FCC Commissioner Stumps For Media Diversity

maynard writes, "Speaking at a New York City town hall meeting on corporate media consolidation and its deleterious impact on the expression of minority viewpoints, FCC Commissioner Michael Copps stumped against greater media concentration and instead argued for greater diversity of media outlets and voices. In 2003 the FCC, under Chairman Michael Powell, changed media ownership rules to favor greater corporate media consolidation at the expense of local owners. In an attempt to reverse totally the prior FCC policy, Mr. Copps argued strongly in favor of independent media owners. Read on for what he had to say. Michael Copps: "The FCC is in the midst of a hugely important proceeding right now to decide what the future of our media, our TV, our radio, our newspapers, our cable, even our internet, are going to look like for a long, long time to come.

A little history, just to set the stage for our discussion. Three years ago, under then FCC Chairman Michael Powell and over the objections of my good friend Commissioner Adelstein and myself, the FCC severely cut back — really "eviscerated" is a better word — the rules that were meant to check big media's seemingly endless appetite for more consolidation. It passed new rules, which have allowed a single media giant to own in a single market up to three television stations, eight radio stations, the cable system, the cable channels, even the internet portal, and the local newspaper, which in most cities in the United States of America is already a monopoly. And the agency did all of that behind closed doors and without seeking meaningful input from the American people. Can you imagine that? Authorizing a sea change in how news and entertainment are produced and presented over the people's airwaves, without even involving the people who own those airwaves and who depend so heavily upon them. It was a near disaster for America.

Thankfully, citizens rose up across the land. They sent nearly 3 million protests to the Federal Communications Commission. Congress rose up, too, and then a federal court sent those rules back to the FCC saying they were badly flawed and they needed to be reworked. That was good, and anybody that doesn't believe that citizen action can have an effect should just revisit what happened there. We checked those rules. You checked those rules from going into effect. It was concerned citizens at work, and it was a citizen consumer victory.

But, here's a reality check now. We're right back at square one, and it's all up for grabs again. And if we're going to have a better result this time around, doing something positive for media democracy, it's going to be because of more citizen action and more input from folks like you. So, this time we need to make it an open public process, instead of hiding in our office in Washington like the majority did in 2003. This time, let all the commissioners come to New York City — I wish they were all here tonight — and let all the commissioners get out across America and find out what's happening in the real world, beyond that Beltway that they bemoan so much but seem to love staying behind so much.

So, as we begin our discussion, then begin with that simple reminder: it's all of us who own the airwaves. There is not a broadcaster, a business, a special interest, and any industry that owns one airwave in the United States of America. They belong to you, and they belong to me. And, my friends, now is the time to assert our ownership rights."

Comments

Bolshevization of North America

[P(0)(!P(k) P(k 1))]

From TFS:

So, as we begin our discussion, then begin with that simple reminder: it's all of us who own the airwaves.

A quaint sentiment, indeed, that the private citizen is still sovereign; I'm afraid, however, that the Bolshevization of North America is well underway, and that more violent notions will be required to reverse it.

The Bolshevization of North America consists above all in:

1. the centralization of media, agitation and propaganda;
2. ubiquitous surveillance;
3. the nanny state.

Eminent domain, if anything, should prove how highly our gubernatores esteem “ownership.*”

_____________
* Quod autem vide: DRM and fair use.

Re:Bolshevization of North America

[gbulmash]

Eminent domain, if anything, should prove how highly our gubernatores esteem "ownership."

But after the New London, Connecticut case where the Supreme Court ruled that municipalities really could take private property and hand it over to condo developers, there was a huge backlash. Eminent domain laws are mainly at the state level, and that's where citizens took action. A number of states now have laws on the books explicitly forbidding those kinds of eminent domain seizures.

- Greg

Re:Bolshevization of North America

[Anonymous Coward]

It's been large corporations, not commies, that have centralized media and propoganda. And governments may be getting in the game now, but in the past it's been mainly corporations invading my privacy.

Re:Bolshevization of North America

[krell]

"It's been large corporations, not commies, that have centralized media and propoganda."

Except the opposite has happened. In the last 25 or so years, the number of major national news outlets has just about doubled. There has been an explosion in alternative weekly newspapers. There's the new phenomenon of public access TV on cable.

Re:Bolshevization of North America

[Instine]

OK the US is clearly in a turning point at the moment. You only have to look at the number of posts to topics like media, politics, or as just seen, leaving America, to see how conflicted and concentrated feeling is at the moment regarding these issues. Can I just point out as an observer, that it may not be simplistic, reductionist logic that wins out here. There is no magic formula for freedom of press.

For decades now the UK has had state own/governed (or at least centrally funded) channels dominating the airwaves. We've also enjoyed independent outlets, so its not like N Korea. But news in particular is the BBC's domain. And for all that time, we have been the envy of America with regards to freedom of press (or at least the Americans who have witnessed both). You want the glossy crap, its there to, but you want more even handed, insightful, in depth news the UK's has beaten the US for a long time. But why?... It doesn't seem right.

It's not that I don't see your point that centralisation is a danger, and can lead to more total loss of objectivity. That is clear and obvious. Yet why is it that the contrary is born out in practise for us? I would say it is something that you do have control over. Your culture. Is it snobbish to think less of someone, you know could care more about world affairs, but who can't be bothered? Or is it your duty as a responsible citizen? Fox News would not get watched here. I know, because they tried something approaching it on channel 5. It stank. No one watches it still (even though its improving slightly). I would be ashamed to do so. If I saw a friend watching it, I'd say don't watch that shit. Its all sensationalist crap. Why watch the news if its not news. Watch kids TV or something. And I'd mean it. My tone would be seen as condescending snobbery to many Americans. It would not to most Brits. THIS is the reason you have "consolidated press". Here we have many Newspapers owned by one corporation, that are politically conflicting even. Why? because people expect varied opinions. This is bolstered by my experience of German news, and attitude to news. Which is an exaggerated version of the UK culture. And they have better news for it.

I do fear that this is fading some. And that the US way of toeing big business/party lines with soundbites and banalities, interspersed with adverts for the very same power mongers, is approaching. But there is still a big enough distinction for us to see the phenomena for what it is. Sadly know one wants to think they are living a lie. Or to pull your bloody socks up! Which is kind of what you are being told by people like me. But there you have it. DON'T watch crap, centralised, sanitised news. e.g. If you're being told everyday how many of your soldiers are being BRUTALLY MURDERED. And vague indications, if that, of civilian "casualties" that there have UNAVOIDABLY been, then your news is not news. Its propaganda. And you really are better off switching of the box and staring at the wall, or better still talking to a real person about what might really be happening in the world. AND EXPECT the same of your friends. EXPECT the same FOR your friends. They deserve better, as do you. I assume.

Re:Bolshevization of North America

[ObsessiveMathsFreak]

The Bolshevization of North America consists above all in:

      1. the centralization of media, agitation and propaganda;
      2. ubiquitous surveillance;
      3. the nanny state.

Nice troll, but you've forgotten that;

1. ... is due to increased monopolosation by private companies. This is classical "Kapitalism" in action.
2. ... is a phenomenon in no way unique to, or in itself indicative of, Bolshevism. Plenty of tyrannanies of all parts of the spectrum have empolyed such methods.
3. ... is laughable. The USA doesn't even have a modern public health service, and your education system is in disarray. Security is being increasingly privatised and even essential public services like water and electricity have been sold off to private monopolies.

Blaming your countries problems on the long since dead communist bogeyman is less than derisable. No sir, your problems are entirely as a result of unrestricted market forces acting upon your society. Enjoy!

Re:Bolshevization of North America

[d3ac0n]

Not to pick nits,

but you obviously haven't read this article: http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3318582, 00.html

Or this article: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/new s/news.html?in_article_id=411846&in_page_id=1770

The BBC ADMITS that is not only NOT objective, but that they are VERY far to the left. Of course, I guess if one is already a socialist this would appear to be "objective" but to the rest of us that are more towards the center and right-of center this is hardly "Objectivity".

Sorry, but the Beeb isn't objective, and hasn't been for years. Much like many of the newsies and other media outlets in the UK, it is a prime example of what happens when with media concentration. A restriction of viewpoints to a very small selection on the overall spectrum. It's quite obvious that you have not been properly exposed to enough viewpoints if you can't see the obvious liberal slant in most British newsies.

Of course, the American news landscape is much the same. We Americans don't have the Beeb, but we do have our own Alphabet Soup of "me too" liberal outlets that all report the exact same stories in exactly the same manner with exactly the same slant and conclusions. Fox News is really the only one even slightly different. While I will readily admit that thier format is not entirely my favorite, at least I know that I'm getting a different slant on the news when I watch them. It allows me to make a more informed decision than if all I watched were CNNCBSABCNBCMSNBC et al.

I'd recommend that you start adding FoxNews to your weekly watching schedule, if for no other reason than to broaden your perspective a bit.

(And yes, I do think it's sad that an American has to tell a Brit to get a broader perspective.)

Re:Bolshevization of North America

[Anonymous Coward]

The above comments notwithstanding, the REAL way to accomplish the goal of the main article is to Keep Internet Neutrality.

Re:Bolshevization of North America

[atani]

... and that more violent notions will be required to reverse it.

That sounds like a cop-out to me. "We can't change it without violent resistance" is not a sentiment that you should be too eager to adopt, IMHO, and most people who claim to espouse that sentiment only use it to avoid doing anything about the problems they perceive. Perhaps you're not one of those who ends up doing nothing because of that belief, but you'd be a exception if so.

The courts are not completely bought and paid for and this is still a government of elected officials. If you take an active role in the governance of your county/state/country you can help hold your representatives accountable for their votes and (in)action. It is entirely too easy to look around at all the efforts being made to strip our rights or consolidate power into the hands of a few wealthy oligarchs and say "bah, too late to make a difference" when it's absolutely not too late. The folks trying to "take it all away" aren't going to stop trying.

Some of the things that could be resisted right now, sans "violent notions" include:

• The mandatory use of insecure voting machines with no papertrail. Search google.com
• The consolidation and monopolization of media markets (apropos this article)
• The martial aspirations of some members of our government. Search google.com
• The legal subversion of end-to-end neutral data networks. Search google.com

Just to name a few.

Re:Bolshevization of North America

[IAmTheDave]

So, as we begin our discussion, then begin with that simple reminder: it's all of us who own the airwaves.

That's nice and all, but if "we" all own the airwaves, why don't "we" have any say as to who can broadcast on them, why don't "we" have any say as to who can bid on the airwaves, and where is my check for the leases for these airwaves handed out to companies like Verizon that pay billions that I never see a dime of?

Don't fool yourself, you and I don't own squat.

Re:Bolshevization of North America

[Instine]

there is no such thing as objectivity I guess. But It is clear to me that sensationisim is something that hinders it further. The the BBC is not nearly as guilty of this as FOX, or I hate to knit pick, but the Daily mail. The daily mail is ridiculed here for being xenophobic and right right wing to the point of, again, not being news, but rather propoganda.

The beauty of the BBC is that I can see it is left leaning. And as you rightly point out that it admits to this. Thats the point. FOX's tag line is a lie. Plain and simple. It says that it is unbiased. It can't be, is is very far from being so. Do you see?

As for adding them to my viewing list, no. I've watched it once or twice, and I know what to expect. Here we also have C4 news. For example. Its remit, that it has set itself, is to offer the 'other point of view'. And is therefore 'at odds' with the BBC most of the time. And because the BBC is left of where you see centre, and "safe" news, C4 is oftern 'dangerous' and willing to air the radical right's (or left's) arguments. i.e. they would be more willing to have a lengthy debate with BNP leaders, or air the views of a far right, middle eastern commentator. As such I actually do watch it more than the BBC News. The difference is the sane, and unemotive manner in which the facts are broached. News should not be entertainment. As it is treated on Fox. And every News show I've watched in the States.

I have seen both sides, haveing visited America, haveing an American family, and being subjected, as is everyone in the UK (/world) to a great deal of American media. Right or left leaning, vurtually everyone I've spoken to who is in a similar position would agree, that your news over there, just isn't news. In short, your dead wrong.

Re:Bolshevization of North America

[kthejoker]

There's a fundamental difference between our countries.

Britain is dominated by state power. America is dominated by corporate power.

State power is at least somewhat grounded in the people, so varied opinions have their value, because the chief parties can acquire actual power through persuasion and viewpoints.

Corporate power is entirely guided by money. Acquiring more money means no varied opinions - it means one central opinion.

Because of this fundamentally different end goals (and thus the different means needed to acquire them) American news is simply incomparable to British news. They aren't even the same creature.

The flip side to this is that America as a whole is the more economically successful of our two countries. That's cold comfort for most Americans, but that's the guiding spirit of pretty much all of America.

Re:Bolshevization of North America

[Instine]

Nice reply. I agree whole heartedly. I'd mod up if I had pointsat the mo.

However, we're here to debate, so instead of just backslapping - would you see it worthwhile trying to alter this? IF you'd prefer a less capatalistic power moulding your lives over there (for this and/or other reasons) do you see it as a lost cause? Or as I see it, well within culture's grasp, to, at the very least guide the hand of your master?

Re:Bolshevization of North America

[kthejoker]

Well, there are, of course, a lot of different ways to approach this.

From the individual's standpoint, as pervasive as conglomerate media can be, it's fairly easy to just tune out and do your own thing. In fact, this path is so easy that it is, unsurprisingly, the most popular option. And it's easy because it's empowering - it often reveals the emperor has no clothes.

From the collective's standpoint, conglomerate media still kowtows to the almighty dollar, and it can be exploited as necessary. The major advantage to this is (verging on irony) is that many of the quote unquote liberal views of the day - the green economy and environmental sustainability, better education and better schools, and more federal support for programs like stem cell research and Medicare - are actually more econonomically viable than their alternatives. So when Google can push out a solar-powered campus and say, "This is good for the environment *and* the bottom line," then the money-focused mainstream media starts touting this as part of the central tenet: greed is good. If you can tie on socially desirable benefits to greed, so much the better.

So there really is no guiding the dollar, because it is entirely based on an economy of scale that can't really be guided by anything short of toppling 2 towers in New York City on a Tuesday. So the issue isn't that you have to convince the the other side that you're right - there's no Parliamentary function at hand in America's future (our levels of Congressional approval are more implicit signs of mistrust rather than the effects of recent scandals) - but you must in fact *be* right. And if you are right, the bottom line will bear you out.

This also explains a lot of America's success - the market intuitively and instinctively moves towards the best ideas for making money. This allows us to be more risk-takers, and our overall economic success is pretty much a function of the risks taken by all Americans throughout history. It's why Americans seem so cocky - there's a whole lineage of success behind us. And the price for that is, simply put, corporate hegemony - but when you're part of the corporation, you're less likely to complain.

I think one of the real challenges for both our countries over the next century is to figure out how to "do business" with Asia, South America, and the developing nations of the world. This is probably where are two disparate approaches will differentiate themselves most clearly - and I don't doubt for a second that America will come out on top. At what price? ...

Re:Bolshevization of North America

[caseydk]

"FOX's tag line is a lie. Plain and simple. It says that it is unbiased. It can't be, is is very far from being so."

Actually, I've never seen "unbiased" in their tag line. The tag line I've always seen/heard is "Fair and Balanced".

Therefore, if they have someone on from one side, they have someone on from the other and give them about the same time to speak. Obviously when you have two guys butting heads over a point, it sometimes turns into a shouting match and no one is heard, but that's the fault of the moderator, not the channel.

I think it's a huge step that the BBC is admitting their bias. I'm tired of commentators, anchors, etc getting on and saying that they're unbiased despite facts to the opposite.

Re:Bolshevization of North America

[krell]

"The daily mail is ridiculed here for being xenophobic and right right wing to the point of, again, not being news, but rather propoganda."

What then definese "news". Is that a term you use for the propaganda you happen to like?

Re:Bolshevization of North America

[d3ac0n]

You are correct caseydk, they do indeed have opposing points of view on thier network. Not only guests, but commentators that are unabashedly liberal are part of thier line up. I would say that, on balance, they are more conservative than liberal, and those on the network that are conservative make no bones about being so.

You see, this is the difference between Conservatives and Liberals in the media (The American media particularly, but the worldwide media as well.) Conservatives (in the Anglo-American mould) will come right out and say they are conservative. They will be up-front and honest with you, and allow you to take what they say with that in mind. Liberals, on the other hand, will be entirely DIShonest about the entire affair(for the most part. There are exceptions). They will attempt to say, despite all evidence to the contrary, that they are "objective" and that you should accept what they say at face value, and never question it. Indeed, it takes the leak of an internal memo (such as the one I referenced in my earlier post) to get them to admit that they are indeed Liberals.

And yes, the tag line is "Fair and Balanced, We Report, You Decide." Nothing there about being unbiased. Frankly, with as liberal as the rest of the available Television media in the US is, I find FoxNews to BE balance, although not much of it, as even they have Liberals on thier lineup.

Of course, most Liberals would prefer that FoxNews just go away, as they don't like having thier worldview challenged. Witness the fact that my earlier post was marked as a troll for several hours today, despite being a respectful and thought-out reply, and not trollish in any way. Fortunately, some fair-minded people have since rectified that, although I would imagine the thought-suppressors will continue to try to push down any disagreements with the liberal line.

---

Instine,

It would seem to me that your big issue with FoxNews is formulaic in nature. You simply don't like the "splashy" way that they present news. I suppose that I cannot argue that, as it is a matter of personal taste. As you well know, there is indeed no accounting for anyones' taste, yours or mine. However, That does not mean that it is not "news".

All T.V. outlets in the US focus on politics, current events, sports and finance, with a dash of human interest stories to round it out. That is what news is. While one channel or another may focus on one part of the news spectrum more than the others, that doesn't make it "not news". It simply makes it "News in a format or on a subject that you don't like or aren't interested in." Again, this is fine. You are free to not like the format or the topic. However you cannot correctly say that it "just isn't news". To do this is to be factually inaccurate and intellectually dishonest.

In short, I am correct, and YOU need to reasess your definition of "news".

Re:Bolshevization of North America

[kirun]

Let us take two ways of writing up news stories, and see if you can spot which one is less biased:

1) Home Office releases new asylum figures, showing X applications last year. This is a change of Y% from last year. Overall, Z% of applications were accepted.

