On 12 and 13 October, the 14th Legal & Public Affairs Assembly of the European Broadcasting Union (EBU) was held in Sofia. More than 80 delegates of 40 media organizations from 27 countries arrived for the forum hosted by the Bulgarian National Radio (BNR). The key topic in the program was governance of public service media (PSM) organizations in the digital world.

In a speech at the event’s opening, Bulgarian National Radio Director General Alexander Velev pointed out that digitalization of radio arrives with a host of challenges and also with plenty of opportunity for providing better services to audiences. Among keynote speakers was Milen Mitev, BNR Chief Legal Officer and member of the EBU Legal Committee.

What is the role and the optimal regulation of public service media in today’s pluralistic and digitalized world? The EBU Legal Director Dr Richard Burnley outlines the important role that public service media has to play today as well as to the relevance of its adequate regulation:

EBU Head of Media and Communications Law Michael Wagner casts light on some of the core values of present-day media and the challenges it is faced with:

In this environment experts are unanimous that the method of public service media funding plays a decisive role for its independence and for the quality of content. More from Michael Wagner:

In Bulgaria public service media and the Bulgarian National Radio in particular is financed for the most part by the state budget under a three-year term of office of the director general. For a start Richard Burnley sees a need to extend this term to 5-6 years, so as to allow the BNR management to properly carry out its program. However Dr Burnley also points to the obvious advantages of funding PSM via license fees: