David Atter, S&M director at beeb.com, has hit out at the British Internet Publishers Alliance (BIPA) calling it "partisan". In an interview with The Register Atter said that despite its name BIPA was not representative of the whole industry. Atter is all for trade groups, despite the tirade of criticism that the alliance has vented against the BBC, its commercial arm BBC Worldwide and beeb.com. "I would like to be a member of BIPA," he said Only last week BIPA attacked the launch of freebeeb.net as anti-competitive and an abuse of public money. "BIPA should be delighted for beeb.com that it is doing so well. People like our brand and we're good for the whole industry," he said. "A lot of people have come online because of us and we're helping to grow the Net in the UK. "What we need is a handful of top British sites that can compete with the likes of Amazon and MSN," he said A spokeswoman for BIPA said she would bring up Atter's request to join the alliance at the next BIPA meeting. Ironically, BIPA -- which is made up of a number of leading lights in the UK Web industry including Associated New Media, Electronic Telegraph, News International, ITN and Capital Radio -- doesn't have its own Web site. ®