Fed: Senate to probe details of ABC on line deals

AAP General News (Australia)
02-17-2000
Fed: Senate to probe details of ABC on line deals

By Krista Hughes

CANBERRA, Feb 17 AAP - ABC deals to provide news and other content to commercial Internet
sites are to be scrutinised by a Senate committee, which will also consider the wider
role of the ABC on-line.

The inquiry, sparked by controversy over the national broadcaster's proposed $67.5
million deal with Telstra, comes as the ABC said it might reconsider its policy of allowing
advertising on news index web pages.

ABC head of business development Harry Bardwell said the ABC's existing on-line contracts
allowed operators to run advertisements beside ABC news headlines, which could include
a lead paragraph.

"We are looking at the possibility of reducing it to just a headline," he said, after
the ALP attacked advertising being run on the stockmarket investment site EquityCafe.

Site operator Digital Media Productions today cut ABC content on the home page - which
contains advertisements for ANZ, Westpac and travel.com - to headlines only, after a call
from the ABC.

But Mr Bardwell said EquityCafe had not been in breach of its contract and other websites
running ABC news were under no obligation to cut back content to headlines only on index
pages.

Labor Senator Mark Bishop said confusion over when and where advertising was allowed
was one driver for public scrutiny of ABC on-line deals, which are expected to net at
least $85 million over the next five years.

"It is a bit like the bucket, it is either half full or half empty," he told parliament.

"Either you have advertising, either you have alternate revenue streams, either they
are the dominant factor in the funding of an independent corporation, or they are not."

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