2) SOFT TOUCH BRITAIN FLOODED WITH BOGUS ASYLUM APPLICATIONS AS SYSTEM DROWNS IN CHAOS.

~~~~

1) Pedophile sentenced to X years in jail. Due to sentencing guidelines, they are eligible for parole within Y years.

2) JUDGE PASSES LENIENT SENTENCE: PEDOPHILE COULD BE FREE IN Y YEARS

News sources can be more or less biased. The Daily Mail is well-known for making sure its stories are all biased a certain way for a certain market. It's fair to call this propaganda, up against other sources with more fact-based reporting. The "all sources are biased" gambit is a distraction, to try to convince people that sources with deliberate bias are no worse than ones which aim for neutrality, but are obviously "biased" in the eyes of those that would prefer an "improved" selection of facts.

Re:Bolshevization of North America

[mofomojo]

I don't think that you understand, Bolshevik in Russian means the "majority", which was utterly a lie. Bolshevikism can come in to ways, from idiots under the guise of socialists killing all the capitalists and taking their money and power and abusing it or, the capitalists themselves abusing the power of their own money and concentrating all their money and power into one monopoly.

Different means, same ends. Monopolies have come and gone throughout US history, few have been able to truly challenge the power of the US government and it's respective republic. However, today, these people are growing so powerful through the use of technology - surveillance, the Internet, Television, etc - that they just might be able to do that!! As Orwell predicted. Whether they have a revolution for it, or not, the power hungry are going to always reaching for the same ends.

I believe, O'Briend said "You don't establish a dictatorship to safegaurd a revolution. You have a revolution to establish a dictatorship". And well, that's the turning point that America is at right now, the type of conservative, national socialist, hawkish, democratically elected revolution. However, to Hitler's credit, he wasn't a chickenhawk and actually fought in a war, as opposed to the current administration.

Hopefully, the Dems retain the House and Senate, while that wound solve all the problems of the past 6 years of bullshit, that should soundly put America on a right track to getting back on it's feet.

Re:Bolshevization of North America

[krell]

" the capitalists themselves abusing the power of their own money and concentrating all their money and power into one monopoly."

At which point they become socialists, since they have met the definition of socialism.

Re:Bolshevization of North America

[krell]

"Let us take two ways of writing up news stories, and see if you can spot which one is less biased"

Both of them are. One is just more subtle-looking than the other. Both of them made subjective decisions of what to say, and what not to say.

Using your technique of comparing two headlines about the same event, consider this example, using a historical situation from the 1930s:

1) Regional agricultural administrators predict that Ukrainian harvest will fall below expectations for this 5 year period.

2) MURDEROUS SOVIET-ENGINEERED FAMINE KILLS MILLIONS IN THE UKRAINE.

Now, which one in all honesty tells are more accurate story? Which one has the more venemous slanted looking headline?

Re:Bolshevization of North America

[epee1221]

And yes, the tag line is "Fair and Balanced, We Report, You Decide." Nothing there about being unbiased.

This is sarcasm... right?

Re:Bolshevization of North America

[Anonymous Coward]

I believe that socialism generally requires some degree state or collective ownership; a corporate monopoly or cartel does not.

Re:Bolshevization of North America

[macraig]

Spoken just like a good little misguided fanatic Libertarian would say it, especially that last gasp about eminent domain and ownership.

The Libertarian dream only exists in fantasy, and thank goodness! If everyone was allowed to do entirely whatever the hell they wanted with land they own, there'd be even more abuse of it and natural resources than there is now. Homo sapiens is still far too limbic and too little sapient to put into practice what Libertarians imagine. Sadly, that's also true of Socialism as well. One requires perfect market education and awareness, and the other requires perfect ethics (and objective valuation).

What the United States has now is a hodge-podge of capitalism and socialism with a smidge of libertarianism, and that economic mutt - or some variant of it with a bit more or less of one or the others - is about the best we can expect to achieve for a good long time. Only capitalism can exist successfully in its "pure" state, because it's the baseline economic Law of the Jungle and not dependent on any higher human brain functions. Even chimps and rats practice capitalism. Our advanced evolution, however, only gets us to the point of a few humans being able to IMAGINE other systems... we're still mostly practicing the same economic model as every lower life form. Dog eat dog. Survival mode. Survival of the "fittest". Hooray for us!

Re:Bolshevization of North America

[krell]

"I believe that socialism generally requires some degree state or collective ownership; a corporate monopoly or cartel does not."

Can you deny that once those in this scenario have a monopoly control over everything, that they will likely have also become the government/state?

Best use of the airwaves

[gbulmash]

Thankfully, citizens rose up across the land.

If they'd rise up more often, they could call it exercise.

There is not a broadcaster, a business, a special interest, and any industry that owns one airwave in the United States of America. They belong to you...

Well, if they belong to me, I'd like my airwave now. I'll use it to broadcast Janet Jackson's nipple 24/7. Just as we've been desensitized to violence through the massive amounts of it on TV, it is my dream that, via continuous exposure to Janet Jackson's nipple, we'll soon become desensitized to breasts and let them bounce freely across our screens all day long (not just late at night on Cinemax).

- Greg

Re:Best use of the airwaves

[Si]

I went to the FCC conference and all I got was this lousy airwave.

Re:Best use of the airwaves

[mwvdlee]

I'm sorry. but I couldn't disagree more!

Woe the day we get desensitized to naked boobies.

Re:Best use of the airwaves

[aadvancedGIR]

I pitty you, poor brainwashed american, if it is really your better definition of nude beauty.

JJ nipple even was at most a funny attempt of a declining star to draw some attention on a meaningless PR stunt instead of her artistic work (and I would say it was a success, because I know what she did, but cannot remember anything the sang). The overreaction tells is by itself more intersting, and therefore, I indeed like your idea of promoting beauty instead of violence, but your choice would be as if we chosed Ozzy Osbourne to tell kids that music is a sane activity.

Re:Best use of the airwaves

[KlomDark]

Yah, it'd be better to further sensitize the people, like the Arabs do by not letting women show their faces.

Instead of "Dude, she showed me her nipples!" it'd be like "Dude, she let me look up her nostrils. It was hot!"

Re:Best use of the airwaves

[Doctor Faustus]

JJ nipple even was at most a funny attempt of a declining star to draw some attention on a meaningless PR stunt instead of her artistic work

Take a look at the picture sometime. Her breast was being lifted strangely by what was left of her top, leading to a serious pancake effect. If that was intentional, don't you think they would've done something mroe flattering?

Low power community FM

[krell]

I'm opposed to laws limiting ownership (I don't want anyone silenced, even if they are portrayed as having "bad" views that deserve censorship, such as the Sinclair Group).

However, I definitely want more of a diversity of voices. Low power FM radio station licenses should be made much easier to get for community radio.

Re:Low power community FM

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm opposed to laws limiting ownership (I don't want anyone silenced...

If somebody owns all the TV stations, newspapers, and radio stations, they are silenced how exactly?

Re:Low power community FM

[krell]

"If somebody owns all the TV stations, newspapers, and radio stations, they are silenced how exactly?"

Who are you speaking of specifically? I don't know of any such entity in the US.

Re:Low power community FM

[Anonymous Coward]

Nobody in particular, just inquiring on the general point that laws preventing ownership tend to (or, at least if they exist, should tend to) prevent one entity from owning "too much" of the media. Therefore, they would only affect somebody who already owns a substantial piece of the market, and preventing their further ownership wouldn't silence them. The example of "total control" was a comparison between current ownership limits, and what might happen if they were removed.

If what was meant was "There shouldn't be laws saying 'you can't own X media channel because we don't like you' (or a seemingly plausible reason with the same effect)", then fine, I agree.

If what was meant was "Laws that prevent media from falling into too few hands can silence some voices", this is counter-intuitive (more owners should mean more voices), and I'd like an example of who would be silenced by such a thing.

Re:Low power community FM

[Anonymous Coward]

Dude, Clear Channel and other giants practically vaporized any diversity in radio media when the FCC changes hit. It isn't about limiting access in the FIRST PLACE. It's about limiting one entity from owning a majority or all of the main media point in a location. Dumbass.

Re:Low power community FM

[krell]

"The example of "total control" was a comparison between current ownership limits, and what might happen if they were removed."

Do you have any sort of real example of where this is a real danger? Clear Channel is often mentioned, and they own 7% to 8% of questions. If they doubled the number of stations they own, they'd still have less than 20%.

Re:Low power community FM

[krell]

"Dude, Clear Channel and other giants practically vaporized any diversity in radio media"

How? They own less than 10% of the stations. They didn't do this, and they can't do this.

"It's about limiting one entity from owning a majority or all of the main media point in a location"

Can you show a place where this has happened? Or is even close to happening? The movement is really all about censoring certain people. A little while back, when there was a controversy over rules changes, the opponents of relaxing ownership used as a main complaint the content of certain Sinclair Group content, and they used Murdoch as a poster boy (literally, on posters). Dumbass. Why not check the real numbers next time?

Re:Low power community FM

[Anonymous Coward]

If you wish to argue that there isn't a risk of this happening, that's fair enough, and maybe I shouldn't have initially picked such an intital example to make my point. I was just using it to contrast as to whose speech was being curtailed. The same idea would work if the media ownership laws were preventing n+1 owners from going to n. I'm not trying to convince you in this instance that any particular level is even bad, or likely. "Somebody owning all media" was just the simplest example scenario, which was intended to quickly illustrate who was or was not being censored. Whether these laws are needed we can leave aside, my question is simply about the intent and effect of them.

So, were you referring to laws that limited number of properties owned, and if so, how would they prevent media owners from getting their message out to those that wanted it, given that they should already own enough properties to do this before the laws take effect? (assuming as I mentioned before, that the laws are written in such a way as this is their actual effect). Or did the original post mean something else and I have the wrong end of the stick here?

Re:Low power community FM

[Pollardito]

i'm not sure he needs a real example, as you said "I'm opposed to laws limiting ownership" and not "i'm opposed to these laws that we have now limiting ownership." he (and i) assumed that you were against any theoretical law, therefore he asked you a theoretical question. i'll ask you another :
if one company owned every TV station except one, and there was a law that prevented them from buying that one, how would that be silencing them?

Re:Low power community FM

[Dirtside]

Number of stations is not the issue, so much as how much of the audience they account for. They own around 11% of all stations in the U.S. (not 8%), but because almost all of those stations are large stations in large markets, they account for a huge percentage (75% or so) of all listeners.

Re:Low power community FM

[krell]

"Number of stations is not the issue, so much as how much of the audience they account for"

Number of stations is the only issue. Why bring up the audience share unless you are looking to change legislation and policy to punish someone for daring to be too popular?"

"but because almost all of those stations are large stations in large markets, they account for a huge percentage (75% or so) of all listeners."

How is this a problem when they control a minority share of the stations?

Re:Low power community FM

[krell]

"(and i) assumed that you were against any theoretical law, therefore he asked you a theoretical question."

If this "theoretical situation" is not a realistic one at all, why bring it up except for sensationalism fallacious "slippery slope" arguments?

"if one company owned every TV station except one, and there was a law that prevented them from buying that one, how would that be silencing them?"

Rather like passing a law that puts an upper limit on how many newspapers the New York Times can sell. Well, there is indeed a difference between passing a law to censor someone to limit or curtail their speech, and passing a law to censor someone to completely silence their speech. I'll agree that while both situations are censorship even if one is not complete silencing.

Re:Low power community FM

[amRadioHed]

Number of stations is the only issue.

You really are starting to sound like a troll. We are talking about the amount of influence a media company has. If you ignore their market share, you are an idiot.

I could print up a thousand different independent newsweekly's that never get distributed past my kitchen and by your standards I guess that would make me one of the worlds largest media monopolies.

Re:Low power community FM

[Dirtside]

Number of stations is the only issue. Why bring up the audience share unless you are looking to change legislation and policy to punish someone for daring to be too popular?"

They're not popular because they have excellent quality -- which would be a bad reason to punish them -- they're popular because they BOUGHT all the big stations. The reason this is a problem is that there's only a finite number of radio stations, because of the way the FCC allocates the EM spectrum. Having one entity account for that large a percentage of what people hear is bad for a democracy. It's not like people can just start up a bunch of competing radio stations -- you need an FCC license (expensive and limited in number), and there's all the usual costs involved in starting a business.

How is this a problem when they control a minority share of the stations?

