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.
B Sky B initially liked the idea but, after some thought, decided against commissioning it or taking it further. A little later, however, B Sky B introduced a new show themselves called Must Be The Music, which featured several elements which were similar to certain elements in the Real Deal pitch. The overall similarity of the show was such that one independent person who knew in confidence of the Claimants' proposed show sent a congratulatory text to them in the belief that it was their show when he first saw it on Sky.
The B Sky B show was not successful enough to last beyond its first series in the UK but the format was sold on to Poland - where it has now had its sixth series - thereby re-enforcing the practical reality that, whilst the law is slow to protect rights in formats, format rights are regularly bought and sold in the commercial world.
The core of the Claimants' case was that 1) the deck of slides enjoyed the necessary quality of confidence 2) it was imparted to B Sky B in circumstances in which B Sky B regarded it as confidential and 3) B Sky B had misused such confidential information in the making of Must Be The Music.
The Court upheld the Claimants on points 1) and 2) but, on the facts after hearing many witnesses, concluded (as B Sky B had maintained) that there had been no misuse of confidential information. B Sky B had arrived at a broadly similar format with several similar features to those of the Claimants but as a result of their own creative processes so that their show was conceived independently of any influence from the Claimants or their confidential materials. The Claimants' case thus failed.
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