Al Jazeera Being Blackballed?: Update…

Following up on this, Kevin Coy of News on News emailed in the following…

EBU (you’re correct, it’s European Broadcasting Union), was created to provide easy access to extensive sat uplink provisions for european broadcasters. EBU is funded by the state broadcasters (BBC etc), but commercial broadcasters can use the services at a subsidised rate. Al Jaz is allowed to utilise these as Al Jaz English has a huge ops base in London. It comes as no suprise that the EBU cut Al Jaz’ links, as the EBU is very much tied to the EU, and the EU has been suspiciously quiet on the whole Egyptian uprising story, leading to thinking that the EU is most probably fiscally tied to Egypt or has interests there that they don’t want upsetting.

That then becomes a very political minefield, and exposes political impact of the EU on media coverage. Cue a great big can of worms being opened up.

You are also correct too that Al Jaz English is still broadcasting extensive coverage using broadband connections. One brief testcard displayed the phrase ‘Slingbox’ which may give an insight into the technology they are using.

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