As said by one of our most famous Historian and Noble Peace Prize Winner Christian Lous Lange Technology is a Useful Servant but a Dangerous Master, he was very clear about what he was saying and we are going to talk about the same. The New Technologies that we are discussing today are the OTT Platforms. In the old times, all the family even including the neighbors would gather in front of the only Television in the town, village, or family to entertain themselves and watch something else. But with the shifting trends of society now, there is a small version of Television i.e. Mobile with every single individual even it be a child or an old man. They entertain themselves with the help of these OTT Platforms. OTT platforms refer to online streaming services like Netflix, Amazon Prime, and Hotstar which deliver content directly to the viewers over the internet. They played a very crucial role in transforming the content which was consumed by Indians. It has introduced every possible genre of content which ranges from reality-based thought-provoking documentaries to truly fiction-based content that make the person escape to an endless world. But however, with great power comes great responsibilities. The saying of Sir Lange comes into question again whether it is becoming a Useful Servant or Dangerous Master which is taking society towards questionable norms. The exposure to the children and youth that these platforms were providing towards nudity and obscenity is the question of fact making it useful or dangerous. The New OTT Regulations 2023, seeks to answer this but has added layers of ambiguity for the creator and viewer at the same time.
The OTT Platforms seemed very beneficial and helpful initially, but they became a double-edged sword for the Indian Entertainment Industry. On the one hand, it gives open freedom to the makers to experiment with the genre of the content they are making and make the content a global library for the audience so they have access to all 13 or more genres of content, whereas, on the other hand, the lawless digital playground of the past made the viewers especially the children and youth being exposed to vulgarity, obscenity, and unchecked violence which deeply fill the young impressionable minds with the harmful content.
They proved themselves to be valuable allies by giving Indian audiences exposure to international culture, which was not the case in the television era. A great example of this would be the affection of Indian audiences towards Korean Dramas as a source of entertainment. In this way, they came to differentiate between the cultures and people of South Korea, North Korea, Japan, and China, breaking the earlier notion that they all look the same. In the same way, it has made people aware of global affairs as well by making movies on global issues. Since OTT platforms didn’t have any regulations on the content they were providing, it gave an open-ended direction to the makers and gave them the liberty to show their work and storytelling without traditional gatekeeping. Not only this, it has supported economic growth as well by creating a lot of jobs. The growth of the internet due to demand for OTT in India has led to new jobs in internet and telecom companies. Some roles are telecom engineer, network manager, and field installation engineer. But as I have mentioned earlier, with power comes responsibility, which the OTT Platforms failed to look at. They took the freedom to the extent that graphic violence, explicit language, and sexual content were very easily accessible to all age groups. With little to no safeguards at all. By this time now, the OTT Platforms had already caught the attention of the population from the entire age spectrum. And in India, we just don’t “see” the content we “adapt” the content. The most impacted were the children and the youth, and this was the topic to be worried about as they are not just small children but the future of India. And their exposure to the glorification of content abuse, casual relationships, and violent behavior affected their minds negatively. It didn’t stop here and goes even to the extent that affected the cultural sensitivity of India. For example, some of the content clashed with the socio-cultural fabric of India (In movies like A Suitable Boy (2020) – Netflix, Tandav (2021) – Amazon Prime Video, etc.), which not only hurt the sentiments of people but also created controversies and debates in the society leading disharmony. By these problems, they were making their image more clear of the Risky Overload.
