The idea, much as it was with printed content, is to archive the U.K.’s cultural and intellectual output. The libraries — including the British Library, the national libraries of Scotland and Wales, Trinity College Library Dublin, the Bodleian Libraries and Cambridge University Library — will be allowed to scrape and store everything on the .uk domain, and to demand copies of ebooks, e-journals and even CD-ROMs published in the U.K.

Here’s an interesting snippet from the FAQs:

“Legal Deposit Libraries will copy U.K.-published material from the internet, including freely accessible material on the open web. They are also entitled to harvest copies of password-protected or paid-for material, but are putting alternative arrangements in place for any publisher who prefers to deliver such material to them instead.”

A British Library spokesman confirmed to me on Friday that this was a reference to paywalled content. However, given that people will only be able to access the archive by physically visiting the libraries in question, and that there will be a seven-day lag between publication and archiving, that shouldn’t be too much of a problem for the publishers.

The spokesman said social media output would also be included, “as long as it is U.K.-based and openly available on the web,” and confirmed that this includes identifiably U.K.-based individuals’ Twitter feeds, although “we’d need to select people because it’s a .com” — no Library of Congress-style catch-all approach, then.

“The main thing we’re trying to capture first time round is .uk domain websites,” the spokesman added, while also stressing that no non-public social media material would be scraped.

On the book publishing side, The Bookseller reported that priority will be given to ebook-only publishers. This is presumably because those who aren’t ebook only are already submitting their books under the previously existing legal deposit scheme.

So why is this all happening? As my colleague Mathew Ingram pointed out last year, digital content can often be ephemeral and easily lost. That sentiment was echoed on Friday by British Library chief executive Roly Keating:

“Ten years ago, there was a very real danger of a black hole opening up and swallowing our digital heritage, with millions of web pages, e-publications and other non-print items falling through the cracks of a system that was devised primarily to capture ink and paper.

The regulations now coming into force make digital legal deposit a reality, and ensure that the Legal Deposit Libraries themselves are able to evolve — collecting, preserving and providing long-term access to the profusion of cultural and intellectual content appearing online or in other digital formats.”

The U.K. is not the first country to update its legal deposit rules in this way – similar requirements are in place in Denmark, Finland, Sweden and New Zealand.

This week Tamiz made wave with an appeal against Google, which he was trying to sue over defamatory comments about him made on Blogger posting. In a case that goes back to 2011, Tamiz had argued that Google was effectively the publisher of a series of comments calling him, falsely, a thief and a drug dealer, and should have deleted them as soon as they were made aware of them. Google did delete the comments, but only after a five week gap.

Tamiz is familiar with online controversy: one reason he was a lightning rod for angry comments in the first place was because, he stepped down as a local election candidate in 2011 after calling Margate’s women “sluts” on Facebook. And so, when he did not originally win his case — the first judge ruling that Google was not the publisher of the comments — he appealed to a higher court. There Google’s inaction was found to be troubling, though it did not actually overturn the libel ruling itself.

As the Financial Times reported:

Although Lord Justice Richards and Lord Justice Sullivan agreed with the original ruling that Google was not the primary or secondary publisher of the content it hosted, they said it was “at least arguable that some point after notification Google became liable for continued publication of the material”.

The Lords Justice likened the situation to a 1930s court case in which a golf club was held responsible for defamatory material left on its noticeboard because it failed to remove it after it was notified.

Cue the shrill sound of the press screeching into action. “Blogger.com libel case opens door for internet giant being required to monitor users’ posts”, squealed the Daily Mail with barely contained delight. Except, as it outlines in the story, the headline is essentially trolling — Tamiz was denied his libel claim and asked to pay 50 percent of Google’s legal costs: likely to be a tidy sum. And it’s a stretch to suggest, as much commentary does, that this is another step towards internet regulation — asking a company to respond to notices of illegal content may not be popular (just see the DMCA) but it is reasonable to expect them to comply with local jurisdiction.

Still, Tamiz — and the kerfuffle around his case — does show the amount of energy being expended around online libel in Britain right now.

