These were the years of emancipation from both state and political forces for the Estonian mass media, while adapting to market conditions.
Still, findings show that Estonia has two radically different information fields: one for Estonian speaking audiences and one for Russian speakers.
All major newspapers have gone online in recent years, and several online-only news portals have extensive readership.
According to the Council of Europe’s Convention on Access to Official Documents[11] anyone can request information held by public authorities at no cost.
[12] In 2009 the Estonian Supreme Court decided that online media are deemed responsible for comments posted by their readers.
Estonia’s largest website, Delfi, was fined in 2013 for one of these comments and referred the case to the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR).
In the Delfi AS v. Estonia (2015) ECtHR 64669/09 case the ECHR ruled that holding Estonian news site Delfi liable for anonymous defamatory comments posted online from its readers, even when they are removed upon request, was not a violation of the Article 10 of the European Convention on Human Rights's guarantees of the freedom of speech.
[1] The ruling was unexpected, because of potential conflicts with the "actual knowledge" standard of Article 14 of the EU's E-Commerce Directive.
However, the ECHR on 2 February 2016 acknowledged in the case Magyar Tartalomszolgáltatók Egyesülete and Index.hu Zrt v. Hungary that publishers cannot be held liable for comments posted on their sites if they have a notice-and-take-down system operating effectively.
Media outlets in Estonia are free to express a variety of positions and they are not generally subject to political interference.
However, since 2009 the Courts have started to argue more about the liability of professional content providers in cases where an individual has suffered severely.
[14] As a result of the country’s 2009 economic crisis, a number of print media stopped publishing, while others dismissed employees and reduced salaries.
The crisis also led to significant declines in the advertising market, causing serious financial difficulties to many commercial broadcasters.
It is prescribed to us whom to cover and with what degree of criticism," said the department heads of the daily in a memo sent to the publication’s owner, the Estonian entrepreneur Margus Linnamäe, and its general manager, Sven Nuutmann, denouncing an unprecedented pressure on their professional freedom.
Ekspress Meedia, which is one of the main subsidiaries of the media group also operates Delfi news portals in Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania.