Canvas news roundup - May 31

So since the news last week that the Office of Fair Trading (OFT) won’t investigate Project Canvas as a merger, there’s been some more information both about Project Canvas:

• Tim Bradshaw (his twitter) at the FT has it that a final brand name being considered from the shortlist for the initiative is ‘YouView’. FT article here. One of the Intellectual Property Office marks referred to in the article is here at the IPO site.
• The same article has the project partners conceding that a likely revised launch date to consumers is spring 2011, rather than end of 2010 as originally hoped for, given the delays caused by regulatory approval.
• One part of the advertising duties for Project Canvas has been awarded, to agency Saint@RKCR/Y&R. The agency will look after the digital advertising for the project (while it wasn’t explicitly mentioned, chances are high that this includes the consumer-facing website too).  The rest of the advertising - which presumably means the offline advertising and the strategic work - is still out to pitch. Campaign Live article.
• Two days after the OFT’s decision, chairman of TalkTalk - one of the Canvas partners - Charles Dunstone had a piece in the Guardian defending the initiative. In it he admits there have been differences over the strategic direction of the project at times.
• Post the OFT approval for Canvas, Sky’s COO Mike Darcey has come out and said he believes BBC & ITV knew how to work the regulator, based on their experience with the blocked Project Kangaroo. Telegraph article.
• Sky’s director of on-demand Griff Parry has repeated that Sky are not altogether ruling out appearing on Project Canvasas as a platform (and re-iterated that it is the BBC’s involvement that Sky objects to). TechRadar article.
• Channel Five appointed Capablue to handle Five’s involvement in Canvas, including strategy and technical requirements. NMA article.