Ok, I'll explain this in simple terms: It's a bad thing for a single entity -- government or corporate -- to have control over the news that a vast majority of the population hears. This is our base assumption, and if you don't agree with it, there's no point in continuing.

Assuming you do agree with it, then the problem is that Clear Channel has control over the (at least radio) news that around 75% of the population hears. Per our assumption above, this is a bad thing. The fact that Clear Channel only owns 11% of all the individual radio stations nationwide has no relevance.

Re:Low power community FM

[krell]

"You really are starting to sound like a troll. We are talking about the amount of influence a media company has. If you ignore their market share, you are an idiot."

But if you take into account the relative market share that equal voices have, you are in effect making policy that is based on how popular something is. How trollish is that: wanting to censor something because too many people "like it too much"?

"I could print up a thousand different independent newsweekly's that never get distributed past my kitchen and by your standards I guess that would make me one of the worlds largest media monopolies."

Which is entirely irrelevant to this, as the numerous independent radio stations that greatly outnumber Clear Channel/etc each have the same sort of slot on the dial as each Clear Channel station, so they are "getting out" (not stuck in your "kitchen"). And, in considering newspapers and magazines, I am only considering those available in newspaper boxes, bookstores, and magazine stands. There's an extremely large number of these, distributed beyond your example "kitchen".

Re:Low power community FM

[krell]

"Ok, I'll explain this in simple terms: It's a bad thing for a single entity -- government or corporate -- to have control over the news that a vast majority of the population hears. This is our base assumption, and if you don't agree with it, there's no point in continuing."

Whether or not it is a bad thing (you know, maybe it is!!!!), we are nowhere near getting to anything like this.

"The fact that Clear Channel only owns 11% of all the individual radio stations nationwide has no relevance."

It's around 6%. Unless CC ownership has significantly increased in the last several months and I'm out of date.

Re:Low power community FM

[epee1221]

If somebody owns all the TV stations, newspapers, and radio stations, they are silenced how exactly?

They're not "silenced" at all -- everyone else is.

Re:Low power community FM

[krell]

"They're not "silenced" at all -- everyone else is."

Which might be a concern if we got anywhere here this. With situations where the largest companies control only a small fraction of the stations, this is far away.

Re:Low power community FM

[krell]

"You really are starting to sound like a troll. We are talking about the amount of influence a media company has. If you ignore their market share, you are an idiot."

If you take into account market share instead of actual station share, you are really using popularity as a criteria. As for focusing on "amount of influence" as a justification for censorship, I'd really love to give you a time machine so you can go back to the Constitutional Convention and try to convince them to add a clause to the Bill of Rights that exempts the press from protections if it gets too popular with people.

It's also interesting that, when you get right down to it, the arguments are entirely content related. If the Clear Channel stations all decided to air one single Tiny Tim song over and over again, their popularity (and thus their market share) would quickly go down.

Re:Low power community FM

[epee1221]

Which might be a concern if we got anywhere here this. With situations where the largest companies control only a small fraction of the stations, this is far away.

Would you mind giving me a list of "independent" stations present in a specific area? Please include only the ones capable of reaching a large number of people (along with what you consider a "large number").

Re:Low power community FM

[krell]

What market are you referring to? Which specific area?

Re:Low power community FM

[epee1221]

Any one. Pick one. And then stop dodging the question.

*Wipes back tears*

[BeeBeard]

That was...*sniff*...so beautiful. Preach on, brother, preach on!

In your face, Mike Powell!

[192939495969798999]

That's great, the very next FCC chairman acts to reverse the very thing that Powell fought so hard for... I only hope that it's in time to boot Clear Channel out of a couple of markets. It's insane, where I live you hear the same 12 songs on every channel all day. Of course, I suppose maybe Powell knew that and held stock in Sirius satellite radio! I'm gone there forever, but maybe for my future kids it's not too late.

Re:In your face, Mike Powell!

[mgblst]

So the issue is, does this one man have too much power - should he be making these decisions on his own (which is what seems to be happening)?

Re:In your face, Mike Powell!

[Anonymous Coward]

You think the same 12 songs from different artists on the same channel is bad? How about when 50 Cent first blew up and became popular? Every radio station in Detroit (and probably the country) played the same fucking 50 Cent songs for months. Even the rock stations joined in on the fun! The constitution has been pissed on yet again. Wake me up when George Washington is cloned.

Re:In your face, Mike Powell!

[Anonymous Coward]

he's not the chairman; still just a commission member

Copps is not the Chairman!

[Anonymous Coward]

Michael Copps is not the Chairman of the FCC. He is "minority" Democrat member.

Re:Copps is not the Chairman!

[maynard]

(rolls eyes) sonofabitch!!!

You are absolutely right! Here is Commissioner Copps' biography page.

Well, I got that writeup very wrong. Slashdot editors: _please_ fix the title and text so as to remove FCC Chairman, and instead shift it to FCC commissioner. Or, conversely, since the premise of this story is factually inaccurate, just go ahead and wipe it.

Re:Copps is not the Chairman!

[Shaper_pmp]

I think the parent is "Score:4, Sarcastic", not "Score 4, Interesting".

Total Bullshit

[Anonymous Coward]

For years the FCC has stood in the way of any form of diversity, from anti-local ownership of licenced outlets to LPFM (low power FM). The smart money says they'll go back to their old ways after the election.

BTW, I honestly don't see the democrats as being much better on the same subject.

Re:Total Bullshit

[maynard]

It's total bullshit because I got the story completely wrong. Michael Copps is not the FCC chair, he is a minority democratic member of the commission. Which places his words in a completely different context.

I totally fucked this up.

Re:Total Bullshit

[Anonymous Coward]

Could you explain what this means:

"FCC Chair Stumps For Media Diversity"

and

"Michael Copps stumped against greater media concentration and instead argued for greater diversity of media outlets and voices."

I'm familiar with say: "Tough question, its got me stumped." Or: "I need to burn the remaining tree stumps in that field before I can plow it easily."

I've never seen the word used as you have. I checked google:
http://www.google.ca/search?q=define:+stump
None of Google's definitions seemed to match your usage.

I checked Webster:
http://www.webster.com/cgi-bin/dictionary/stump

Main Entry: stump
Function: verb
transitive verb
1 : to reduce to a stump : TRIM
2 a : DARE, CHALLENGE b : to frustrate the progress or efforts of : BAFFLE
3 : to clear (land) of stumps
4 : to travel over (a region) making political speeches or supporting a cause
5 a : to walk over heavily or clumsily b : STUB 3

Which either #2 or #4 might match what you are trying to say?

Interesting, I never knew the word stump had so many meanings! Which meaning are you using and out of curiousity, why did you choose that word?

Not the chairman

[oldave]

I'm not sure where the description of Michael Copps as the Federal Communications Commission Chair came from, but it's, well, inaccurate.

Kevin Martin is the chairman at the FCC.

The remainder of the commission consists of:

Michael J. Copps
Commissioner

Jonathan S. Adelstein
Commissioner

Deborah Taylor Tate
Commissioner

Robert M. McDowell
Commissioner

THIS STORY IS WRONG

[maynard]

I submitted this article. I made a mistake and confused Michael Copps, FCC commissioner, for the Chairman Kevin Martin. Thus, the entire premise of the submission that the FCC is shifting policy away from what had been set in place by former Chairman Michael Powell is WRONG.

I should have fact checked it better before submission, and for that I apologize.

Re:THIS STORY IS WRONG

[Tim C]

I should have fact checked it better before submission

There are those of us who would suggest that kdawson should have fact checked it better after submission...

Still, respect for owning up to your mistake.

Re:THIS STORY IS WRONG

[maynard]

Here is replacement text for the intro:

Speaking at a New York City town hall meeting on corporate media consolidation and its deleterious impact on the expression of minority viewpoints, Michael Copps, minority Democratic commissioner, stumped against greater local media concentration and instead argued for greater diversity of media outlets and voices. In 2003 the FCC, under Chairman Michael Powell, changed media ownership rules to favor greater corporate media consolidation at the expense of local owners.

In what would be an apparent total reversal of prior FCC policy, Mr. Copps argued strongly for a complete policy shift at the FCC to favor independent media owners:

QUOTE MR. COPPS' actual text:

Re:THIS STORY IS WRONG

[maynard]

Well, perhaps as editor it is true that kdawson has a responsibility to slashdot. But I really should have caught this. It is a glaring and stupid error of fact that could easily have been fixed prior to submission. And I didn't catch it until an AC posted an early comment with a correction. So, right up to the story going live I was completely in the dark.

Duh.

Well, the damage is done. Now, how to get kdawson to fix it?

Re:THIS STORY IS WRONG

[gEvil (beta)]

Well, the damage is done. Now, how to get kdawson to fix it?

Send an email to daddypants@slashdot.org. They'll get on it right away!

Bwahahahahaha!!! (sorry, it's hard to say that with a straight face)

Re:THIS STORY IS WRONG

[Aeamarth]

No wonder you're still beta!

Re:THIS STORY IS WRONG

[Simonetta]

I should have fact checked it better before submission, and for that I apologize...

    no, you need not bother apologizing. No one believed you in the first place.

    It is inconceivable that a Republican appointee to the head of the FCC would come out against further consolidation of media ownership. Your story set off all the bullshit detectors of every politcally savvy Slashdaughter. There was simply no way that it could be true, and it wasn't.

    I was wondering to myself if it were actually April 1 already. It's an equinox and I pay more attention to the season and the daylength than I do to the months. I was afraid that I had gotten six months out of sync somehow.

Re:THIS STORY IS WRONG

[Vitriol Angst]

>> Jinkies, I was instantly worried that the Bush Crime Syndicate had made a mistake and allowed a pro-Citizen bureaucrat into a position of power.

I should have realized we'd never get that lucky.

Re:THIS STORY IS WRONG

[jafac]

It is inconceivable that a Republican appointee to the head of the FCC would come out against further consolidation of media ownership.

Really - when I read that title, I thought I had woken up in bizzarro-world or something.

Re:THIS STORY IS WRONG

[mellonhead]

"...Michael Copps, minority Democratic commissioner..."
You are aware that Mr. Copps is caucasian? ;-)

Re:THIS STORY IS WRONG

[maynard]

I found this story by listening to the Democracy Now podcast. I thought I heard him referred to as 'chairman.' Apparatly not. Had I simply googled his name before submission I would have caught it. Duh. Harsh lesson in fact checking.

That he is an FCC commissioner does still make his words of some interest. *shrug*

What a crock!

[BCW2]

If the members of the FCC board cared about diversity they would quit allowing mergers!

It really is that simple.

Re:What a crock!

[gfxguy]

In truth, the FCC should be about licensing airwaves so that competitors can't step on each others bandwidth... this is the part about the "public" owning the airwaves. Beyond that, they should stay the F out of it.

If you want to prevent monopolies, there's other government bureaucracies in that business.

I long for the day when everything is on cable or satellite and these people completley lose power.

Re:What a crock!

[krell]

"In truth, the FCC should be about licensing airwaves so that competitors can't step on each others bandwidth... this is the part about the "public" owning the airwaves. Beyond that, they should stay the F out of it."

I also think they should make it easy to get licenses, without denying them for silly discriminatory reasons such as someone thinks you are a "media conglomerate" or your skin color is that of a group that represents a "traditional racist power structure.

"I long for the day when everything is on cable or satellite and these people (FCC) completley lose power."

Fuggedaboutit. They already meddle some in the "closed circuit" media, and plan to meddle more. Look at this page, one of many involving existing FCC censorship and control of closed-circuit media.

Where's Steve Ballmer when you need 'im?

[scotbot]

Why is it whenever I read the word "chair" on Slashdot I immediately think of a certain Mircosoft employee??

Re:Where's Steve Ballmer when you need 'im?

[gfxguy]

Chairface Chippendale works for Microsoft?

Irresponsible, racist, and convoluted

[BeeBeard]

I'm still trying to figure out why this got posted. It is a link to half of a transcript and some audio downloads from a television show so far-from-coy about its politics that it comes across as the Left's version of The O'Reilly Factor. If you read the exchange between Copps, Goodman, and Gonzalez, I promise you will come away bewildered and disappointed. And even as someone who is a card-carrying liberal, I find this kind of propaganda hard to justify.

Read the transcript. Read it. Gonzalez himself is the biggest offender. He literally blames whitey for the phenomenon of media consolidation, undoubtedly finding a use for his own Latino ancestry as a carte blanche license through which he may criticize The Man for all of The Man's failings. If you're easily frightened by the cliched Orwellian future that people like Gonzalez try to paint, then here's some fearmongering for you right now:

We are in real danger of waking up one day with a de facto apartheid system, one where a small group of giant firms, run almost exclusively by white investors and managers, control the production and distribution of news and information to a largely non-white population.

"That's right! Our world is run by rich white men!!" It's an understanding of the problem that goes no deeper than what you'd find at a freshmen political science class.

The entire interview is a clumsy mashup of two unrelated ideas: White ownership (framed as the confusingly converse concept of "minority representation") and corporate consolidation. The former is a symptom of the way in which America was settled, and has no place in a rational discussion about the latter (which Gonzalez gladly forgoes in favor of white-baiting).

