FCC Loosens Media Ownership Limits

U.S. communications regulators on Monday narrowly approved sweeping new rules that will allow television broadcasters to expand their reach, despite fears about reducing the diversity of viewpoints.
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  thanks to daily KOS

Who Cares Who Owns The Media?

Today, after a long and ludicrous debate forced upon it by "interest" groups such as Internet users and those concerned with freedom of speech, the Federal Communications Commission will issue a completely just ruling. Let us all hail the abolition of an antiquated system of rules that prevents large companies from owning a newspaper and a television station in the same market! We welcome media companies, those most backward-looking of all capitalist enterprises, into the 21st Century. Please allow me to be the first to say: Howdy-do, neighbor!

The FCC's critics obviously have no conception of how the media works. I've worked for many newspapers and magazines, and appeared on television somewhere between four and eight times. I can tell you for certain that the corporate owners of media outlets never, ever, ever influence content, particularly when it comes to environmental news. So stop worrying, you ninnys. The situation has improved drasticallly. Why, I remember 1974 like it was 2000. At 4 PM on any given weekday, your only viewing options were Zoom on PBS, a showing of some old movie like Key Largo on a UHF station, and reruns of The Dick Van Dyke Show. Now look at our choices. Surf Girls, for one, on MTV. J Lo's Top 10 Hot Motorcycles on VH1. Black Judge Court on WGN. Truth Report with Shep Smith on Fox News. And those are just my four favorite stations. There are so many more, some of them sports-related, some of them geared toward women, some of them showing loud Japanese cartoons. So how can people honestly say there's no diversity in media?
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I believe it was my mentor at Oxbridge, Sir Francis Crapshoot, who said, "an excess of information, if controlled by a excess of providers, inevitably leads to public confusion, followed by free thought and free elections. This can never be healthy for a country fortunate enough to be led by a man sent by God to bring peace and prosperity to all corners of the earth willing to practice abstinence before marriage." I believe that says it all. Antiquated rules of media ownership just get in the way of our divine mission.
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Heard the local news? It may soon be harder to find

The Federal Communications Commission is about to make big, powerful media corporations in this country even bigger and more powerful.

It now appears all but certain that the FCC will vote — probably Monday — to significantly relax the ownership rules that have long kept alive, if only barely, a sense of competition and independence among the nation's news media.

Big mistake.
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  thanks to Cursor

TV News That Looks Local, Even if It's Not

If Mr. Hyman's tan looked out of place in central Michigan, or if his commentary seemed ill suited to a city with a large population of minority groups, there was good reason. Mr. Hyman was actually in a studio just outside Baltimore, not sharing a set with the Flint news team. As he does most nights, Mr. Hyman also addressed audiences of local news programs in cities across the country, including Pittsburgh, Oklahoma City and Rochester, from right where he sat in Hunt Valley, Md.

Mr. Hyman is part of a national team of anchors, commentators and weathercasters that, when plans are complete, will report for all 62 television stations owned by the Sinclair Broadcast Group. Sinclair calls it "Central Casting." To the company, it is an efficient way to cut the costs of local journalism, bringing news to small stations that otherwise would go without.

But to opponents of a proposal before the Federal Communications Commission to loosen media ownership rules, the set in Maryland is a frightening sign of things to come.
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