Defamation laws in the U.K. are notoriously harsh, in large part because they lean in favor of the plaintiff and put the burden of proof on the defendant: it’s a case of “prove your comments were true” rather than “prove their comments were false”.

And the precedent for defamation in online publishing stretches back 15 years, to the case of Godfrey v Demon Internet Service, in which a physics lecturer sued an ISP over comments made in a Usenet group it hosted: the ISP settled the case, because a pre-trial ruling intimated that it was potentially culpable since, despite knowledge of the situation, refused to act for 10 days. Although the award was small — just £15,000 in 1997, the equivalent of around $33,000 today — it has laid the groundwork in Britain.

It’s one major reason many media companies employ battalions of comment moderators, and carefully police the comment threads on their own stories.

But remember, we are all media companies now. And that means that we are all open to the same set of rules. There have also been plenty of high-profile cases on Twitter and Facebook against individual users, but so far there has not been much success in taking on platform providers themselves. Just last week a judge in Northern Ireland ruled that while anonymous comments made on Facebook were defamatory, Facebook itself was not liable.

Still, with Godfrey in the background and more and more cases coming along, you can understand why people see Tamiz’s case as another push at a brick in the wall between platforms and publishing.

Yes, everyone’s a media company now: and eventually that will go for Google, Facebook, Twitter and the rest as much as it does you and me.

Some of the measures are terrifically obvious, none more so than the legalization of format-shifting – yes, copying music from a CD to your iPhone is still technically illegal in the UK, although no-one gets prosecuted for it.

Others bring the UK much closer to the U.S. fair use system. For example, a copyright exemption will now be brought in for parody, caricature and pastiche. In other words, stuff like that Newport State Of Mind parody will no longer be illegal. Witness the tentative relief of Rob Manuel, the man behind the hilarious and usually NSFW B3ta:

Has the Government made B3ta / photoshopping (sort of) legal? Yay. Huzzah.news.bis.gov.uk/Press-Releases…

— Rob Manuel (@robmanuel) December 20, 2012

Bafflingly, the government says it will “allow limited copying on a fair dealing basis which would allow genuine parody, but prohibit copying disguised as parody”. The Intellectual Property Office, which the reforms will put in charge of “clarifying areas where there is confusion or misunderstanding on the scope and application of copyright law”, clearly needs something to keep it busy.

The reforms should have a big impact on the educational and research sectors. Again with some absurdity, the current IP regime makes it legally risky for teachers to show copyrighted material over interactive whiteboards and distance-learning systems – this will be fixed, as will the ban on allowing the copying of sound recordings, films and broadcasts for private study and non-commercial research.

Don’t go thinking this is exactly like the U.S. fair use system, though. As a spokesperson for the government’s business department handily spelt it out for me:

“The proposals to reform UK copyright exceptions include a number of specific exceptions which are limited by a requirement that any use of the exception be fair dealing. This is not the same as the US ‘fair use’ approach which allows a broad range of unspecified uses as long as they are fair.”

Still, much closer than before. There’s good news too for people with disabilities: the reform gives them the right to “obtain copyright works in accessible formats” if an accessible version isn’t already on the market.

And for those doing big data research? The reforms will also “allow non-commercial researchers to use computers to study published research results and other data without copyright law interfering”.

“Making the intellectual property framework fit for the 21st century is not only common sense but good business sense. Bringing the law into line with ordinary people’s reasonable expectations will boost respect for copyright, on which our creative industries rely,” business secretary Vince Cable said in a statement.

“We feel we have struck the right balance between improving the way consumers benefit from copyright works they have legitimately paid for, boosting business opportunities and protecting the rights of creators.”

Which is very true. If you’re trying to get people to stop unlawfully copying stuff, as is the case with the UK government, you’ll want to legalize the kinds of copying that people don’t even know are illegal. It’s a lot easier to sell a system that makes sense.

The government also reckons that the changes will contribute “at least £500m” ($813m) to the UK economy over the next 10 years. I suspect that precise figure has been pulled out of someone’s posterior, but the research implications alone should generate significant value.

And now Last.fm is cutting back even further on playing tunes, as it struggles to turn a profit for owner CBS.

The service, which is celebrating its tenth anniversary currently, will in 2013 require subscription for the “radio” features of its desktop client in the US, UK and Germany, and will stop offering the service elsewhere in the world except Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Ireland and Brazil (announcement). Curiously, web radio will remain free.

A CBS VP with Last.fm oversight told me in 2010 it hoped to turn a profit that year, but we have since received no confirmation, when asked, that has yet happened.

Last.fm introduced the £3-a-month subscriptions belatedly in March 2009 as it dawned on the industry that ad-supported music streaming could not support online businesses in the same way it does traditional radio. A year later, it abandoned on-demand music streaming — the most costly of all to license.

Instead, Last.fm is happy to advise users to listen instead through services like Spotify, which have overtaken it in the sexy stakes and inside which Last.fm now even has an app of its own. At the end of the day, why shouldn’t Last.fm charge for the same kind of service Pandora does?

With less and less music — at least, free music — Last.fm is reverting to its original core concept of tracking listening habits (or, “scrobbling”) and making connections through the data. The site is celebrating its tenth birthday by outputting historic artist and track popularity data as charts in press releases. Like a 90s boy band reforming for one last tour, if there were a more potent illustration that much of the value of Last.fm  – which CBS acquired for $280 million in 2007 — is in the past, I don’t know what it would be.

But this diminished focus is, at the same time, joyous — for, connecting data about songs and their listeners has always been Last.fm’s strong suit…

• Any lapsed Last.fm users like me who revisit the site today will find the recommendations and gig listings based on their listening habits are excellent.
• When experienced inside Spotify, Last.fm’s recommendations are one of the best things about the Swedish music player, which has lacked meaningful discovery features until last week’s upgrade announcement.
• Meanwhile, the Xbox Last.fm app, free for those who subscribe to a Gold Xbox Live membership, is an excellent way to program eclectic music during parties.

Last.fm’s radio subscriptions may keep ticking over with perhaps a couple of hundred thousand subscribers. But now it’s probably time to mine the music data, not the music itself, to find Last.fm’s real value.

For their first iPad app, the publications have launched e-edition replicas that mimic the printed red-tops in every way, save for the £0.45 ($0.72) price.

Many publishers like The Guardian and FT, for their first iPad foray, launch for free on the device, often with a big advertising sponsor, in order to build audience, only to require subscriptions a few months later. Though most newspaper websites, including on iPad, are free, the typical iPad newspaper app subscription pricepoint has settled at £9.99 per month.

For the Mirror and Record, however, there is not yet any suggestion that the zero cover price is a temporary, audience-gathering exercise.

That makes this launch interesting. In a possible future where print is replaced by tablet consumption, the Daily Mirror and Daily Record just became freesheets. Former Mirror digital publisher Matt Kelly calls it “game-changing”.

remarkable move on ipad by The Daily Mirror – totally free five days a week, then the weekend editions only available in print. Gamechanger.

— Matt Kelly (@mk1969) December 3, 2012

London’s Evening Standard has already successfully gone free in print on the city’s streets, increasing advertisers’ exposure through heightened circulation, and recently moved back in to profit. Some industry observers believe only a free future is viable in an age where paid circulation is declining for most titles.

In the Mirror and Record‘s cases, the e-edition downloads are free only on weekdays — weekend editions still require payment.

But newspapers’ historic strength has been their financing by multiple revenue streams — ads and cover price. So are the Mirror and Record crazy to lock themselves in to a future where no-one pays anything for them?

Last year, the papers jointly circulated over 1.4 million printed copies per day, making £256.6 million in annual circulation revenue and £135.1 million in advertising revenue.

So, in a future in which they replaced their paid, printed newspapers with free tablet editions, the publications would be losing their largest income source.

Last year, they reached around 4.1 million readers per issue combined. But this secondary readership in a tablet world would certainly diminish, since few people will share their iPad in the same way they will share a low-cost printed paper. So even advertiser outlook may be diminished.

