posted on May 30, 2003 07:03:49 AM new
This the last day to give your comments on the June 2nd FCC meeting. Check article at end of post. You might want to check the internet for other articles if this is the first time you are hearing of this.
Since the last change in 1995 Clear Channel has gone from 43 stations to 1200. An example of the importance of have local programming is the chemical spill in Minot ND. Please add any other info on this or other examples you have from your own community.
You can go online and try to post your comment, but it may be busy. Click on "Comments" middle left of page. You will be using Docket 02-277, third on the list today. www.fcc.gov
Here are alternative numbers to submit your comments.
Please pass these numbers on to others who might care to comment.
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F.C.C. Prepares to Loosen Rules on Media Ownership
May 13, 2003
By STEPHEN LABATON
WASHINGTON, May 12 - The government proposed the most significant overhaul of its media ownership rules in a generation today, including a change that would allow
television networks to own enough local stations to reach 90 percent of the nation's viewers.
That change - a result of increasing the cap on ownership and simultaneously preserving a 1980's formula that discounts the reach of UHF stations - is part of the package of proposals that officials said appeared to have the support of the Republican majority of the Federal Communications Commission.
The commission staff sent the detailed plan early this evening to the five commissioners ahead of a final vote in three weeks. The commission has not formally made the plan
public, though major portions were disclosed today and in previous days by officials and industry experts.
The proposed changes represent the most important rewriting of the ownership rules in decades, permitting the largest
media conglomerates to expand into new markets and own more properties in a single city. Analysts expect companies, including Viacom and the News Corporation, to seek to
expand their media holdings substantially.
Others, like the Tribune Company and the Gannett Company, might seek to acquire broadcasters or newspapers in cities
where they already have a presence. Media brokers and Wall Street bankers have begun advising clients on what is expected to be a scramble of mergers that would reshape the
media landscape in many communities across the country.
In a recent interview and in other comments, the agency's chairman, Michael K. Powell, said that revisions in the media ownership rules would be more modest than critics had
maintained and that changes in technology and viewing habits, combined with court decisions and a Congressional directive, necessitated that the current regulations be
reconsidered.
But the agency's two Democrats have expressed concerns about many aspects of the proposal. In interviews today before receiving the detailed plan, the two commissioners, Michael J. Copps and Jonathan S. Adelstein, said that they were troubled by reports that the commission's staff, after
extensive consultations with Mr. Powell, would recommend raising the ownership cap while retaining the formula that discounts the audience size of UHF stations.
"I'm afraid we may be moving in a more dramatic fashion that could permanently alter the media for generations to come," Mr. Adelstein said.
Mr. Copps said that the changes, including the sharp increase in the television ownership cap, "would be a green light to considerable and significant consolidation in the future."
"It's hard to imagine how the proposals foster the goals of the rules, which are diversity of voices, localism and competition," he said.
One change will permit a company to own both a broadcast station and a newspaper in all but the smallest markets. A second would permit a television company to own three
stations in the largest markets; the current limit is two.
The most fiercely lobbied proposal would loosen the national television ownership cap, which had been set at 35 percent of the nation's viewers before a federal appeals
court ordered the commission last year to reconsider it after a challenge by the networks.
Local affiliates and small broadcasting stations fear that any further growth in the networks would be detrimental to viewers in a variety of ways. They say it would homogenize entertainment, discourage local news coverage in favor of national broadcasts and reduce the commercial leverage of the local stations to offer independent programming.
Mr. Powell and other supporters of the proposal say that the rules need to reflect the changing marketplace and to help preserve free over-the-air television. In a world where consumers can receive their news and information from hundreds of channels in addition to the Internet, it makes little sense to preserve rules of a bygone era, they say.
Officials said that the commission was expected to increase the national television ownership cap to 45 percent of the nation's viewers and also retain the rule that considers two viewers as one viewer of a UHF station - the band that over the air has generally been Channel 14 and above.
The provision, known as the UHF discount, came about in a different regulatory and technological era, when a vast majority of viewers received television signals free over
the airwaves and had to use special equipment like antennas that resembled rabbit ears to pick up UHF stations. Today,
about 85 percent of viewers use paid services from cable and satellite providers, rendering the distinction between VHF and UHF largely a relic.
Officials close to Mr. Powell said today that the agency had decided to retain the discount because under the agency's interpretation of the law, it was not clear it had the authority to alter it in the current proceedings. They said that there was nothing in the public record to justify
changing the way the commission counted UHF viewers and that Mr. Powell had attributed the growth of new networks in recent years to the UHF discount, including UPN, Pax, WB
and Fox.
Others outside the agency noted, however, that most of those networks are hardly independent - UPN is owned by Viacom, WB is owned by AOL Time Warner, and Paxson is 32
percent owned by NBC. Critics of the plan have focused on the UHF provision as emblematic of the selective way that the agency has approached deregulation.
"It's total hypocrisy," said Gene Kimmelman, a director at Consumers Union who has testified in Congress against loosening the rules. "If the theory behind changing the
rules is that the F.C.C. needs to keep up with market conditions, to preserve a significant discount for UHF stations is simply a fraud on the regulatory process."
Andrew Jay Schwartzman, president of the Media Access Project, which advocates diversity of the airwaves, said that the UHF discount "eviscerates the cap."
"The 45 percent number that has been floated is a fake number," he said referring to the concentration of the nation's viewers by one company. "It will realistically be much much higher."
[ edited by aposter on May 30, 2003 07:06 AM ]
posted on June 2, 2003 11:06:57 AM new Good news for Fox...Bad news for America.
Today, the Federal Communications Commission voted 3 to 2 to meet the demands of big communications corporations. Rigorously opposed by consumer, religious, labor, community and public interest groups across the country, FCC Chairman Michael Powell warped the decision-making process to deliver a result allowing conglomerates to buy up hundreds of newspapers, television and radio stations in communities across the United States. Competition, diversity and local content will be undermined in local markets and nationally.
posted on June 2, 2003 03:41:45 PM new
ABC NEWS tonight said the vote would mean
in the Washington DC area one company
like Clear Channel (conservative right) or Disney (entertainment w/Disney advertising)
or far left liberal station could own:
1 newspaper
3 TV stations
1 cable company
8 radio stations
I don't care whether you are a Christian Conservative who doesn't believe in women's rights, a gun toting card carrying NRA member
or a liberal far left of Ghanda, this stinks!
If you didn't voice your opinion, why not?
If you didn't get to email because the system
went down, call and ask why it was down.
Abernathy, FCC Commissioner said Thursday
on NPR they had had trouble but it was up
and running so people could comment electronically. How many couldn't get in?
Bush won another one. Only this time he doesn't have the backing of those of the NRA's ilk.
posted on June 2, 2003 08:27:05 PM new
This country is going to hell in a handbasket under the leadership of George Bush. People don't seem to know or care what's happening.
The public outcry
Hundreds of thousands have written to the FCC expressing their opposition to further deregulation. The National Rifle Association alone has submitted 300,000 postcards. The FCC has received over 9,000 emails through its Web site. Reportedly, only 11 of those were in support of relaxing media rules.
aposter...When the edit feature is not available, you can turn it back on by logging in at the top of the page.
