British Regulators Reject BBC Plan to Add Local Web Video News

British regulators rejected a plan on Friday to add locally focused video news to BBC Web sites in Britain, dealing a setback to the digital ambitions of the BBC, which has expanded aggressively on the Internet. The BBC Trust, which oversees the public broadcaster, and Ofcom, the British media regulator, said the proposal would have hurt rivals in the private sector, including the Web sites of newspapers. Under the plan, the BBC wanted to spend £68 million, or $100 million, and hire 400 people to provide news, sports and weather for dozens of local BBC Web sites. Commercial rivals said the £3 billion in public financing that the BBC receives each year gave it an unfair advantage. The BBC Trust, which was created last year, previously approved other contested BBC Internet initiatives, including the addition of advertising to the BBC News Web site outside Britain.