20 May 2003 | stumpy said...

I've writen to my Reps. But it's all for nothing. ClearChannel has greased all the right palms and this is going to happen. It's sad and depressing.

20 May 2003 | Ben Langhinrichs said...

The proposed new rules will further concentrate ownership and stifle dissent and free speech. It is probably not terribly surprising that newspapers are not reporting it heavily, both because Americans are not terribly interested in actually thinking and because those very newspapers are, or will soon be, part of the very media conglomerates that have formed. It might be a bit of a CLM (career limiting move) for a reporter to expose too much of the process when his/her bosses may be the people being exposed. I don't mean to sound paranoid, because I don't think it is a deep, secret conspiracy. Rather, it is an obvious, public move to consolidate the media, and people in the US seem to have trouble seeing any problem with that.

20 May 2003 | Lyndon B said...

Stumpy -- If you know that there have been bribes, turn them in to the FBI. If your Senators and Representatives aren't placing the proper pressure on the FCC to do the right thing, vote them out of office and work on a campaign to put someone in that will do the right thing.

It's time to turn this useless complaining into some positive action. Things don't change themselves. This is our government and it's our job to make it right. Let's get busy.

20 May 2003 | Darrel said...

While you have a point, Lyndon, it's fairly well known that the FTC, for the most part, is run by big business. It's heavily controlled by lobbyists and is mainly a moderator between competing corporations.

As for 'bribes' AFAIK, campaign contributions are still considered legal. As such, it's hard to turn anyone in for briber ;o)

Of course, we could start telling our representatives to change the pathetic lobbying and campaign finance rules.

20 May 2003 | Peter Davidson said...

While this is a tragic hijacking of media by big business does it not also present greater opportunity for the blogsphere to provide mixed, balanced, dissenting news coverage and commentary?

20 May 2003 | hurley#1 said...

While this is a tragic hijacking of media by big business does it not also present greater opportunity for the blogsphere to provide mixed, balanced, dissenting news coverage and commentary?

Journalists and responsible news organizations have professional codes of ethics and usually at least aim for some semblance of impartiality, and while of course we see flagrant examples of cases in which these standards are violated I still would tend to trust a publication like the New York Times, say, (despite the Jayson Blair debacle) than a bunch of bloggers hurling opinions and hearsay around. Doing real journalism takes time and money, and somebody's got to pay you to do it. I'm not saying that all bloggers are poorly informed armchair theorists, but I personally wouldn't want to rely on bloggers for my news. Opinion and commentary, maybe, but not news coverage.

Do commercial interests influence the news we receive? Sure, albeit more in some media and some news organizations than in others. But you also have to realize that journalists tend not to take this stuff lying down. Professional journalists with an ounce of character who encounter politically or commercially motivated censorship of their work are not going to just meekly say "okay" and slink back to their word-processors. They're going to fight it internally, and if that doesn't work, they'll let the world know about it through one media outlet or another (maybe a blog, for example).

20 May 2003 | pb said...

I'm not even a conservative yet still think that these rules governing media ownership are rather arbitrary. Someone mentioned that we should stop complaining and take positive action but got the action incorrect. Instead of taking a governmental approach, why not take a free market approach? If the concentration is so "bad", shouldn't there be a market for an alternative.

20 May 2003 | Don Schenck said...

Darrel -- what proof do you have that, as you write,

"... it's fairly well known that the FTC, for the most part, is run by big business. It's heavily controlled by lobbyists and is mainly a moderator between competing corporations."

????

20 May 2003 | Darrel said...

Instead of taking a governmental approach, why not take a free market approach?

Because the free market approach fails when there is monopolistic power.

Take, for instance, the town in North Dakota that has every radio station controlled by out-of-state interests. How do you protest that? Convince everyone in town to stop listening to the radio? What is that going to do?

Once an industry hits a monopolistic level of control, there is little to stop it in terms of consumers in the 'free market'.

There may be exceptions. The music industry, for one. The market has clearly stated that they want music cheap and online. The industry has refused to change, though, and they don't really have to, since they have the support of a lot in congress and insane lawsuits in the courts.

