German public broadcasters ARD and ZDF have taken legal action against ProSiebenSat.1 in a dispute over the embedding of their media libraries into the commercial broadcaster’s streaming service Joyn.
Joyn is embedding the media libraries without approval by ARD and ZDF, according to a report by German industry magazine Cable!vision Europe. Content from the ARD media library is available at www.joyn.de/ard while ZDF’s content is offered at www.joyn.de/zdf.
The move follows agreements ProSiebenSat.1 recently signed with the commercial subsidiaries of ARD and ZDF to expand Joyn’s content line-up. Notably, the public broadcasters’ media libraries were not mentioned when the deals were announced on 30 January 2025.
According to a ProSiebenSat.1 spokesman, the company has started “a preliminary beta test” on Joyn to check “how we can best embed the ARD and ZDF media library content. We are in an intensive exchange with the public broadcasters on this.” He did not answer the question of whether ProSiebenSat.1 had obtained the approval of ARD and ZDF for the move.
The public broadcasters’ main point of concern is the way in which their media libraries are embedded on the Joyn platform. “There were talks about a collaboration around the ARD media library in which we explicitly excluded the model now implemented by Joyn,” an ARD spokesperson told German industry publication DWDL. “In our view, the form of integration (embedding) implemented by Joyn is legally inadmissible and not in line with the public service mandate. We have taken legal action.”
ARD explains the decision by stating that ARD’s mandate is to provide an “editorially curated overall offering”. Joyn, on the other hand, is now taking individual content from the media library and building “its own ‘ARD media library’ in the Joyn product logic” by selecting and curating the content. However, specific functions of the ARD media library – such as accessibility, the option of personalisation, login, children’s profiles or recommendation logic – would not be adopted. “In addition, embedding has consequences under copyright and media law because it affects the rights of producers, authors or sports rights providers, for example.”
Fellow public broadcaster ZDF has a similar view: “ZDF has not agreed to the integration of the media library into the Joyn platform in this form,” a spokesperson confirmed to DWDL. “We are taking legal action against the unauthorised takeover of our content.” In its statement, ZDF also points out that in recent months it had offered Joyn “several times the linking of the entire media library in line with market practice and under legally compliant conditions”.
Both ARD and ZDF stress that they are prepared to continue discussions with ProSiebenSat.1 to make their media libraries available to Joyn users.
In fact, the public broadcasters’ media libraries already form part of several third-party platforms in Germany, but not – like in the case of Joyn – under a streaming service’s brand and on its proprietary player, but as stand-alone, independent apps.
