Slashdot Mirror
More on Media Consolidation
A few more links on the important FCC decision coming up in a few weeks (see our previous story for more). Common Cause has a good set of background information and advocacy. The Washington Post has a story about the decision, focusing on how independent television stations will be squeezed even harder. This article about ClearChannel is a useful primer about the future of mass media.
Relaxation of media ownership is something that is happening over here in the UK at the moment and many are worried that Murdoch in particular could expand into terrestrial television. Our network television is now owned by two companies who are planning to merge once the Communications Bill is passed.
johnBe like Jayson Blair and make up your own news at the Not True Times
All I Want For Christmas Is My Constitutional Rights
but they have bought every radio station station in the Houston area that didn't suck, and even a few that did. So I drive cross country, I find another radio station. I listen to it, sounds kinda cool, then you hear "Thank you for listend to KXYZ, the ONLY station that doesn't suck, a Clear Channel Communications station." So they admit that all their other stations suck?
I wanted to boycott them for taking off my morning show, and using the trained monkeys that borderline politicaly correct (the previous guys would never be mistaken for anywhere near politicaly correct) from New Orleans to broadcast to the entire Gulf Coast. Sounds like cost savings to me, but it really ruined the mornings for me.
So I swallowed my pride and listened anyways. Before Clear Channel bought everything I stopped listening to one of our local stations because I couldn't stand hearing "Did somebody say McDonalds" 13 times in a 30 second period. Now nearly half the commercials ClearChannel plays assume I can't get my dick up and I need to hear the phone number of the fixer 12 times because I can't dial a damned phone. I assure you neaither is a concern in my case. The quality of radio sure took a dive when they came in.
The preceding post was not a Slashvertisement.
Saw my first ClearChannel signed billboard near my home in London :-(. Begun this advertising war has.
"The first thing to do when you find yourself in a hole is stop digging."
Clearchannel has singlehandedly destroyed radio in the US. Five years ago, I had quite a nice variety of stations to pick from, with all twelve of my presets going to something that, depending on my mood, I would enjoy.
Now, I have two stations I listen to... A local college station, and NPR. And I don't even like NPR, but angry lesbians amuse me more than the same top-10 pop songs played over and over.
Clearchannel, as an "experiment" in media conglomeration, should end. Revoke its corporate charter, dissolve it, return control and ownership to each individual station. And more importantly, we need to IMMEDIATELY stop further Borg-like activity on the part of media megacorps.
I want decent independant radio back.
Why are they losing audiences to cable channels?
Can it be because the programming they offer flat out sucks?
Can it be that people aren't as stupid as they've assumed since the 50s?
That they dont want to see another sitcom about a family with a precocious little kid that runs the house, or 5 20-something hipsters drinking coffee and making dumb wisecracks?
Can it be that they've reached the puking threshhold with this reality TV crap? That people dont care which of the 40 masked guys that some whore chooses?
Can it be that the old standbys of Leno and Letterman kissing hollywood ass is frankly BORING?
I mean there's a reason I'd rather watch some longwinded documentary about the treasures of King Razamatooten from the 3rd dynasty; as dry and uninteresting as it is, it's better than anything NBC, CBS, ABC, FOX and the DUBBYA-BEE have to offer.
Perhaps just getting "known star" to do a sitcom for 2 million an episode doesn't guarantee ratings anymore.
I don't need no instructions to know how to rock!!!!
I suggest that most slashdot types are libertarian in their political thought. Not Libertarian(tm), but libertarian in thought.
At least that's what I seem to get from reading at +1 or -1.
It seems hip to call yourself liberal, but then go home and secretly watch Fox News.
The vast majority of Americans (sorry foreigners) have very mixed political views, and fewer and fewer can strongly identify with one of the two major parties.
"If you want to improve, be content to be thought foolish and stupid." - Epictetus
where are all the libertarians crying out in joy? isn't this great - capitalism in action! more and more of those pesky government regulations being whisked out of the way!
and now you guys all have your free-market radio stations where you - yes, i mean YOU! - can make choices about which radio station will be #1! yes-siree-bob, all those companies are entirely dependant on your happiness with their programming decisions.
isn't it just GREAT!
