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FCC Repeals Decades-Old Rules Blocking Broadcast Media Mergers (variety.com)

An anonymous reader quotes a report from The Washington Post (Warning: source may be paywalled; alternative source): Federal regulators rolled back decades-old rules on Thursday, making it far easier for media outlets to be bought and sold -- potentially leading to more newspapers, radio stations and television broadcasters being owned by a handful of companies. The regulations, eliminated in a 3-to-2 vote by the Federal Communications Commission, were first put in place in the 1970s to ensure that a diversity of voices and opinions could be heard on the air or in print. But now those rules represent a threat to small outlets that are struggling to survive in a vastly different media world, according to FCC Chairman Ajit Pai. One long-standing rule repealed Thursday prevented one company in a given media market from owning both a daily newspaper and a TV station. Another rule blocked TV stations in the same market from merging with each other if the combination would leave fewer than eight independently owned stations. The agency also took aim at rules restricting the number of TV and radio stations that any media company could simultaneously own in a single market. A major beneficiary of the deregulatory moves, analysts say, is Sinclair, a conservative broadcasting company that is seeking to buy up Tribune Media for $3.9 billion.

5 of 146 comments (clear)

  1. Fascism progresses by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Informative

    In Germany they called the result of this Gleichschaltung: all media effectively delivering the same content (propaganda).

    These days the fascists uniforms are suits...

  2. Re:Trump hates consumers by PopeRatzo · · Score: 3, Informative

    Net neutrality? We're fucked. Bringing back coal? We're fucked.

    Yes, but at least we have the great success of the Keystone XL Pipeline.

    --
    You are welcome on my lawn.
  3. Re:Trump hates consumers by fahrbot-bot · · Score: 3, Informative

    They still do. Polls consistently show that viewers of Fox News ...

    Fox News is a cable company, not broadcast TV.

    It would have been funnier had you included the remainder of the original quote:

    ... the largest and most successful among its competitors by far, are the worst-informed news consumers of all.

    --
    It must have been something you assimilated. . . .
  4. Wrong. Stop Rewriting History. by mpapet · · Score: 3, Informative

    Parent blames "Congress" when in fact, the financial regulators were deregulating banking. Congress did their part. Guess who was driving the deregulation? Banks.

    Parent also has a rudimentary understanding of the problem that's fundamentally wrong in so many ways no one would read the wall of text..

    --
    http://www.maxineudall.com/2010/02/should-economists-be-sued-for-malpractice.html
  5. Re:Trump hates consumers by PoopJuggler · · Score: 3, Informative

    You mean like the successful Keystone pipeline that just leaked 210,000 gallons of oil in South Dakota?