Brussels, 03/11/2006 (Agence Europe) - American company Google, the creator of the famous internet search engine has called on the Commission not to impose the rules on content and advertising contained in the Television Without Frontiers (TWF) Directive on the Internet. The draft review of this directive, presented on 13 December 2005, is currently under study in the European Council and Parliament. At a meeting this week with representatives from the cabinets of Commissioners Neelie Kroes (Competition) and Viviane Reding (Media), Google Vice-President David Drummond said he was very worried at the extension of the scope of the directive to non-linear services, which could restrict the broadcasting of televised and videos available on line. “Imagine the difficulties of applying these regulations to the hundreds and thousands of videos being uploaded every day,” he said. Extending the scope of the directive in this way would stifle innovation in Europe and complicate unjustifiably the task of companies like Google by requiring them to fully check all that they were about to put out on line. Mr Drummond said the participative nature of Internet services, which involved television, consumers and many other players, led automatically to natural monitoring of harmful or harmful content. He went on to suggest to the Commission that it refer rather to the “very progressive” e-commerce directive, which makes on line content the responsibility of national governments and not of the European Community. (il)