US Citizen living abroad? Register to vote!
Back when I was a DJ at WVBR (briefly) I spent most of my time calculating which songs to play in order to fill the 20-minute space between weather and station identification, and between news and the ad break. Given that I had exactly 20 minutes, if I started with a 5:13, a 3:17, and a 4:39, I then had to find a song or two to fill the remaining 7 or so minutes.
Before holidays, we would prerecord our shifts on reel-to-reel tape, and the engineer would simply swap reels every 3 hours.
It occured to me that if we had every song in our cd library as an mp3 in a database, we could automate the entire process. We could have the software rotate through the songs to fill the air-time exactly, we could load all the ad spots and PAs in a separate table, and not even have to be in the room.
I wonder if anyone is doing this now. If not, I'm sure it will.
every stain tells a story
San Fransisco and LA have KPFA and perhaps one or two other radio outlets that are operated similarly to the way KBOO is. But nationwide our options for true community controlled media has become very very limited.
There are several reasons why corporate control of our airwaves remains an issue that is important to understand:
It amazes me how little the citizens of this country care about being controlled or manipulated. Perhaps it has come down to the power that can be purchased by a few people who have large sums of money and big desires that remain unfulfilled.
If you are a terror to many, then beware of many. --Ausonius
welcome to the grassroots fight of your life, if you're a media democracy activist. we've been working on this for a year, trying to build a coalition of peace and justice groups against the issue. during the war in iraq, many national peace activists would turn on the nightly news and say, 'what the hell? where are the bodies? why are retired generals and embedded reporters giving me my news?'
so they embraced the issue. it's a lot harder to ignore the group of people on the steps of the fcc whining 'FREE AND INDEPENDENT MEDIA' if those people are anti-war citizens from all across the country with money, clout, and celebrity spokesmen (michael moore).
the smallish team media democracy activists has ballooned into a huge group of peace and justice activists, hackers, consumer rights activists, kids, parents, people of all stripes. now groups like moveon.org are planning national call-in days. now code pink is pink-slipping fcc chairman michael powell alongside his much-more-famous father, colin powell.
so we have the people. what do we do? what's our power?
1) call your senator. like, now. right now. the senate, after the second commerce committee hearing on this issue, is rattling some sabers and could definitely use some encouragement that this issue isn't just one for the lobbyists.
2) comment to the fcc. you can do so here and the comments you make will also go to the senate commerce committee, and to the president.
3) tell someone who isn't tech savvy about this. you're reading slashdot. you have a choice about where you get your media. most people don't. newspaper, radio, and television matter more than we can say in most parts of this country. just ask the good people of minot.
and visit us at prometheus. we're here all the time. and we will be until june 2nd and after.
hannah sassaman
prometheusradioproject
As you may know, one of the advantages of cable is that it has so many channels that there is the opportunity for niche markets.
Digital Television provides 19.4 Mbps of data per channel. This could either be a single high-definition stream, or a multiplex set of standard-definition streams (or even a mixture of both).
So you could have 4 times as many digital video streams on the air as you have analog video channels today, if they all do a 4 way multiplex (they call it "multicast", but that confuses us IT folks) at SD bitrates equivalent to those of SD digital cable.
It remains to be seen what might be made of those multiplexed digital television channels.
PBS, for example, provides a pre-multiplexed DTV feed to public television stations broadcasting a digital channel, including a children's feed, and an adult learning feed, and many are running with this 4 channel "multicast" during non-prime hours.
So it might be that broadcast DTV becomes more "cable-ized" through the addition of multiplexed channels.
They have a license to use the public's airwaves for the public good. They are in gross violation of that license. Someone needs to organize a campaign to protest the re-newal of a stations liscense, they need to be re-newed every 8 years
Free cell phone tracking
This article in the NY times is one of the best things I've seen on the subject, so I had to pass it along.
It's true that it is very hard to find an alternative viewpoint in the media in this country, and surprising when the press is so profit-driven. This is the best explanation of this problem that I've seen so far, and suggests that it is this very profit motive that causes large media companies in the US to take the side of the party in power.
Very interesting and important.
(previous submission accidental)