforce intrusive content regulation, it is not obvious that the balance of civic benefits - freedom of expression and creativity versus protection from offence - would favour it except in the case of minors and the most extreme content.

"Self-regulation grounded in systematic and continuous research into public attitudes and responses is a better option for the new media."

Updating the directive

The European Union is currently looking at ways of updating its TV Without Frontiers directive. Originally devised in 1989, it has been made redundant by advances in new technology such as broadband internet and digital television.

The BBC chief said quotas on the nature and country of origin of programmes should not be transferred to the new media world either.

"Enforceability again is an issue, but so too again is the balance of civic advantage in an environment which is very different from that of traditional broadcasting," he said.

"Where spectrum and viewer choice is limited, it is reasonable to insist that a reasonable proportion of output should be of European origin. Where spectrum is effectively infinite and the consumer is in control, it is hard to see why they shouldn't be allowed to choose for themselves."

However, the director general said certain categories of programming, such as comedy, current affairs, arts and religion would continue to require "large scale European investment" if they were to survive and prosper in the digital age. He said such programming required "not regulation but active public intervention".

He said public service broadcasters such as the BBC would find it hard to justify spending millions of pounds on US imports when it was available not only from their commercial rivals but direct from its producers online.

"Comedy - or at least indigenous comedy - will continue to require public investment if it's to be made.

"And to state the obvious, if it isn't made in the first place, no amount of on-demand distribution technology will enable the public to see it. The same is true, not perhaps of chart music - but of most other forms of music-making. The same is true of in-depth news and current affairs, documentary, many forms of indigenous drama and so on.

"The key pressure on all these genres was never lack of spectrum. It was lack of sufficient investment. It seems to me that the key purpose of public service intervention in this converging world is to concentrate investment to support outstanding content in all these areas."

TV downloads

Mr Thompson said he hoped to launch the corporation's new download service, called MyBBCPlayer, nationwide as early as next year. The service, which launched this week in 5,000 homes on an experimental basis, allows viewers to download any programme from the previous seven days over the internet free of charge.

He said the on-demand window allows users to catch up on the past seven days' worth of TV and radio programmes, explore the BBC archive, or create their own news bulletins based on the stories that interest them.

"If that trial is successful, we'll be proposing MyBBCPlayer to our board of governors. If it passes what will be one of the first 'public value tests' and receives all other necessary consents, we would aim to launch it in 2006.

"MyBBCPlayer points up another important theme. It's not a separate service alongside BBC Television and Radio. It is television and radio delivered by other means."

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