Also, tablet ownership amongst the Mirror and Record reader demographics are not yet at the levels of, say, The Times.

However, there is one big benefit that likely rides above all others for the titles — any free downloads they do get will be added to their declining print circulation. That is because, while native-looking tablet apps don’t count toward ABC data, e-replica distribution can be pitched, by canny ad sales staff, as extra circulation.

What we are likely seeing is the iPad being used to prop up circs, more than the definition of a whole new business model in its own right.

All in all, this is likely a smart first move for publisher Trinity Mirror to gently build up a tablet audience and stabilise its declining print base. When readers open the app — which, by virtue of being a replica, was likely cheap to build and which requires zooming to read text easily — they are asked by Apple to share their name, email address and post code with the publisher.

That information can be used to target future promotions — perhaps future subscription invitations?

Many a publisher tweaks its tablet and mobile business model along the way, and I would be surprised if Daily Mirror and Daily Record are yet committing themselves to a free future forever.

Now video ad targeting will come to the living room, when the UK’s two big pay-TV operators will soon start showing targeted ads to viewers in 2013.

The launches could improve effectiveness of a TV advertising business that is still growing strong thanks to its mass broadcast appeal but which could wring out even more dollars by guaranteeing advertiser outlay.

The products

Leading provider BSkyB will trial-launch an NDS Dynamic-powered service to seven million set top boxes under the AdSmart banner by the summer, allowing advertisers to target 90 different demographic attributes. According to Sky:

“Sky AdSmart uses the capability of the Sky+HD set top box to schedule advertisements seamlessly over the linear broadcast stream, when triggered by specified attributes.

“When a break contains a Sky AdSmart instruction, a unique code is sent to all Sky+HD STBs at the precise moment selected in the schedule. Households with matching attributes will seamlessly trigger the playing of an appropriate ad for the circumstances.”

Ads can be pushed to the boxes via Sky’s satellite dishes and stored for later playback. Some 500,000 of the 1.3 million internet-connected boxes Sky has in the market will be used as a viewing panel, recording an ad impression when at least 75 percent of the ad is viewed.

So far, Sky will only get to place such ads in the breaks on its own channels – Sky 1, Sky Sports, Sky Atlantic, Sky Movies, Sky Arts, Sky Living, Challenge and Pick TV. Rival broadcasters like ITV will prefer to keep their ad sell for themselves.

Cable operator Virgin Media says it will also roll out targeted TV advertising, but details are sketchier. Commercial director Mark Brandon says (via DTVE) it will introduce “advanced” on-demand ads on its TiVo box.

The operator will launch a “full-scale” service next year but is taking the prospect “one step at a time”, Brandon said.

The impact

TV advertising is still a healthy medium and is projected by analysts to hoover up more money each year going forward.

Broadcasters already “target” ads by commissioning shows for specific demographics.

Further “targeted” ad initiatives like these will need to prove both that they can target further than the conventional TV schedule, and work effortlessly, to trump the established paradigm.

These launches’ biggest impact could be to establish platform operators, not broadcast networks, as the most more innovative ad targeters.

The result leaves large mainstream newspaper publishers, which are in decline, the focus of the proposed new standards enforcer — but appears to leave untouched the growing wave of online-only outlets that inquiry chair Lord Justice Leveson nevertheless believes often operate to even lower standards than newspapers.

Weblogs aren’t news, aren’t even popular

Beside the proprietors of several large newspapers, victims of press intrusion and other interested parties, the nine-month-long Leveson iniquiry heard from the publishers of the weblogs Holy Moly (1.6 million monthly visitors), Guido Fawkes (up to 100,000 daily readers), Popbitch (350,000 subscribers) and Huffington Post UK. His report also notes that many large newspapers now publish their own weblogs.

But Leveson’s report nevertheless uses a narrow definition to appear to dismiss the notion “weblogs” could ever produce newspaper-like content…

“Although the blogs cited here are read by very large numbers of people, it should not detract from the fact that most blogs are read by very few people.

“Indeed, most blogs are rarely read as news or factual, but as opinion and must be considered as such”.