Don, I have no proof other than what I've heard lately on NPR. There have been quite a few TOTN show on it lately that have basically pointed that out. It's not a conspiracy or anything, that's just the way it is. The FTC members are typically appointed (not elected) and have to jockey a LOT of industry pressure.

Actually, this morning there was a good example on the radio where they were talking that the FTC is finally forcing cell phone providers to allow consumers to take their phone number with them when they switch providers. They have been telling the industry to do it for years, but they ignore it. Now the FTC is forcing the issue, but the expert being interviewed said that the industry has the advantage as they can use so many different methods (namely court actions and various loop-hole exceptions) to stop the FTC's mandate.

I mean, c'mon--look at HDTV. The FTC couldn't force a simple thing like 'here, this is the standard you will use to broadcast it and you will do it by this date'. Instead what happened? There was something like 32 different formats, and we're going into the second decade of the technology with most people still buying good 'ol PAL sets. That's clearly a decision made by the industry not someone looking out for the consumer.

20 May 2003 | Darrel said...

Oh...another counterpoint to pb's comment.

Keep in mind that most big media targets very specific demographics. If you don't fall into one of the key demographics, they really could care less what you think. No amount of protesting is going to do anything. As we've all seen with radio we now have a very predictable set of formats:

pop-40
pop-40 country
classic rock
'modern rock'
oldies/retro/80's
talk (mainly conservative leaning)

That's it. There's no reason for the big guys to target any other demographic as the above demographics are what advertisers want.

And that's just good business sense. It makes a lot more sense to pump the same playlist to 40 stations than to cater to 40 different markets.

Now, you could argue that that is what a free market is all about. However, that totally ignores the fact that the airwaves in this country are supposed to belong to us...the people. They are supposed to serve the public interests.

Well, that's no happening so much anymore. News is becoming increasingly biased (in all directions) per network and is being selectively produced to generate ratings.

The above example of the North Dakota town has a horrific example of how it's not serving the public anymore. The town had an ammonia spill at bar time. The cops tried calling all stations in town to get the word out. Sadly, not a single station was local...they were all pumping their broadcast in from out of state.

20 May 2003 | pb said...

Darrel, I don't even think a liberal could follow your line of argument.

Are there absolutely no more frequencies left on the dial in that North Dakota town? If the radio stations are so horrible there, wouldn't it make sense for an enterprising outfit to start a station that is "better"? Are the monopolies threatening advertisers who go with the upstart?

Microsoft has one of the most powerful monopolies in the history of business and it's being attacked on numerous fronts with some degree of effectiveness.

There is plenty of music not controlled by the majors (of which there are 5, by the way) that could be made available "cheap and online". Why isn't anyone doing it? Why hasn't anyone created software that reproduces only the sharing feature of iTunes without the downloading and with limited streams?

Why should phone companies be forced to make numbers portable? Should I be able to take my email address to my new ISP? Why should the government decide what HDTV format to use? Why not just let one (or 2 or 3 or however many) win out?

If people who advertisers want to target listen to the radio that you dislike, is that a problem? If news is so biased, wouldn't it be easy for an unbiased news source to compete?

And please elaborate on what this "public interest" thing-y is.

21 May 2003 | alisha said...

I find it strange that many countries who are heading for a more capitalistic structure (EU countries) and away from socialism, have deregulated all forms of media and communication, freeing up the market for healthy competition. And in the US its ironicly going in the opposite direction (like a Bradbury style scene out of Fahrenheit 451). Just an observation.

"Microsoft has one of the most powerful monopolies in the history of business and it's being attacked on numerous fronts with some degree of effectiveness."
---
But if these types of laws are relaxed by the FCC in the Media sector, there wont be much chance for diversity because 2 or 3 mega media companies can use a variety of anti-competitive tactics to keep competitors out.

21 May 2003 | Darrel said...

> Are there absolutely no more frequencies
>left on the dial in that North Dakota town?

I'm not sure. Note that most major markets are full, though.

Also note that current licensing fees from the FCC are prohibitively expensive. Ma and Pa can't scrape up enough dough to start a radio station anymore.

> There is plenty of music not controlled by the majors

This isn't the same as the discussion of commercial radio stations, but it's an interesting question. I have no idea why no one has been able to come along and develop a viable internet distribution method for independant music, although I suppose I've seen a lot of sites attempt it via custom streaming stations tied into CD purchases.

