Formats Revisited

The recent High Court judgment in Wade and another vs British Sky Broadcasting Ltd revisits the familiar territory of TV formats and the difficulties of protecting them in law.

The claimants were the creators of a proposed TV format. They presented their ideas to B Sky B for a new show in which singer-songwriters would compete against one another singing their own material. The prime-time show would avoid the manufactured qualities of the X Factor but the public would vote for their favourite performers by telephone and would be able to download the songs which they performed on TV: the songs would be eligible for inclusion in the UK music charts. The show was to be called The Real Deal. The claimants pitched their ideas for The Real Deal to B Sky B with the aid of a deck of power-point slides which summarised the essential elements that would make up the format of their proposed show.