The nation does not have laws to regulate over-the-top (OTT) content providers, National Communications Commission (NCC) Chairman Howard Shyr (石世豪) said yesterday, adding that the Legislative Yuan has to decide if Chinese OTT providers would be allowed to offer services in Taiwan.
A report published by the Liberty Times (the Taipei Times’ sister newspaper) on Sunday showed that Chinese OTT firm iQiyi this month set up a Web page in traditional Chinese characters targeting Taiwanese subscribers. Like the US streaming service provider Netflix, iQiyi has also started charging Taiwanese a monthly service fee for accessing its content.
Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) Legislator Chen Ou-po (陳歐珀) yesterday asked why Neflix has to establish a branch office in Taiwan, but iQiyi does not.
Shyr said the government does not have laws requiring OTT content providers to establish a branch in Taiwan, adding that whether OTT content should be regulated depends on how Taiwan positions itself in its trade relations with other nations.
“Many OTT providers, including Netflix, want to set up a local office because they want to ensure and enhance the transmission quality of their content,” he said.
Shyr said the commission has recently proposed a new act dealing with issues of electronic communication, in which anyone is given the right to provide contents or services over the Internet. A person would only require permission from the government if the service he or she provides is regulated by the government.
Neither current regulations nor the new act regulate OTT content providers, who offer services only through the Internet and need not set up an office or a company in the targeted localities.
Shyr said the Act Governing Relations Between the People of Taiwan Area and the Mainland Area (兩岸人民關係條例) only regulates radio and television programs from China, which might be imported, distributed, sold, produced, broadcast, displayed or exhibited in Taiwan with permission from the Ministry of Culture.
“Whether a Chinese OTT provider can come to Taiwan and establish a company here is more than just a cultural issue, which should be decided by legislators,” he said.
A group of Taiwanese-American and Tibetan-American students at Harvard University on Saturday disrupted Chinese Ambassador to the US Xie Feng’s (謝鋒) speech at the school, accusing him of being responsible for numerous human rights violations. Four students — two Taiwanese Americans and two from Tibet — held up banners inside a conference hall where Xie was delivering a speech at the opening ceremony of the Harvard Kennedy School China Conference 2024. In a video clip provided by the Coalition of Students Resisting the CCP (Chinese Communist Party), Taiwanese-American Cosette Wu (吳亭樺) and Tibetan-American Tsering Yangchen are seen holding banners that together read:
UNAWARE: Many people sit for long hours every day and eat unhealthy foods, putting them at greater risk of developing one of the ‘three highs,’ an expert said More than 30 percent of adults aged 40 or older who underwent a government-funded health exam were unaware they had at least one of the “three highs” — high blood pressure, high blood lipids or high blood sugar, the Health Promotion Administration (HPA) said yesterday. Among adults aged 40 or older who said they did not have any of the “three highs” before taking the health exam, more than 30 percent were found to have at least one of them, Adult Preventive Health Examination Service data from 2022 showed. People with long-term medical conditions such as hypertension or diabetes usually do not
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Heat advisories were in effect for nine administrative regions yesterday afternoon as warm southwesterly winds pushed temperatures above 38°C in parts of southern Taiwan, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. As of 3:30pm yesterday, Tainan’s Yujing District (玉井) had recorded the day’s highest temperature of 39.7°C, though the measurement will not be included in Taiwan’s official heat records since Yujing is an automatic rather than manually operated weather station, the CWA said. Highs recorded in other areas were 38.7°C in Kaohsiung’s Neimen District (內門), 38.2°C in Chiayi City and 38.1°C in Pingtung’s Sandimen Township (三地門), CWA data showed. The spell of scorching