The British Broadcasting Corporation confirmed yesterday it is to launch a subscription-free virtual internet service provider under the branding freebeeb.net, in partnership with Scottish Telecom. The content will be provided by the BBC’s commercial arm BBC Worldwide, which can pump money back into the license-fee-funded BBC, but not take any from it. Scottish Telecom will be the actual service provider, taking care of infrastructure behind the scenes.
The service will be launched in the summer, but the BBC has yet to reveal its distribution model. It does own the Radio Times listing magazine, which would seem appropriate for circulating start-up CDs, with over a million readers weekly, but could also promote the service via the beeb.com commercial web site and with advertising on its two TV channels. Regulations stipulate that the organization can advertise its related commercial services on BBC1 and BBC2, the UK’s two license funded national television networks, only when there is a direct editorial link between the content of a preceding show and the commercial content.
Freebeeb is the fifth virtual ISP to launch in the UK in four days, and the phenomenon has now also hit the Republic of Ireland, with the launch of oceanfree.net. The service will be run by Ocean Ltd, a half-owned telco subsidiary of British Telecommunications Plc.
