The Premier League has just been handed a judgement form the European courts that are going to affect the broadcasting of the sport significantly. The courts have said that the way that the rights to broadcast sports on a nation by nation basis are contrary to EU law. This ruling is going to change the way that the sport has been broadcast for many years and is also going to affect the broadcasting of other media including television shows and films.
Initially people are going to be able to get around the restriction by buying a foreign television decoder and watching the sport in a different language. Or the can just mute the sound and tune into the radio commentary. This is something that people who are in another country have been doing for years so they can watch UK games abroad.
While this decision has been something of a blow for television operator Sky the situation is unlikely to cause them too much concern. They have an army of lawyers who are working on ways to keep the situation as it has been and the shares in the company only slipped three per cent after the ruling.
The other person who lost on the verdict was Karen Murphy, the owner of the pub who started the whole controversy by going aboard to buy a TV decoder so she would not have to pay the high prices Sky charge to broadcast games in pubs. Interestingly the court said that she was not breaching copyright for broadcasting the match itself, but she was for broadcasting the logo of the Premier League The Premier League is sure that it will be able to stop people from broadcasting the games by ensuring that the logo is viable at all times during games.