In truth, “weblogs” nowadays can no longer be described as simply opinion journals, and are often regarded merely as content management systems for publishing news, opinion, gossip, high-quality investigative journalism and scurrilous defamation — all the equally excellent and embarrassing kinds of content which large news institutions are accused of committing.

Many publishers on weblog platforms are becoming — and have already become — very popular and influential, and will become only more so as print media wane. Most newspaper publishers also publish their own weblogs.

Leveson remains interested in weblogs elsewhere in his final report, but not in considering whether they should be regulated in the same way he is proposing of newspapers. Instead, he notes instances in which newspapers nowadays often report unverified stories by reporting what weblogs themselves are saying — a kind of blogging in print by proxy. It is the newspapers and not the blogs which Leveson is putting on alert.

‘Twitter too small to be news’

One of the biggest digital stories of the year has been the challenges posed by social media users naming alleged criminals and, prejudicing trials and defaming others — the same accusations levelled at many in the “press”. In his report, Leveson acknowledges:

“Although there is limited news provision in the terms that are relevant to this Inquiry on pure social networking sites, all social networks provide opportunities for individuals to disseminate and discuss news, information and comment.”

But he nevertheless contends:

“Despite their extraordinary growth, as with most blogs, in the main, few tweets or social network pages are read by very large numbers of people, most tweets are read by very few people.”

This overlooks not only the rapid explosion of news delivered “socially” by the same institutional publishers who are Leveson’s focus (The Guardian now has a very large Facebook audience) but also the massive disruptive effects threatened by amplification of amateurs’ own inter-personal social messaging.

One of several apparent contradictions in his report, Leveson later himself recants the tale of a Twitter user who “had posted on Twitter anticipating a small circulation to her followers but failing to take account of the ability to retweet and so reaching a far wider audience”. And he later acknowledges that social media do have enough heft to disrupt conventional news publishers:

“Newspapers in this country cannot be viewed as once they were, as being uniquely responsible for the delivery of news. They are not. Control over information which might have been possible in an earlier age can be defeated instantly on Twitter or any one of many other social media sites.”

So who regulates social media?

If weblogs and social networks are not to fall under the auspice of Lord Justice Leveson’s proposed new press self-regulating watchdog, how are they to be regulated? Using existing laws, some of which are adequate and some of which are struggling to keep pace, he suggests…

For example, internet services like Google, Facebook and Twitter have pledged to act in accordance with UK law, removing content where the law has judged it illegal.

But Leveson acknowledges not all is perfect vis-a-vis these platforms:

“They are, however, understandably unwilling to make decisions on whether content may or may not be illegal or to take decisions where there are grey areas in law.”

And that can also leave victims of defamation or intrusion aggrieved:

“In some cases, considerable damage may have been done to the subject of those allegations before a judgment has been reached and the defamatory content consequently removed.”

Social can regulate itself, the law can try keeping up

Leveson acknowledges that, if social media were newspapers, they would have to work to his proposed new regulation agency:

“Although social networking sites are not obviously in competition with newspapers for audience, revenue or advertising, they may be used to publish information that would not be able to be published by a newspaper in conformity with the standards set by self-regulation.”

But he says such platforms have in-built organic correction mechanisms of the kind the new body will have to build for itself:

“The instant nature of social networking also differentiates it from more traditional media. Rebuttals and denials of allegations can take place instantly, helping if not to kill a story at least to provide the subject of the story with a voice and make users aware that the veracity of the allegation or story may be in doubt.”

The dozens of politicians recently named on Twitter as potential child abusers might disagree, as the recent outcry over the Twitter naming of a former politician at the centre of a BBC Newsnight report would suggest.

But, whilst Leveson is cognicent of the many areas in which law is currently being tested to keep up with social, this was not the remit of his inquiry in to “press” standards.

But technology platforms and digital libertarians alike should rejoice at, not feel affronted by, the report’s ignorance — for, it seems to recommend specific new regulation only for that waning group of large publishers who print newspapers.