Corporate consolidation of media outlets, on the other hand, is also a tragedy. But what it means is that the media industry is no different from any other. You can wax philosophical about how the airwaves are free, man--they belong to you and me, man, but in the end there is still a situation where companies who have money buy out those who have less. Don't blame whitey, blame capitalism. To complain bitterly about how the people doing the buying out are white misses the point. It badly and embarrassingly misses the point.

I know this is Slashdot, so by all means, please feel free to copy and paste select portions of what I've written and take them out of context, because I'm sure that works better than actually discussing the issues.

Re:Irresponsible, racist, and convoluted

[maynard]

I submitted it because I incorrectly thought Mr. Copps was the chairman, and found his words at odds with longstanding FCC policy. The forum was irrelevant. What mattered from my thinking was, here is this official and these are his (surprising) words.

From the standpoint that this is an FCC Commissioner, it is still of (limited) interest.

Re:Irresponsible, racist, and convoluted

[Anonymous Coward]

Wow, replace the word "white" with "Jew" and I think we have how he really feels. You can dress it up, put lipstick on it, and call it something other than racism but it's still just a steaming pile of shyt.

Racism is wrong, even if it's against "whitey". Imagine that.

Who needs media diversity?

[Snowtide]

Sit down, shut up and watch the official version of events and media pabulum.
The media corps are run by people richer, smarter and prettier than you, they know what's best for America and for you.

On a more serious note, this guy's talking is too little too late, transmission spectrum and markets in this country are already divided up among the big corporations and they are not going to be forced to let go of it by the US Federal Government in the foreseeable future. Low power FM is a nice idea but dead as a doornail, follow the link in an earlier response to this story. Notice nice talk and good intentions, but any serious implementation has never, and will never happen. Since Low Power FM stations were proposed, how many have been built and are operating? It seems that even when low power stations do not interfere with current stations they might interfere with future digital radio stations so no go. Broadcasting over the web has been quietly hindered for years as well.

Broadcasting is a land of Murphy's Golden Rule, "Them that has the gold makes the rules."

Eh ? There are still "people" in united states

[unity100]

after all ?

So its not like big money white asses and oil rich bastards running everyting - there are still "people" as in "we people" around ?

Well thats a relief ...

Yea. definitely bad. it should been so that

[unity100]

500-100 big money whiteasses running the country and sending everyone, including your sorry ass to die in some foreign land in order to create profits for them.

What i am most annoyed with is the likes of you who come and make accusations of communism at every single move that is made to further the interest of ordinary people, like me, like you, against modern day aristocracy. The people, as in "the people". remember what it was ? if it wasnt for that, you would still be praying for permission from your local lord in order to get married, instead of shitting negative rant about civilized moves.

Some people really deserve what they live in eh ?

see 'stump speech'

[Anonymous Coward]

Stump Speech:

stump speech
a political campaign speech, esp. one made on a campaign tour.
[Origin: 1810-20, American]
Dictionary.com Unabridged (v 1.0.1)
Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2006.
WordNet - Cite This Source

stump speech

n : political oratory

The airwaves belong to "the people"...

[Just Another Poster]

...about as much as collective farms in the Soviet Union belonged to "the people".

If you want less censorship, the only solution is to privatize the airwaves and abolish the FCC. Of course, this won't stop the communists at "Democracy Now" from whining about "corporate media consolidation" (which is false, as there are more companies providing television media now than there were 20 years ago).

Re:The airwaves belong to "the people"...

[danpsmith]

If you want less censorship, the only solution is to privatize the airwaves and abolish the FCC. Of course, this won't stop the communists at "Democracy Now" from whining about "corporate media consolidation"

Privatize them? Who gets the profit from the sale of the airwaves then? The government? Who? And also, just in case you haven't noticed, it's already easy for companies with a lot of money to take up a lot of airspace, so what exactly is your "solution" supposed to be solving? If you want diversity, you don't put things into a marketplace because those with the biggest pockets usually have similar interests. That's why I think public radio is awesome. You turn it on and it's something you might actually want to hear, versus the same 12 songs on every other station. I thought the purpose of radio and television and stuff was at least partially to give people new tastes and interests, but it seems like both have just become ways to shove products down peoples' throats. Whenever any decent music gets popular I usually deem it to be a "despite the media" type of thing instead of with the help of the media. It did used to be the other way around. And I don't think privatizing the airwaves will do a damned thing to help this situation. They are practically bought and sold now as it is.

Re:The airwaves belong to "the people"...

[tenaciousdRules]

"which is false, as there are more companies providing television media now than there were 20 years ago" No offense, but I hope you don't mean to say that all the boutique cable networks out ther actually count.

Re:The airwaves belong to "the people"...

[krell]

"No offense, but I hope you don't mean to say that all the boutique cable networks out there actually count."

Why wouldn't they count? However, if you want to get into some more important (?) indicators, there are 66% more national networks now and twice as many national TV network news /public affairs operations.

Re:The airwaves belong to "the people"...

[Sir_Eptishous]

It always fascinates me when people spout such utter krap.
I mean, do you ever read anything besides Linux Journal? Please, do yourself a favor and research topics before you post.

Where you're going with this statement:
"more companies providing television media now than there were 20 years ago". What do you mean by "television media". Can you be any more vague?

If you had been paying attention to media in the last ten years, notably the Telecommunications Act of 1996 and the Media Ownership Rules changes of 2003, you would see that the content, the substance of what is being delivered is governed and controlled by a smaller and smaller group of people. Do you understand this? If not, please don't waste our time with your trivial bullshit.

Re:The airwaves belong to "the people"...

[krell]

"you would see that the content, the substance of what is being delivered is governed and controlled by a smaller and smaller group of people"

It's not. We have almost twice as many national news TV outlets as we did 20 years ago. None have been lost/consolidated, other than that little ABC competitor to CNN that was hardly around at all. Next time.... count.

Re:The airwaves belong to "the people"...

[krell]

"No offense, but I hope you don't mean to say that all the boutique cable networks out ther actually count."

C-Span actually goes most of the way to counting as a sort of news network. The news and public affairs content of the other ones probably adds up to the rest to count it as a full "one".

So here you have a situation of:

Before: ABC News, CBS News, NBC News, PBS News

After: ABC News, CBS News, NBC News, C-Span, Fox News, CNN, C-Span/etc, Link-TV cable network, various shows such as "Democracy Now" distributed via public access cable.

Rather than consolidation, the offerings (each from a distinct company) have just a little more than doubled. The only instance of consolidation was a very short-lived competitor to CNN that was gobbled up early on. Instead of only 2 or 3 competing with "Uncle Walter" like we had in the early 1970s, there's an ever increasing number of alternatives. Even if we look solely at influence/market share (instead of number of voices), the trend has been diversification and not consolidation.

If we look at airwaves-only (and do not take cable into account) we have an increase from 4 to 5. Not a big increase, but it is an increase. Also, absolutely no consolidation/loss has occured in the airwave-only TV news since the baseline of "the Big 3 plus PBS" networks.

Re:The airwaves belong to "the people"...

[Just Another Poster]

Privatize them? Who gets the profit from the sale of the airwaves then? The government? Who?

My proposal is to abolish the FCC and let the chips fall where they may. Those who are first able to make legitimate use of a frequency have the right to use that frequency. Let common law sort out any conflicts.

If you want diversity, you don't put things into a marketplace because those with the biggest pockets usually have similar interests.

Observe the diversity of speech in periodicals at any bookstore or newsstand, or the diversity of speech on the Internet or in film, all mediums where there is private ownership of production and distribution.

Re:The airwaves belong to "the people"...

[krell]

"If you want diversity, you don't put things into a marketplace because those with the biggest pockets usually have similar interests"

So you want a "diversity" that is forced and created by government? You claim in the sentence above that, given a choice, the people would not have it at all.

"That's why I think public radio is awesome. You turn it on and it's something you might actually want to hear, versus the same 12 songs on every other station"

That's your personal choice. Guess what? Most of the public really cares very little about it.

"...but it seems like both have just become ways to shove products down peoples' throats"

It is impossible to do this via radio. All they do is present information, which I am free to ignore.

"Whenever any decent music gets popular I usually deem it to be a "despite the media" type of thing instead of with the help of the media"

Who decides what is "decent!"? You or the public? Media that the public thinks is decent is what succeeds.

Re:The airwaves belong to "the people"...

[Just Another Poster]

Where you're going with this statement: "more companies providing television media now than there were 20 years ago". What do you mean by "television media". Can you be any more vague?

By "television media", I mean "television media". How many companies were providing programming 20 years ago? How many companies are providing programming today?

Re:The airwaves belong to "the people"...

[danpsmith]

So you want a "diversity" that is forced and created by government? You claim in the sentence above that, given a choice, the people would not have it at all.

No, I want not everything to be about money. I want bands that aren't in the label's pockets to be able to have a chance to be heard along with everyone else. I admit that these things will probably never happen, but that doesn't mean they are bad things to want.

That's your personal choice. Guess what? Most of the public really cares very little about it.

It's quite a common complaint, and you know what, it really doesn't matter. Radio is bullshit anyway and that's why I make a "market decision" not to listen to it at all. I was just saying it would be cool thing if the radio actually let you know about new artists that make good music, aired good music at all, or maybe even aired something other than the P. Diddy "Loosen up my buttons babe" remix 20x a day between hours of commercials. Is this what the public wants? I hardly think so, because more and more people are getting starting to hate the radio and buy players so they don't have to listen to it anymore. If the radio stations were anything like what the public wants, why the hell is satellite radio around? Obviously not 100% of the public is satisfied with this usage of their airwaves. You know who's satisfied? Clear channel. I actually hope that XM and Sirius put them for the most part out of business. I'm not gonna pay for radio personally, but I hope that XM and Sirius keep gaining market share.

It is impossible to do this via radio. All they do is present information, which I am free to ignore.

Way to take a use of language literally when it's obviously not the intention of it. I honestly thought they could shove products literally down my throat via radio, thanks for clearing this up! I'm not saying you can't ignore commercials. I'm making a pretty practical argument here, it's commercial ridden crap, there's just too many commercials. TV is like this too but I don't really even watch TV unless I've recorded the show ahead of time anyway, so whatever. When you are driving to work in the morning between the talk and the commercials there's almost no music at all. Fun stuff. That's why I always make sure to remember my player.

Who decides what is "decent!"? You or the public? Media that the public thinks is decent is what succeeds.

If you think that's really true, then you have some things to learn. Listen, when most people get their musical tastes from the radio or TV, and all of these companies have the same owners and are basically merged with one another I'll tell you exactly what happens: the artist becomes a product. It's not just wow I really like this record let's put it on the radio, that's how it used to be. Nowadays, it's a filtration system. An artist can release an awesome CD that all the critics rave about, and will get no exposure. I believe this is the reason a lot of P2P networks have less popular artists being rated more popularly. People listen to what music they want to listen to with this method, all of a sudden nobody thinks the latest Christina Aguilera single is so great anymore. Radio used to take a chance on artists from time to time, give them a spin and see how the audience responds. It doesn't work that way anymore, now they try to sell you the artist instead of even offering you a choice. They use the repetition as a way to beat the songs into your brain so that eventually you'll like every one of them and probably go out and buy the CDs like the nice little consumer sheep you are. I don't think the public decides anymore what decent music is, and that's my point. What is "decent" is determined for us through a bunch of industry knobs and then we get the pleasure of choosing between the bands they picked out to be popular.

Re:The airwaves belong to "the people"...

[krell]

"You know who's satisfied? Clear channel. I actually hope that XM and Sirius put them for the most part out of business."

I can go up and down the radio dial without hearing P(uff) D(i/a)ddy or any Clear Channel stations. However, I will find public radio to listen to. Clear Channel is nothing to get bent out of shape about; don't believe the lies that they own everything (or even a majority). Less than 8% does not a majority make.

"If you think that's really true, then you have some things to learn"

I long ago learned the lesson that just because I think Britney Spears is crap does not mean that there are many, many times many more people than me that think the other way. I'm not going to play the opera snob on this.

Watch Out!

[HiroProtagonist]

It's A Trap!