This confusion was so big that we needed something to solve this mess and this called for the ‘Draft Broadcasting Regulation Bill, 2023: Regulating OTT’, introduced by the Indian government under The Information Technology (Intermediary Guidelines and Digital Media Ethics Code) Rules. These regulations were brought to balance The double-edged sword (i.e. OTT Platforms) by providing a structured approach to the content creation and the consumption of the content created. This was the most necessary intervention in the OTT world. To ensure that the viewers are aware of the content they are watching, it has provided the age categorization (U, U/A 7+, U/A 13+, U/A 16+, and A) so that even if parents are giving their children to watch something they can use this categorization and know if it is suitable for them or not. Further on, it gives not only categorization but also strong parental control, which includes some enhanced functions and tools that allow the parents to shield their children from inappropriate content, for example, Password-Protected Access for Adult Content, Customizable Viewing Restrictions, Profile-Based Content Restrictions, Real-Time Monitoring and Alerts. The regulations have also worked on ensuring the transparency of the content by explicitly mentioning the potential triggers like violence, abuse, nudity, etc. To monitor all the issues and complaints regarding the same, the regulations had made an officer mandatory to handle the grievances to ensure accountability.
All these seemed to be going nice and fine until the confusion started to play and made things challenging for both the creators and the audiences. The lack of definitions for the words Obscenity and Vulgarity leads to confusion among the creators as these are very subjective things like something obscene to me may not be obscene to others, and these blurred boundaries between the definitions influence the creator to get into self-censorship, which causes a lot of creative ideas among the creators to sink. Since there was no specification, it caused inconsistent enforcement among different platforms, which was that if a specific thing was deemed acceptable by one platform or regulator, it might not hold for another, leading to uncertainty. While all of this was going on, the small creators faced severe problems regarding the increase in the costs to adhere to the regulations. Because of all these confusions, the viewers begin to doubt the content despite the presence of the content descriptors. Another concern raised by the viewers was the dilution of the creative content, its authenticity, and originality because of the excessive regulations on censorship.
The regulations, which we were expecting to be a very, very necessary intervention, helped us in regulating but brought a big bag of confusion over its shoulder. It has given us the safety net for children, the Indian cultural balance, and empowered the viewership with detailed descriptors, but it busted a balloon of disruption of creativity among the creators, the gray area of the definition for specific terms creating ambiguity and also an economic burden on small platforms and independent creators. To come out of the well dug by its own hand, the regulations should bring clear guidelines to establish the ‘objective’ criteria, which can easily differentiate between bold storytelling and obscene content. Regular consultation should be taken with the creators, viewers, and regulators to ensure a balanced approach, like conducting polls on the platform itself, which television shows like Bigg Boss uses to know the opinion of the audience by asking questions on any particular issue to which people express their own views. Financial support can be given to emerging platforms so it can help to level up the field for all. All of this is of no use until there is media literacy among the audience so they can critically analyze, interpret, and understand the content rather than just passively consuming it. So, at last, there should be an encouragement in media literacy.
OTT Platforms are both valuable allies and risky overload to the population to some extent, mainly depending on how it is being used and managed. The 2023 Regulatory Framework was a laudable attempt made by the government to regulate unregulated content. Along with benefits, it has offered the viewers and the creators a bunch of confusion. In a true sense now, we need a framework that is not only robust but also adaptable, which will foster creativity in line with societal interests. We just need the collaboration and creativity to shake hands in this.
It has been more than a year since the regulations were released. Even after these complexities, the government has failed to release, upgrade, or give clarifications on the same. But as a person in this complexity, I only believe in this famous Hindi saying, “Umeed par Duniya kayam Hai!”
Author: Suraiyya Qureshi, in case of any queries please contact/write back to us via email to chhavi@khuranaandkhurana.com or at Khurana & Khurana, Advocates and IP Attorney.
References:
- Economic Times, How OTT Platforms Are Changing Entertainment in India, Econ. Times (2023).
- Bar and Bench, OTT Platforms Empowering Independent Creators, Bar & Bench (2023).
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- Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology, Information Technology (Intermediary Guidelines and Digital Media Ethics Code) Rules, 2023, Gazette of India, pt. II, sec. 3(i) (2023).
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- How OTT Saved the Indian Job Market, ALP Consulting, available at: https://alp.consulting/how-ott-saved-indian-job-market/ (last accessed Jan. 30, 2025).