Media Study - Medija centar Beograd

An example from CEE transition countries, which has often been mentioned by interviewees in Serbia, is
Slovakia’s former state agency TASR 83 and the major privately owned Slovak news agency SITA. After a
long period of bitter fights following the establishment of SITA in the mid 90’s a delicate balance between
the two competitors could be achieved. During the EU accession process TASR has been transformed into
a public institution, the limited state support is clearly declared as state aid and the profile of TASR has
been reshaped to reflect its primarily public obligations. SITA is still not making big profits but it has been
able to stabilize its position on the market by especially increasing its portfolio of services towards
audiovisual, new media and interactive ones.
82 Ritzau's Bureau I/S is a media-owned partnership and includes three subsidiaries, which are owned exclusively by Ritzau's Bureau. Ritzau's
Medienet A/S operates a distribution and service network as an intranet, linking costumers to Ritzau's news service and other content providers
such as photo agencies. The Medienet intranet is faster, safer and has a greater capacity than the open internet. Ritzau Medieservice A/S offers
sports results, sports tabels, and cinema tabels, radio- and tv-tabels. RB-Boersen A/S, a financial news agency, offers financial news to financial
institutions, investors and major companies.
83 Being a split of former Czecho-Slovak state agency CTK, TASR – the Slovak News Agency – was established as stipulated in the (Slovak) Act No.
385/2008 on the Slovak News Agency and in changes of several acts as of September 23, 2008. It is a public-service, national, independent and
information institution that provides public service in the field of news.
The main activity of TASR is a public service in the field of providing news reports. This public service involves the search for and processing of
news items that are: up-to-date, on time, verified, unbiased and impartial; processed in the form of text, audio, audio-video, video or
multimedia files; broadcast via domestic and foreign news agency service. The service also includes storing of the collected news and the
provision of access to them. TASR carries out its tasks in the public interest in accordance with Paragraph 3, Section 5 of Act No. 385/2008
(broadcasting act).
TASR legal and business standing: TASR was established by law, it is a legal entity filed in the business registry – it has clear profile of a “public
institution” similar to Slovak public service television STV or radio SRo. The responsibility for its activities lies with its CEO, who is elected by the
TASR Administration Council.
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