Abolish the FCC

[AbsoluteKeenan]

What part of "Congress shall pass no law . . . . abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press" is confusing? A radiowave is a property just as land. If you don't like what I say on my land/radiowave, stay off. Regulations are like cracks in a dam. Once you get one, more form exponentially.

I have resubmitted new text

[maynard]

Per the /. FAQ, I have resubmitted correct text through the standard submission process. Hopefully, an editor should take notice and fix the factual error within this submission ASAP.

Sounds like Willie Wonka

[karlandtanya]

No.
Stop.
Don't.

Re:Sounds like Willie Wonka

[ZiggyJay]

Does anybody see the irony in that post + sig?

Re:Sounds like Willie Wonka

[karlandtanya]

argument != assertion
simile != analogy

No.

MOD PARENT UP - factual error in article

[Kadin2048]

Somebody needs to mod the parent up; I can't believe it's still down at +2.

The article is completely different if it's "FCC Commissioner" versus "FCC Chair." The guy making the remarks quoted isn't the head honcho, he's a minority member.

If the FCC Chairman had actually come out and said stuff like this, it would be holy crap, stop the presses, who are you and what did you do with the turd pile I used to call my government time.

An FCC Commissioner saying it, is still impressive, but it's an order of magnitude less so.

Cite your sources, or risk derision

[HiroProtagonist]

You can't make a statement like that without citing your sources, and they better be referring to one of the following:

1 - An independent telivision station not owned by a media conglomerate.

2 - An independent radio station not owned by (or owning) a media conglomerate.

3 - An independent newspaper with circulation (no the net and your blog don't count) not owned by a media conglomerate.

I dare say sir, you are full of shit, or being sarcastic.

Re:Cite your sources, or risk derision

[krell]

Why not just COUNT first, before ignorantly blowing smoke? We can start with the national TV news outlets. 25 years ago, there was ABC, CBS, NBC. Now we have ABC, CBS, NBC, CNN, Fox, and enough misc. sources (C-SPAN counts for lot) to count for one more. That's twice as many. None of these owns the other. If you can count to 3, or count to 6, this one should be pretty obvious.

Re:Cite your sources, or risk derision

[FusionDragon2099]

ABC - Owned by Disney
CBS - Owned by Viacom
CNN - Owned by AOL-Time Warner
Fox - Owned by News Corp
NBC - Owned by General Electric

You missed the point entirely, sir. Of course "none of these owns the other". That's not what the GP meant. What he meant that most TV and radio stations are owned by major media corporations.

Re:Cite your sources, or risk derision

[Dirtside]

Wow! You mean instead of three interchangeable TV news sources, we now have six? Why, their opinions must collectively be twice as diverse!

Only, not, because they're all owned by titanic media conglomerates run by incredibly wealthy folks who, quite understandably, tend toward a conservative bent. (Fox is merely the most obvious about it.) There wasn't much difference between ABC, NBC, and CBS to begin with. But no, no, there's no media consolidation, because we have six whole TV networks instead of three. Nevermind that there's lots of other kinds of news media -- radio stations and newspapers, for example -- which have undergone drastic consolidation in the past few decades. No, because there's a couple more sources for TV news, there's no consolidation to worry about!

Re:Cite your sources, or risk derision

[krell]

"Wow! You mean instead of three interchangeable TV news sources, we now have six? Why, their opinions must collectively be twice as diverse!"

The three are not interchangable.

"Only, not, because they're all owned by titanic media conglomerates run by incredibly wealthy folks who, quite understandably, tend toward a conservative bent. (Fox is merely the most obvious about it.)"

Actually, some are owned by titanic media conglomerates with wealthy folks who have a liberal bent. Quite understandably.

"No, because there's a couple more sources for TV news, there's no consolidation to worry about!"

Exactly. Because there were just a couple in the beginning.

"Nevermind that there's lots of other kinds of news media -- radio stations and newspapers, for example -- which have undergone drastic consolidation in the past few decades"

It's more like deconsolidation. But 'nevermind', as you do not know much about this one either.

Re:Cite your sources, or risk derision

[OldeTimeGeek]

You're just counting television news. When there were just three television networks and a couple more radio networks, there were hundreds of independent newspapers. Now that tv, radio, newspapers and magazines can be under the same management, overall media ownership is in far fewer hands.

Re:Cite your sources, or risk derision

[krell]

"Now that tv, radio, newspapers and magazines can be under the same management, overall media ownership is in far fewer hands."

Is many thousands of hands "few"?

Re:Cite your sources, or risk derision

[Just Another Poster]

Only, not, because they're all owned by titanic media conglomerates run by incredibly wealthy folks who, quite understandably, tend toward a conservative bent.

"Conservative bent" only if you mean "conservative" as in "those to the right of Pol Pot".

Re:Cite your sources, or risk derision

[OldeTimeGeek]

Hmmm. I'm trying to figure out whether you're being sarcastic or pedantic...

Yes, if you look at all of the employees and all of the stockholders, there are more people that "own" the media today then before. But those people don't make the day-to-day decisions on what to cover or set the overall direction for the media outlets, which was more to my point.

Re:Cite your sources, or risk derision

[krell]

I'm merely being accurate. TV, newpapers, radio, and magazines are in thousands of hands. This is only if you look at those who make the day to day decisions and / or set the overall direction for the media outlets. The top ones only.

Re:Cite your sources, or risk derision

[amRadioHed]

Maybe if you count every podunk newsletter, AM radio station and zine then the total number of owners is up, but if you look at the relevant media, the major sources which actually have substantial audiences, that's where the consolidation is happening.

There's less then ten owners of the vast majority of American media these days. That's a tad bit short of the thousands you speak of. Maybe you miscounted, no bodies perfect.

Re:Cite your sources, or risk derision

[HTH NE1]

Is many thousands of hands "few"?

According to recent estimates, there are approximately 600 million hands in the United States, so yes.

(I'll leave it for someone else to factor in amputation and birth defect statistics.)

Re:Cite your sources, or risk derision

[krell]

"Maybe if you count every podunk newsletter, AM radio station and zine then the total number of owners is up, but if you look at the relevant media"

"Relevant" meaning only the media you subjectively have made the decision are important? With arbitrary criteria like this, how can you possibly lose an argument?

"the major sources which actually have substantial audiences"

Even more subjective: you are choosing those which are very popular, without regard to the actual number of media "voices". These voices are in the thousands: only you are miscounting.

Re:Cite your sources, or risk derision

[killjoe]

"Actually, some are owned by titanic media conglomerates with wealthy folks who have a liberal bent. Quite understandably."

Which ones would those be?

Re:Cite your sources, or risk derision

[krell]

A few of them. That is, if you measure from the political center. If you are some sort of out-of-touch wing-nut, you'll be one of those who will say that all are conservative, or all are liberal.

Re:Cite your sources, or risk derision

[killjoe]

Which ones?

report issue to: daddypants@slashdot.org

[Bananatree3]

daddypants@slashdot.org is the email for Slashdot editors. Send them a note to correct the title and article from FCC Chairman to an FCC Commissioner.

Re:report issue to: daddypants@slashdot.org

[maynard]

Per the FAQ, I've already resubmitted new text with a correction. I'll try the daddypants email addy too though. Can't hurt. Thanks!

Note: make subject the subject....

[Bananatree3]

[DP] FCC Chair Stumps For Media Diversity This will allow the email to get correctly forwarded.

Re:Note: make subject the subject....

[maynard]

done. and thank you.

texas

[Anonymous Coward]

Check out what is going down in Texas with the beginnings of the proposed trans texas "super NAFTA highway" (soon to be all over the US, there are 80 of these proposed monstrosities)) corridors and "property rights". They are going to be seizing huge amounts of private property to build toll roads, then forcing taxpayers to fund the seizures and construction, (well beyond toll roads really, you need to see some of the details of these huge things), which can and will be sold to foreign corporations to then run and profit from. Pretty soon it will be pretty hard to travel anywhere by road without being stuck double paying over what you are now, plus the added bonus of being tracked constantly, because there will be checkpoints all over and RFID tag enabled stations to read your tires (all new tires soon will have chips in them), along with your vehicle blackbox stuff. It's hideous. the eminent domain deal is going ahead on steroids to provide profit for the top 1%. Another case of the war on the productive middle class.

Re:texas

[Shakrai]

lus the added bonus of being tracked constantly, because there will be checkpoints all over and RFID tag enabled stations to read your tires (all new tires soon will have chips in them)

Care to provide a link?

Steps to Success

[Anonymous Coward]

1. Intentially post flawed article to Slashdot "editors"
2. Reply to all posters calling bullshit
3. Rake in the mod points boosting your various apologies
4. ???
5. Profit

article update was rejected

[maynard]

I believe that means a /. editor now knows of the factual error in this article and will hopefully fix it ASAP. I also emailed the daddypants email address, though have not received a response back. Thanks to everyone who has offered suggestions on how to fix this submission.

Public Access

[Anonymous Coward]

Under Bush, we have seen

Destruction of 4, 5, 6, 7, 8 amendments of the Constitution
Attacks on 1st amendment..Net Nutrality, PEG (Public, Educational, and Government) TV
Snooping by telcos
Databases ala carte, with Identity theft for desert
Unvalidatable Electronic Voting introduced to 80% of the United States.

To be fair, under democrats we have seen

Destruction of 2nd Amendment of the Constitution. (Hand gun laws, assalt weapon bans)

All this garbage equates to is Broken Oath's Of Office, and Un-Constututional Amendments.

How are we going to take back our country when our votes can be rigged, the media won't report on it, and we have no more constitutional rights?

Where are the god damn libertarians? They suck.

Wanna protest in the Streets? The USAF has a microwave gun, the DHS has surveilance and databases, they Catch your picture, put it to your name, and make a carbon copy of your communications, then set you up and destroy you.

Only choice is Hobson's Choice, VOTE DEMOCRAT, RETAKE THE HOUSE AND SENATE, and IMPEACH THE MF ALREADY!

who cares about karma?

[maynard]

I mean, really. I just want the submission fixed. And in the interim, I want to make sure readers know of the error so they are not misinformed.

Local media has paid the price

[Sir_Eptishous]

A few years ago Michael Powell had a study commissioned on the effects of local news coverage by large media consolidation. The study, done by the FCC came back with results indicating that large media consolidation had a detrimental effect on local and small market media. What did the FCC, and your good buddy Michael Powell do?

destroy all copies of a draft study that suggested greater concentration of media ownership would hurt local TV news coverage

To say we live in Orwellian times is not hyperbole!

Title and story text is now fixed

[maynard]

Thanks to whichever editor updated the title and story text to reflect the factual record.

media consolidation is bad for local markets

[Sir_Eptishous]

Why don't you count how many radio stations are now owned by the same large corporation across the US? There used to be tighter restrictions on how many radio and television stations a single company could own, as well as how many newspapers a company could own in a single market. Do your research before you spout such krap.

WTF does an increased number of "national news TV outlets" have do with the who controls the content of media. Take a journalism class sometime nitwit. The point is, media consolidation is bad not only for smaller markets, but the general reliability of news and information from the media. Also, the percentage of people getting their news from television shrinks every year. This is media were talking about, in all its forms. As an example: Study Shows FCC Media Ownership Rule Changes Would Harm Local Florida Communities

Re:media consolidation is bad for local markets

[krell]

"Why don't you count how many radio stations are now owned by the same large corporation [stateofthenewsmedia.org]"

Already did. This one large company you are thinking of controls less than 8% of the radio stations in the country. Do your research (and check a dictionary) before spouting such "krap".

"as well as how many newspapers a company could own in a single market"

What part of the First Amendment did the guys who actually restricted newspapers not understand?

"WTF does an increased number of "national news TV outlets" have do with the who controls the content of media. "

It has everything to do with it.

"Also, the percentage of people getting their news from television shrinks every year. This is media were talking about, in all its forms.

For media in all its forms, the idea of consolidation is a joke.

Re:media consolidation is bad for local markets

[Sir_Eptishous]

Your missing the point. When more and more media is controlled by a smaller amount of corporations, the content of the media, regardless of the 1st amendment, can be controlled and shaped as per the editorial decisions of the corporation. The fact that I even have to explain something so obvious speaks volumes of your ignorance of this topic. So what you're saying is it's okay with you that media consolidation continue, even though all manner of unbiased academic studies indicate it's bad for American democracy in a variety of ways.

I see you wear your brown shirt proudly.

"For media in all its forms, the idea of consolidation is a joke."
With a statement like that I can assume you are also against Net Neutrality.

Re:media consolidation is bad for local markets

[krell]

"The fact that I even have to explain something so obvious speaks volumes of your ignorance of this topic."

The fact that you are complaining about (and wanting legislation to stop) "the press" from "controlling and shaping" its own editorical content speaks volumes of your ignorance of the Constitution. Besides, the consolidation you speak of is just not happening.

"So what you're saying is it's okay with you that media consolidation continue..."

Maybe if it was happening in the real world, this hypothetical situation might deserve more scrutiny. However, by objective measures (the counting of independent voices owned by different "publishers", it is not happening at all.