>Why should phone companies be forced to make numbers portable?

Some believe that a telecommunications infrastructure should be made for the benefit of the citizenship. Why should the phone company be forced to do that? So that consumers aren't locked into one plan just because they can't take their phone number with them.

Pure capitalists believe that nothing should be dictated for the benefit of the consumer and for those people, well, nothing I say will change their mind.

> Should I be able to take my email address to my new ISP?

Uhh...you can. If you purchase your own domain you can take it anywhere. If I purchase my own phone, I should be able to take it anywhere.

> Why should the government decide what HDTV format to use?

Again, you're one of those people that believe NOTHING should be dictated by the government. It's called efficiency. When you let 30 competing standards compete, the consumer never wins. The 'best' standard rarely wins in our market, and in the interim, consumers end up either spending a lot of money on quickly obsolete products or, like in the case of HDTV, sitting around for decades waiting for the 'market to decide'.

Also, remember that the airwaves are supposedly public property. If you don't believe in that, then, yea, your arguments are fine.

> If people who advertisers want to target
> listen to the radio that you dislike, is that a problem?

Specifically, no. Broadly speaking, yea it's a problem because commercial radio then starts NOT being a service for the public in general, but rather a service for a very narrow demographic slice of the public.

> If news is so biased, wouldn't it be easy for
> an unbiased news source to compete?

You'd think. That's more of a problem with American behavior/mentality, I guess. We're not a very picky bunch, unfortunately.

>And please elaborate on what this "public interest" thing-y is.

That seems to be the concept you are missing in your arguments. The airwaves (TV, Radio, shortwave, CB, etc, etc,) were set aside for public use. Commercial entities can use the spectrum, but there was an agreement that they had to serve the public. There were various things that the networks had to provide...emergency broadcasts, so much children's programming, news, political debates, etc.

It's like our state parks. Technically, the citizen's own the airwaves. As such, we should be demanding a bit more out of the corporations that use it, and the FCC that babysits it.

21 May 2003 | Don Schenck said...

I'm waiting for proof, Darrel.

21 May 2003 | Darrel said...

> I'm waiting for proof, Darrel.

Uhh...what proof were you looking for?

I'll see what I can dig up.

21 May 2003 | Don Schenck said...

Darrel -- nothing spectacular, just some links between, say, the board of the FTC and their ties (if existing) to big bidness.

I don't mean to be picky, but a charge such as "it's widely known" does deserve some backing, I hope you'll agree.

Besides, dig it up and perhaps someone will do something with the info *wink*.

21 May 2003 | said...

Hey, who won American Idol last night?

21 May 2003 | stumpy said...

Commercial radio doesn't belong to the people. It belongs to the advertisers. Just like network television, the ads *are* the content. I avoid both like the plague... but that's just me.

22 May 2003 | Darrel said...

> I don't mean to be picky, but a charge such as
> "it's widely known" does deserve some backing,
> I hope you'll agree.

Oh. Gotcha. Well, I don't have any off-hand. I'll see what I can find, though. That info came from a variety of NPR interviews over the past few weeks with various 'FCC experts' and I believe an ex FCC director. The summary of the talks was that even though many FCC directors take the position with the best of intentions, they soon learn that the FCC is more of a moderator than a policy maker and that one needs to balance the needs of the appointing political interests with the interests of the for profit businesses that use our airwaves.

I'm also not trying to make it out as some conspiracy or anything, either. According to the interviews, there's nothing surprising about that fact...it's not unlike some other gov. agencies. That's just the way things are right now.

The only readily available proof I have is to tell you to turn on the radio. It's rather clear that over the past decade, it has moved in a direction that doesn't really benefit the consumer, but clearly benefits the mega-corps that own the stations ;o)

Commercial radio doesn't belong to the people.

No, the AIRWAVES supposedly belong to us. We let commercial (and non-commercial, too) companies use them in exchange for various benefits. In theory, at least.

23 May 2003 | p8 said...

"But as any Econ 101 textbook says, the opposite of a perfectly competitive market is a monopoly or oligopoly. When such exists, the concentrated power of the oligopolists distorts the market in the same way that some forms of government intervention might. Thus, if a set of 'deregulatory' policies actually increases oligopoly, as the current FCC proposals promise to do, then they are anti-free market policies."
more ..

