Jordan and the Media Tax

Jordan's government was planning to cancel a media tax on advertising revenues (currently set at 5%). The Senate Education Committee rejected this cancellation and proposed lowering the tax to 1% of ad revenues.
The Senate has now to approve this change.

ATV is back...again

Jordan's first private TV group is back! ATV which initially supposed to start broadcasting two years ago, but was closed by Jordanian authorities, announced that it will resume broadcasting next spring 2009.

The group will launch three channels simultaneously (a news channel, an entertainment channel, a religious channel) under its new ownership structure (Mr. Radi Al Khass purchased 13% of teh channel from previous owner Mr. Muhammad Alyan; even though the current structure is still murky...)

Info from agencies, Al Akhbar newspaper and own sources.

The Week in the press

*Tunisian pollster company : Sigma, published a survey on Tunisian TV watching during Ramadan (prime time)

Tunisian TV Channel 1 (Government TV): 46%
Hanibaal TV (Private TV): 22%
Tunisian TV Channel 2 (Government TV): 21%
Others (Arab channels): 11%

* Jordan Children channel launched its new website

*Syrian banned Al Hayat newspaper (Al Hayat is based in London, but is Saudi owned)