"...even though all manner of unbiased academic studies indicate it's bad for American democracy in a variety of ways. "

1) Show me one single unbiased study on this
2) This matter has nothing to do with democracy.

"I see you wear your brown shirt proudly."

Hard to do so when you are always wearing it at the marches demanding that publishers kneel to the Zod of government and give up their Constitional right to "control and shape" (your words) their own publications.

"With a statement like that I can assume you are also against Net Neutrality."

Interesting question. However, the only thing I have against "Network Neutrality" proposals is that they will likely be Trojans through which disastrous slightly-related initiatives will be foisted on us. Actually, I would fight the problem that "Network Neutrality" attempts to deal with a different way. Instead of meddling in the Big Telco/Cable attempts to crap up their pipes, I'd seek policies to encourage the creation of additional tubes in the Internets that don't have this problem. That's also the best approach to deal with perceived "media consolidation". Don't censor the existing ones. Instead, make it easier for new voices to enter.

Re:media consolidation is bad for local markets

[Sir_Eptishous]

"wanting legislation to stop) "the press" from "controlling and shaping" its own editorical content"
I never said I wanted legislation to stop the press from "editorical(sp) content" That is your bizarre interpretation of what I said. What I want (at least I know) is for the FCC to do their job and regulate the media conglomerates. You know, the way they used to before Congress was bought off in 1996. Nevermind, I'm sure you weren't paying attention then, as you aren't now.

"However, by objective measures (the counting of independent voices owned by different "publishers", it is not happening at all."
What objective voices are you referring to? I have supplied many links to analyses of media consolidation, and I could supply more. I think your problem is you don't even understand what media consolidation is, let alone if it's happening.

"1) Show me one single unbiased study on this"
I guess you didn't hear the one about the FCC doing it's own study, and not liking what they found, so they destroyed it...
"The report commissioned under Michael Powell turned out to undermine his argument that consolidation has no ill effects on local news, and he ordered "every last piece" of the study destroyed."

"2) This matter has nothing to do with democracy."
Wow, I almost want to think your baiting me with this one. But if you are being sarcastic, you're hiding too well, so I assume your serious. Theres a country called North Korea you would feel really at home at. How do you think the fomenters of dissent during the American Revolution got their message across? It wasn't telepathy. It was media, like Thomas Paines 'Common Sense' pamphlet.

"Zod of government and give up their Constitional right to "control and shape" (your words) their own publications."
Nice, pulling a DC Comics analogy to debate media consolidation. Whats next, Optimus Prime for president?

"encourage the creation of additional tubes in the Internets"
I see you and Ted Stevens are good friends. Can we have Chutes and Ladders too?

"Don't censor the existing ones. Instead, make it easier for new voices to enter."
Media consolidation is a form or censorship, by allowing control of media content to a smaller and smaller group of people.

Re:media consolidation is bad for local markets

[krell]

"What I want (at least I know) is for the FCC to do their job and regulate the media conglomerates"

As there is no need for them to do so, I want them to not do this job, and instead concentrated on making it easier to get access (licenses, etc) rather than clobbering those who dare to be too popular.

"What objective voices are you referring to? I have supplied many links to analyses of media consolidation"

None of which showed any media consolidation, as there are thousands of "voices.". They intentionally cook or tilt their "studies", doing things like only counting popular voices, etc.

"I think your problem is you don't even understand what media consolidation is, let alone if it's happening."

I understand exactly what it is. That is why I know it is not happening.

"How do you think the fomenters of dissent during the American Revolution got their message across? It wasn't telepathy. It was media, like Thomas Paines 'Common Sense' pamphlet."

How do the "pamphleteers" of today get hindered in any way?

"Nice, pulling a DC Comics analogy to debate media consolidation. Whats next, Optimus Prime for president?"

Not until we have a President who could actually pronounce "Optimus Prime."

"I see you and Ted Stevens are good friends. Can we have Chutes and Ladders too?"

I can see now that you failed to look past this mocking reference and see that I meant expansion of Internet access and "backbone."

Re:media consolidation is bad for local markets

[Sir_Eptishous]

"rather than clobbering those who dare to be too popular."
As in this entire debate, your arguments go nowhere. What does this mean, "those who dare to be too popular"? If you're referring to the FCC clobbering someone, it sure isn't clobbering the media corporations, who have been treated very well by Michael Powell and have been allowed to purchase more and more media outlets.

"They intentionally cook or tilt their "studies", doing things like only counting popular voices, etc."
Well then you could say that about anything you disagree with. In the U.S. it's popular to take pride in the fact that we landed men on the Moon. Could that be cooked or tilted studies? Your argument is the one used by the Bush administration when it doesn't agree with a particular scientific study.

"I understand exactly what it is. That is why I know it is not happening."
It sounds like your mind is made up, regardless of the facts. Thats ok, keep watching Fox and listening to O'Reilly. They'll tell you what you want to hear. The interesting thing is that many conservative groups have aligned themselves with groups on the left in opposing media consolidation. Thats because they know it affects everyone, especially those with less funds, lobbyists and lawyers to push their agenda.

"How do the "pamphleteers" of today get hindered in any way?" My comment about Thomas Paine was in reference to your comment that media has nothing to do with Democracy. I would completely disagree with that sentiment. Media, and the dissemination of information plays an incredibly important role in our Democracy.

"Not until we have a President who could actually pronounce "Optimus Prime."
Hey, we agree on something!

"I can see now that you failed to look past this mocking reference and see that I meant expansion of Internet access and "backbone.""
If I had made that gaffe I would have expected the same response. I appreciate that you've come clean with your Corporatist values

Re:media consolidation is bad for local markets

[krell]

"It sounds like your mind is made up, regardless of the facts"

My mind is made up because of the facts.

"Thats ok, keep watching Fox and listening to O'Reilly. They'll tell you what you want to hear."

What does this have to do with anything at all? Does it have to do with a claim of media consolidation? I could point out that when O'Reilly is on the radio, I can listen to about 20 other radio stations that are not airing O'Reilly. Also, what is wrong with "they'll tell you what you want to hear"? That's merely media being responsive to the public interest. In all honesty, O'Reilly is a Fallafel Sex toad, and I probably watch "Democracy Now" (something that would not exist if "media concentration" claims were true) more than Fox News.

Regardless of men on the moon, the myth of media concentration is easily proven wrong when you look at the actual numbers of distinct media "voices" everyone has access too. The studies get "tilted" into meaninglessness when those who make the claim that there is media concentration basically fake their case by not counting most of the media voices. So EASY to make a case that there are too few voices when you arbitrarily toss out most of the voices from being counted. Using their methodology, I can just as easily do a study that complains about Apple Computer's monopoly on desktop computers once I use whatever trick I want to exclude Apple's competitors from any consideration in the study.

"Media, and the dissemination of information plays an incredibly important role in our Democracy."

Then it is too important to have the government meddle and silence (ahem, hinder speech). Powell has not been generous at all. With friends like him, who needs enemies? The ability to purchase media outlets is part of freedom of the press, not a favor to be granted by the FCC.

"I appreciate that you've come clean with your Corporatist values"

You mean anti-corporatist values. I suppose you support it: one important part of the definition is "in corporatism, certain unelected bodies take a critical role in the decision-making process." (first paragraph) That's a perfect description of the FCC and its meddling: an unelected body given power by the Government to make decisions that are best made instead by individuals with a channel-changer.

Re:media consolidation is bad for local markets

[Sir_Eptishous]

"My mind is made up because of the facts."
Well then, lets see some of your data to backup that statement. As I've stated earlier, I've included links, that you glibly avoid discussing, to support my point. You simply make a statement as if it's a fact without proof. Here is another link to support the fact of media consolidation. Lets look at what media consolidation is, it is when more and more media outlets, whether they are television, radio, newspaper, etc;, are owned and controlled by a smaller and smaller group of corporations. If you had been paying attention for the last ten years, you would already have known this. Obviously your too busy playing WOW or watching Survivor... I don't know which is worse. Here is an article by Ted Turner where he discusses the folly and danger of media consolidation, terming it a "Loss of democratic debate". Remember when you said media consolidation had nothing to do with Democracy?

"they'll tell you what you want to hear"? That's merely media being responsive to the public interest.
I disagree strongly. "Responsive to the public interest."? Give me a break. Good journalism is supposed to make people question and think, not blindly accept as the dittohead's do. Also, the vast majority of talk radio is spouting this type of right wing jingoistic krap (theres that word again), and guess who owns the stations that play them? Thats right, Clear Channel, Cox, and the rest of the consolidaters. The only real place to find voices of dissent or questioning is on public or "free" radio, those stations not controlled by corporations.

"and I probably watch "Democracy Now" (something that would not exist if "media concentration" claims were true) more than Fox News."
I find that hard to believe, because if you did watch or listen to Democracy Now then you wouldn't have the "world is flat" opinion about media consolidation that you have. Check this link for details. I dare you.

"The studies get "tilted" into meaninglessness when those who make the claim that there is media concentration basically fake their case by not counting most of the media voices. So EASY to make a case that there are too few voices when you arbitrarily toss out most of the voices from being counted."
Thats a good one. You are using that methodology now. As I stated earlier, you are taking the tack that the Bush administration takes when a scientific study comes up they disagree with. They simply dismiss it because they don't like how the data came out. Thats what you are doing here. The internet is full of examples and proof of this. The fact that you argue the point makes me think that you're either:
A) A corporate shill getting paid to post this krap on /.
OR
B) Someone too scared of the truth to research anything, knowing they won't like what they find.
Which is it?
Also, what specifically do you mean by "voices"? Being vague and rhetorical are the weapons of politicians, why don't you run for office?

"The ability to purchase media outlets is part of freedom of the press, not a favor to be granted by the FCC."
The Freedom of the press has nothing to do with creating media monopolies. When a single company owns more media outlets in a given market it gains unfair advantage. You may have trouble understanding this concept... Perhaps you should read up on American history, particulary the beginning of the 20th century during Theodore Roosevelts period. Do you know what a VNR is? That is essentially "fake news" that PR firms create to push a specific point of view of product. These VNR's are then played on local news stations and the average viewer assumes they are "real news" pieces by real journalist

Junk Media Formats

[sultanoslack]

Another one really is that the countries have flipped junk media formats. In the UK it's tabloids; in the US it's TV. 4 of the top 5 newspapers in the UK are rubbish tabloids. In the US they're all legitimate newpapers, with 4 of the top 5 (USA Today being the exception) decent publications.

You can carry the cultural surperiority thing as far as you'd like, but don't forget 3.5 million Brit's pick up a copy of Sun everyday, which is probably worse than Fox News. Germany's in the same bag; the most popular newspaper here (I'm an American that's been in Germany for about 5 years) is Bild Zeitung ("Picture Times") which makes Fox News look like an academic triumph.

Wait, could it be that there are idiots everywhere? Nah.

Sure, the US is in democratic straights and the media's intelectually offensive, but Britain's scarcely a shade better.

Re:Junk Media Formats

[Instine]

I agree with virtually everything you say here, but not your tone/sentiment. Like I say i think this is a cultural thing, so its not easy to fix. Things are 'barely a shade better' here, but they are a shade better, and I started by saying there was no magic wand. Your not offering much help by "there's idiots everywhere". That really is plain snobbery, with little/no benifit.

But its true that the tabloids are awful here, and they feed the brains of millions daily. And yes Germany has its problems there too. And now Mudock owns MySpace. Joy! But don't give up. As it apears you have.

Again my point is not to cause offence. Don't hate the Sun reader, hate the Sun. ;o)

Re:Junk Media Formats

[sultanoslack]

Your first post very much read as "These are cultural problems with the US that those of us over in the enlightened world don't have. See! You have Fox News and we have the BBC." For counterpoint I wanted to point out that you have Sun and "we" have The Wallstreet Journal.

Are things better in Europe? Perhaps marginally, but it's only a different strain of the same disease.

The problem is living with nominal democracy and a steady supply of entertainment is enough for most people. There's a historical precedent there that goes back to the pax romana. No amount of screaming and arm-waving tends to cause democratic revival until things get suffeciently bad for the citizens, at which point a pro-democratic subculture gains momentum.

In American culture that's happened a few times, most recently McCarthy-ism and the Vietnam war. Things got ugly enough to entergize the 60s and 70s subculture and press the country towards democratic renewel. The sucess of that subculture in affecting real change has been the stuff of golden eras and toppled empires.