23 May 2003 | Darrel said...

Don:

I think this is the show that I got my above opinions from:

http://discover.npr.org/rundowns/rundown.jhtml?prgId=5&prgDate=May/20/2003

23 May 2003 | pb said...

"over the past decade, [radio] has moved in a direction that doesn't really benefit the consumer"

I'm afraid you need to show some evidence here as well. I couldn't disagree more.

23 May 2003 | Darrel said...

I'm afraid you need to show some evidence here as well. I couldn't disagree more.

Well, as bigger national companies buy up local markets, local markets, in return, see:

1) Less local relevance (news, events, etc.)

2) Less options in terms of formats to listen too (namely the handful listed above)

3) Less regional variety and support in terms of local artists.

4) Fewer local jobs (as more content is pumped in from HQ)

So, that's my stance.

How do you think it has benefitted consumers, PB?

26 May 2003 | p8 said...

FCC Receives Trips From Lobbyists

Move Over, Right Wing Radio: The Liberals Are Coming
Gabe Hobbs, Clear Channel Radio's vice president of News/Talk/Sports, announced that in the near future this corporate owner of over 1,200 radio stations is considering programming some of their talk stations "in markets where there are already one or two stations doing conservative talk" with all-day back-to-back all-liberal talk show hosts.

27 May 2003 | Darrel said...

If anyone is still reading this thread...Today's (Tue, May 27) Talk of the Nation (on NPR) will address this very issue.

27 May 2003 | Darrel said...

Er...rather the issue of radio specifically...

28 May 2003 | Steve said...

One quibble: The media ownership debate is hardly going under the radar in various media outlets. My local paper, the LA Times has had almost daily articles and/or commentaries on the issue the last several weeks. Several online publications deal with it regularly. Business Week, one of way too many magazine I subscribe to, does as well.

Despite my rather liberal tendencies, I'm generally not a huge fan of regulation. Where I am in favor of regulation is where the market starts demonstrating that it's heading to monopoly-like or cartel-like tendencies. The past several years of partial deregulation of media ownership (only in broadcast; there is no regulation of print, nor can there be legally) have shown a definite tendency in that direction. That's why I think further deregulation is a mistake, and some re-regulation may be necessary.

28 May 2003 | Darrel said...

I wish I could remember the source of this, but someone of some importance (or stature) said something similiar to your views, Steve.

The point was that under-regulation is as damaging as over-regulation to a free-market economy like ours.

Capitalism is a good thing, if controlled to an extent. Lately, in many industries, the power has been shifting away from an open and competitive market to single corporations.

Anyone hear Ted Turner's speach on NPR a few weeks ago?

And PB, where did you go? Still waiting to hear your side of the argument!

28 May 2003 | Darrel said...

Oh, Steve, I thought there was some regulation of print...namly one company couldn't own more than one major newspaper in a market and a newspaper couldn't own a radio or TV station.

I could be proven wrong, of course ;o)

28 May 2003 | Steve said...

Darrel, you're right that there are restrictions on owning TV/radio and a newspaper in the same market. But that restriction is on the broadcast licensing end. Print cannot be regulated directly, largely because of the 1st Amendment guarantee of freedom of the press. Broadcast news organizations are considered the press in most ways, but given the limited availability of the airwaves and the legal concept that they are owned by the public and their usage is licensed to private entities, they can be regulated from a business side.

Now, that doesn't mean that newspapers are completely free of regulation. They're still subject to antitrust and competition legislation, which is why joint operating agreements between competiting newspapers typically need to have court approvals.

And I'm not sure what the precise rules are regarding broadcast and print ownership. The Tribune Co. has owned the Chicago Tribune and WGN radio and TV for decades. When Tribune bought the Times Mirror Co, they ended up owning the LA Times and a TV station they already had in LA. THere's other joint ownership going on in LA, but that's cases of two TV stations. So, it's pretty much a big, muddy mess.

29 May 2003 | Darrel said...

That makes sense, Steve. Thanks for the info.

As for the Tribune Co., my understanding is that they got in under a grandfather clause.

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