 |
Contents of today's ICOMP newsletter: 
Through many conversations with members and stakeholders, ICOMP has come to believe that transparency and openness in the search advertising marketplace are of central importance as it is online advertising that makes possible many of the free services that the public enjoys online today. The conclusion reached by participants was that the opacity within online advertising, arguably the engine room of the Internet, is potentially stifling the promise of the Internet to deliver value and innovation. "The recent economic downturn has brought about a focus on accountability," Lord Watson, ICOMP's Chairman said, "it therefore stands to reason that there is great interest in this subject both within Brussels and across Europe." The White Paper 'Openness and the Internet' is available here.
Questions that remained unanswered during the hearing also led to ICOMP, CEPIC, Börsenverein and SuMa-eV (the Association for the Promotion of Search Engine Technology and Free Access to Knowledge) sending a public letter to Commissioner Charlie McCreevy.
|
|
ICOMP launched its Imperatives for a Healthy, Secure and Competitive Internet on 6 October during a lunch debate at the Presidential Salon in the European Parliament in Brussels with Commissioner Viviane Reding. The debate, hosted by the German Liberal MEP Alexander Alvaro, one of the Parliament's most outspoken experts on internet issues, and chaired by Lord Watson of Richmond, ICOMP's Chairman, was attended by over 50 people, including Members of the European Parliament, ICOMP Council Members, as well as other industry representatives and journalists.
Commissioner Viviane Reding was presented with the first copy of the 'Internet Imperatives', a charter produced by ICOMP highlighting some of the key issues facing the digital economy, and marking a starting point for a debate among policy-makers, industry and the general public on the concrete steps to be taken by the incoming European Commission and the recently elected European Parliament in the new parliamentary term to address the key challenges facing the digital world. To view the Imperatives, click 
Among the top EU priorities for the online marketplace was addressing the issue of mass scale digitisation of books and orphan works, Commissioner Reding told the audience. In particular, she said that the EU should create "a modern set of European rules that encourage the digitisation of books, including a European Rights Registry or a European System of Rights Registries able to guarantee that publishers and authors' rights are respected and fairly remunerated." Commissioner Reding also mentioned that before the end of her mandate, she will launch a reflection paper with a set of possible policy and legislative options aimed at paving the way for a Digital Single Market for Creative Content for the benefit of right holders, internet service providers and consumers. Finally, she underlined the protection of privacy and of personal data in the online environment as another key issue that needs to be addressed.
Following the event in the European Parliament, ICOMP held a Business Roundtable to introduce and discuss its newly published White Paper on the role of transparency in online search and search advertising, the first in a series of White Papers exploring areas/qualities which ICOMP believes are imperative to a healthy online marketplace. Roundtable participants included a select group of EU decision makers, academics and industry experts. Presentations on the subject were given by Ben Edelman (Assistant Professor at Harvard Business School), Shivaun Raff (co-Founder of leading Vertical Search Engine Foundem), and Brendan Tansey (UK CEO of Wunderman).