I haven't given up by any means. I'm just cynical enough to assume that history is repeating itself and that disgruntledness rather than enlightenment (through media restructuring or otherwise) is usually the key to democratic renaissance.

Re:Junk Media Formats

[krell]

" Things got ugly enough to entergize the 60s and 70s subculture and press the country towards democratic renewel."

With this counter-culture's explicit admiration for the extremely brutal totalitarian dictatorship in North Vietnam, "pro-democracy" is not a label you could put on them. Real positive change did occur due to related forces during this time. See Martin Luther King Jr.

Fair trade?

[krell]

I'm willing to forgive you calling me a Nazi for my opposition to government censorship of media if you agree to forgive me my "editorical" typo. Fair?

missed this

[krell]

"Having one entity account for that large a percentage of what people hear is bad for a democracy."

That is like saying that it is bad for pumpkin pie and makes Baby Jesus cry. Totally unrelated.

"It's not like people can just start up a bunch of competing radio stations -- you need an FCC license (expensive and limited in number), and there's all the usual costs involved in starting a business"

If you go WAY back up to my first post on this, you will see that I identified this as a problem we should work to solving.

Not a fair trade?

[krell]

"I never said I wanted legislation to stop the press from "editorical(sp) content"

So I take it that having you excuse me for a typo was not a fair trade for me excusing you for calling me a Nazi. I could call you a "spelling Nazi", but that would impose a similar Godwin debt upon myself. Anything else I can toss in? I'm sure that there are some periods or spaces you missed in your postings that I could call you on.

Fox News can't control itself?

[krell]

"Obviously when you have two guys butting heads over a point, it sometimes turns into a shouting match and no one is heard, but that's the fault of the moderator, not the channel."

That's only an excuse, maybe, if it is the moderator's first day and it is live TV. Beyond that, just about everything in the way the moderators run their shows is with Fox News' approval and direction. You can bet that any shout-out on "Hannity and Colmes" is 100% the fault of the channel. If they didn't like these, they'd easily have put a stop to them.

"I think it's a huge step that the BBC is admitting their bias. I'm tired of commentators, anchors, etc getting on and saying that they're unbiased despite facts to the opposite."

That is a pretty good point. Can anyone find anyone that is not biased?

Effort to get Fox News silenced

[krell]

"Of course, most Liberals would prefer that FoxNews just go away, as they don't like having thier worldview challenged."

I do not know if "most liberals" is true. In fact, I doubt it. However, there certainly has been an organized effort by some to pressure the government to yank Fox stations' licenses for airing political content that the organizers do not agree with.

Media consolidation is nonexistent in the US

[krell]

"Well then, lets see some of your data to backup that statement. As I've stated earlier, I've included links, that you glibly avoid discussing"

They were discussed. I also pointed out the flaw that the studies excluded most media voices in order to make a case for "concentration". You do simply make a statement as if it's a fact without proof. The CJR link is yet another that only looks at a small number of companies owning a small part of the media.

"Lets look at what media consolidation is, it is when more and more media outlets, whether they are television, radio, newspaper, etc;, are owned and controlled by a smaller and smaller group of corporations."

In some sectors, the opposite has happened. National TV news is one where the number of distinct voices has grown. In the overall picture, the number of media voices owned by these giants is a small fraction of the total number of media voices. Looking at the definition of "consolidation", this would appear to fall short. As does the ludicrous idea of Clear Channel "consolidating" control by only having 8% of stations.

I used to take the unsupported claims of media consolidation at face value, like you, without looking at them criticically. Since I lived in a media market with more than 20 radio stations not one owned by Clear Channel, I decided to check the claims that "Clear Channel owns a majority of the stations in the US". The cold hard numbers blew this idea away: 20,000 radio stations in the US. Clear Channel controls 1,200 of them. These cold hard facts in other media sectors do the same thing.

"Here is an article by Ted Turner [washingtonmonthly.com] where he discusses the folly and danger of media consolidation"

Ted Turner's CNN is one of the examples that proves the myth of media consolidation wrong. 30 years ago, it did not exist. It was a new voice that sprang up from nowhere. In Turner's realm, a small sort of media proliferation has occured instead of a consolidation.

"Good journalism is supposed to make people question and think, not blindly accept as the dittohead's do."

That's just your opinion (aside from the fact that "dittoheads" exist that follow many popular media voices, not just Limbaugh). I think I agree with it. However, unlike you I recognize the fact that this is a subjective matter, not for the government to decide. Thankfully, the First Amendment does not distinguish between someone's idea of "good" journalism and "bad" journalism.

"The only real place to find voices of dissent or questioning is on public or "free" radio, those stations not controlled by corporations. "

"Dissent" defined as views you happen to agree with? Also, what dissenting voices are you specifically referring to? Both Pacifica Radio and the Corporation for Public Broadcasting are corporations.

"I find that hard to believe, because if you did watch or listen to Democracy Now then you wouldn't have the "world is flat" opinion about media consolidation that you have."

I have a "world is how it really is" view of the myth of media consolidation. In fact, "Democracy Now" is only one more example of the proliferation of differing voices (along with, whether you like it or not, the new phenomenon of AM talk radio both left and right). I clicked the link. It's nice to see the hilarity of a new voice such as "Democracy Now" that has had great success due to the decentralization of media and proliferation of voices complain that there is no freedom of speech anymore.

"They simply dismiss it because they don't like how the data came out."

I'm dismissing these because the data shows a lack of consolidation. This contradicts their conclusions. I'm arguing the point because the facts prove you wrong. I'm a Constitutional rights shill, so to speak. I've spent plenty of time researching this.

"Also, what specifically do you mean by "voices"? Being vague and rhetorical are the weapons of politicians, w

Re:Media consolidation is nonexistent in the US

[Sir_Eptishous]

"They were discussed"
You discussed nothing, you simply dismissed all the links I posted including the Columbia Journalism Review link. What about the interview with Ted Turner. I guess the opinion of a media entrepreneur of his caliber doesn't merit any respect from you, eh? I'm glad you know more about the "myth" of media consolidation than someone like him, or say Bill Moyers. But there it is again, those darned links. You have brought nothing to the table except your "world is flat" dismissals.

"Looking at the definition of "consolidation", this would appear to fall short. As does the ludicrous idea of Clear Channel "consolidating" control by only having 8% of stations."
When you consider that Clear Channel used to own a paltry 41 before the Telecommuncations Act of 1996, and has now ballooned to over 1200 stations. That is media consolidation whether you want to admit it or not. The only thing ludicrous is your pseudo-libertarian ideology that all regulation must disappear. Like communism, libertarianism is a fantasy in the real world.

"Clear Channel owns a majority of the stations in the US". Sure, its easy to point to Clear Channel, as they are the biggest, but there are several others who have gobbled up television and radio stations and newspapers in markets all across the U.S. By focusing on one company you miss the point of the general trend. The trend since 1996 has been cosolidation because the FCC relaxed the rules on how many media outlets a particular company could own. This is fact.

"Ted Turner's CNN is one of the examples that proves the myth of media consolidation wrong. 30 years ago, it did not exist. It was a new voice that sprang up from nowhere. In Turner's realm, a small sort of media proliferation has occured instead of a consolidation."
Apparently you didn't RTFA. Turners position is that with the consolidation he has seen since his early days at WTCG, there is very little possibility of someone like him now doing what he did then. This is because it is too easy for large corporations to leverage their buying power now and purchase more and more. From TFA:
When I was getting into the television business, lawmakers and the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) took seriously the commission's mandate to promote diversity, localism, and competition in the media marketplace. They wanted to make sure that the big, established networks--CBS, ABC, NBC--wouldn't forever dominate what the American public could watch on TV. They wanted independent producers to thrive. They wanted more people to be able to own TV stations. They believed in the value of competition.

"However, unlike you I recognize the fact that this is a subjective matter, not for the government to decide. Thankfully, the First Amendment does not distinguish between someone's idea of "good" journalism and "bad" journalism."
Actually, unlike me you can't stay on topic. The debate here is whether or not media consolidation is happening or not. More vacuous rhetoric about the First Amendment will get you nowhere. This is all about whether the FCC will allow competition to be stifled due to more and more media outlets (television stations, radio stations, newspapers) to be owned and controlled by a smaller and smaller group of corporations.

As I'm sure you're aware, the Dixie Chicks(sp?) made a comment about the president back in 2003 while on tour in London. Even though they are still around and touring, this comment cost them dearly, and they later found out that radio DJ's were fired because they played their music. They were blacklisted by corporate media. Get it? There was a corporate mandate "from on high" that dictated that none of the stations would play thier music after their comment. They also found out that corporate execs (Cox?) admitted this, and that all the other country stations would "fall in line". That is the kin

Re:Media consolidation is nonexistent in the US

[krell]

"You have brought nothing to the table except your "world is flat" dismissals."

Nice way to change the subject from the fact that actual numbers of media voices show that there is no media consolidation.

"When you consider that Clear Channel used to own a paltry 41 before the Telecommuncations Act of 1996, and has now ballooned to over 1200 stations"

How misleading when you conveniently leave out that this is a small fraction of the total number of stations.

"but there are several others who have gobbled up television and radio stations and newspapers in markets all across the U.S."

Each of which controlls far less than what Clear Channel controls. How many do all of these control between them? 30% or 40% or something like that?

"That is media consolidation whether you want to admit it or not"

How can I "admit" something that there is no evidence for?

"The trend since 1996 has been cosolidation because the FCC relaxed the rules on how many media outlets a particular company could own. This is fact. "

The fact is that the FCC has relaxed the rules, but there has been no consolidation. Looking at the definition, "to bring together (separate parts) into a single or unified whole; unite; combine: They consolidated their three companies.", it is clear that nothing like this has happened.

From Ted Turner: "When I was getting into the television business, lawmakers and the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) took seriously the commission's mandate to promote diversity, localism, and competition in the media marketplace"

In other words, the FCC ignored the First Amendment and meddled in the media to try to dictate preferred content. Good riddance.

From Ted Turner: "They wanted to make sure that the big, established networks--CBS, ABC, NBC--wouldn't forever dominate what the American public could watch on TV."

Yet, when the FCC had much tighter control, we only had ABC,NBC,CBS. With the relaxation of control, we've had more and more new voices getting added. The "forever" domination" of those few voices is over.

From Ted Turner: "They believed in the value of competition."

And there is more such competition now than ever before. Do you want me to link to other new media voices aside from the ones I linked to above? It's like Ted had no idea what he was saying, which could be summarized as "Back when the FCC encouraged competition, we only had 3 news networks. Now we have less competition and more news networks."

"The debate here is whether or not media consolidation is happening or not"

I guess that is true. It is hardly a debate since there is no evidence of media consolidation.

"As I'm sure you're aware, the Dixie Chicks(sp?) made a comment about the president back in 2003 while on tour in London. Even though they are still around and touring, this comment cost them dearly"

Cost them? How so? Do you have any idea what cost means? They ended up more popular than ever, selling more music than ever. They are more than "still around".

"There was a corporate mandate "from on high" that dictated that none of the stations would play thier music after their comment."

Worked so WELL, didn't it? I'd never heard them on the radio before. After the Bush comment flap, I started to hear them on the radio.

" That is the kind of power media consolidation gives corporations. I'm sorry you can't understand this, but it's right there in front of your face"

What, the power to make musical artists like the Dixie Chicks more popular and more rich?

"Apparently you aren't aware of what happened to Pacifica during the 90's."

I followed this as it happened. Does not change the fact that Pacifica is a corporation.

one last bit on this

[krell]

You "disagree strongly" that it is not in the public interest to serve the public? I leave my own uninformed opinion out of it, and wish others would too. The public decides what its interest is, whether it is in our personal interest or not. Oprah, Jerry Springer, Rush Limbaugh, Britney Spears instead of opera: it's their choice, not ours.

postscriptum

[krell]

""Democracy Now, like all other independent media in the U.S., has been marginalized since it's inception."

You might not know what independent means. CBS is independent (a separate company voice from the others). So is Fox News, CNN, Link TV, C Span, etc. CBS, by the way, has just a few hundred TV affiliates, which makes them even more "marginalized" than "Democracy Now" carried by 500 stations and growing.