Although Lord Carter’s yesterday’s report (Digital Britain) about the future of the digitalisation in the UK did not produce any big surprises, it would still change the development of the British information society significantly. Here are some of the most interesting aspects of the strategic paper.

1. Public funding will be granted for the provision of broadband internet access for all British households by 2012, including the most distant house in the countryside. It will be funded by a surplus from BBC’s licence fees , primarily  alloted  for the development of digital televison, plus an anual tax of 6 pounds, collected from all owners of fixed telephone lines.

2. All internet service providers will be forced by Ofcom to reduce the illegal file sharing by 70% by the end of the year. Thus, ISPs will turn into digital police stations collecting data from all illegal downloaders and submitting it to the music/film companies and Ofcom. The regulatory body will be than authorised to reduce the speed or the capacity of the “guilty” user by thus limiting his/her possibilities to download further copyrighted content.  Although this sanction is obviously  softer than its equivalent in France, which foresees cutting off the internet access completely, it is still expected to cause an uproar among the internet users in the country.

3. Regional news providers (ITV) together will children programming providers (Channel 4) will both benefit from the licence fees. BBC’s trust does not seem very happy about sharing its funding with commercially financed broadcasters, by arguing that the licence fee should not be implemented from the government for politically and commercially motivated purposes

A very interesting list of the winners and losers after the report can be found here. More interesting reactions on “Digital Britain” – here.

Related Articles on Internet Piracy in France and Sweden.