For an inquiry that was tasked by government to examine the “press”, this focus is perhaps unsurprising. But Leveson’s intellectual contortions, in exploring news publishers’ online evolution, are curious, and important in assessing where UK media policy currently lays…

Newspapers better than the internet

Leveson’s 1,987-page report appears to rule out out extending proposed new self-regulation to online-only publications and has rejected newspaper publishers’ argument that they should be allowed to re-publish whatever is online — on the basis of a fundamental value judgement…

“The internet does not claim to operate by any particular ethical standards, still less high ones. Some have called it a ‘wild west’ but I would prefer to use the term ‘ethical vacuum’.

“This is not to say for one moment that everything on the internet is therefore unethical. That would be a gross mischaracterisation of the work of very many bloggers and websites which should rightly and fairly be characterised as valuable and professional. (But) bloggers and others may, if they choose, act with impunity.

“The press, on the other hand, does claim to operate by and adhere to an ethical code of conduct. People will not assume that what they read on the internet is trustworthy or that it carries any particular assurance or accuracy; it need be no more than one person’s view. There is none of the notional imprimatur or kitemark which comes from being the publisher of a respected broadsheet or, in its different style, an equally respected mass circulation tabloid.”

The irony of this viewpoint is that it is nostalgic. Leveson has admonished newspaper publishers for dropping standards. Some, though not all, have hacked the mobile phones of a murdered schoolgirl and terrorism victim, chased celebrities down the street for photographs and too commonly disregard accuracy and right of reply, the report found. Leveson concluded newspaper publishers have “caused hardship”, “wreaked havoc” with the lives of innocents and failed to live up to their responsibilities.

Yet he still holds these newspapers to meet higher standards than he expects of the internet.

Print is the focus

Lord Justice Leveson has proposed a revised and enhanced self-regulation body to oversee UK “press” standards. But he is not going so far as to lay down the terms or specific scope of that body. The current Press Complaints Commission (PCC), comprised of big newspaper editors, encompasses newspapers and their websites, but it is thought its now-discredited code is subscribed to by only one online-only outlet – AOL’s Huffington Post UK.

In handing over the establishment of the new body, Leveson is passing on whether that scope should be extended farther online — but the clear cue from his report is that new-look self-regulation should remain pertaining to newspapers and their own sites. That is because he is both satisfied that some areas of online media have necessary protections built in — and because he is frankly uncertain whether online media can be controlled anyway…

Internet is uncontrolled, except when it is

Leveson himself notes ”profound questions about the ability of any single jurisdiction to set standards which, in a free and open society, can be breached online with the click of a mouse”, and says: ”In evidence to the Inquiry, the Internet has been described as an unregulated space, in which businesses can avoid the regulation of a given jurisdiction by hosting the content they publish in a different legal jurisdiction.

In one breath, he disagrees, calling that view “a simplification that ignores what is a more complex picture”, before reeling off a list of bodies and laws to show the internet is indeed already regulated. However, later in the report, he contradicts himself, asserting: ”The internet is an uncontrolled space.”

The contradiction is tangible. It shows Leveson wrestling not just with whether digital news outlets should be self-regulated in the same way proposed of newspaper websites, but whether they can. For these two reasons, Leveson’s conclusion appears to be that the internet must inevitably host lower-quality content than must be expected of print publishers.

Lord Justice Leveson, who has been hearing issues including the “hacking” of mobile phones for news stories, said the existing Press Complaints Commission (PCC), comprised of newspaper editors, is “not actually a regulator at all”. And he has rejected news publishers’ alternative suggestion of binding themselves to ethical standards by commercial contracts.

Instead, he is advising the government to legislate the creation of a new independent body to promote “high standards” and safeguard individuals’ rights, run by a chair and a board who will hold publishers to a code.

Leveson is leaving the definition of that code and the implementation of the new body to whomever Prime Minister David Cameron, should he follow the recommendation, might appoint to set them up. But Leveson suggests the code should outline what constitutes “public interest” – a thorny topic on which newspapers and others often disagree.

The Lord Justice says publishers will be incentivised to adhere to this code because it will create an alternative dispute arbitration forum that will be cheaper than court battles — if publishers lost against a complainant in court, they would face heftier damages awards than in arbitration.

Whether this is enough of an incentive if unclear — after all, news publishers have operated in what Leveson called a “reckless” manner with the threat of hefty court fines up until this point.

Newspaper industry campaigners had worried that Leveson’s report, if it required legislation, would amount to state interference in newsgathering. They had highlighted United States citizens’ right to free speech under their First Amendment. But Leveson says:

“This is not, and cannot be characterised as, statutory regulation of the press. The legislation would not establish a body to regulate the press: it would be up to the press to come forward with their own body that meets the criteria laid down.

“The legislation would not give any rights to Parliament, to the Government, or to any regulatory (or other) body to prevent newspapers from publishing any material whatsoever.

“Nor would it give any rights to these entities to require newspapers to publish any material except insofar as it would require the recognised self-regulatory body to have the power to direct the placement and prominence of corrections and apologies in respect of information found, by that body, to require them.”

That definition of the body’s role sounds somewhat akin to that of the existing Press Complaints Commission, which is now discredited. But Leveson also says: “(The legislation) would enshrine, for the first time, a legal duty on the Government to protect the freedom of the press.”

But the new body must be recognised by Ofcom, the existing and powerful regulator of UK radio spectrum, telecommunications infrastructure and broadcasting standards — and Leveson suggests Ofcom be used as a “backstop” regulator for publishers that refuse to join the new scheme.

Leveson said: “For the seventh time in less than 70 years, there is a new report commissioned by the government dealing with concerns about the press. The PCC has failed in the task — if, indeed, it ever saw itself as having such a task — of keeping the press to its responsibilities to the public. There must be change.”

In sum, the Leveson Inquiry report amounts to a stern telling off for British newspapers, sets the basic colour and ideas for a slightly enhanced regulatory body but leaves all of the next steps to government — a process that is likely to be mired in ongoing political wrangling.

Update: Prime Minister David Cameron says he agrees with much of the recommendations but not the need to create the new body through state legislation:

“For the first time, we would have crossed the rubicon of writing elements of press regulation into the law of the land.

“We should, I believe, be wary of any legislation that has the potential to infringe free speech and a free press.

“In this House – which has been a bulwark of democracy for centuries – we should think very, very carefully before crossing this line.”

That is a significant milestone for the UK publisher in the battle to win American hearts, minds, eyeballs — and advertisers. And it’s partly true…

The Guardian‘s October unique web visitors reached 11.8 million, surpassing BBC News’ 10.8 million visitors…

But those figures are only for the BBC News site (bbcnews.com). The main BBC homepage (bbc.com), which includes a BBC News feed that is one of the site’s main fixtures, had 15.5 million visitors — still 3.7 million more than The Guardian.

What the numbers nevertheless show is that The Guardian had a better run-up to the U.S. 2012 presidential election that BBC News…

While BBC News lost one percent of its U.S. traffic between February and October, The Guardian gained 26 percent. But the BBC homepage also gained 14 percent.

This suggests politics is an area on which The Guardian may do relatively well in the States. Some scepticism persists that its British editors, based in New York, can make an American news site that Americans want to read. But those editors have been hiring U.S. writing talent like Marketplace’s respected former New York bureau chief and Wall Street correspondent Heidi N. Moore, who has become finance and economics editor.

At home in the UK, news publishers grumble they cannot compete with BBC News’ free, license fee-funded output. But, in the States, they can compete for both audiences and advertisers. Indeed, the BBC has, over the last few years, been investing heavily to build out ad sales infrastructure in America. In fact, politics is likely a speciality for The Guardian‘s U.S. site — so watch for whether it will sink back below BBC News in the months following Obama’s re-election.

Although Mail Online may be the most-read UK news service on the U.S. web nowadays, it is not necessarily competing for the same market as either the BBC or The Guardian, which are courting similar readers and advertisers. So BBC Worldwide will want to arrest the flattening of its BBC News traffic.

Disclosure: Guardian News & Media is an investor in paidContent’s publisher, Giga Omni Media.