Archive for September, 2006
Wednesday, September 27th, 2006 by jhoward
After much speculation, the FCC has announced that the Oct. 3 LA hearing will occur at two venues with an afternoon and an evening session — and that there will be an opportunity for public testimony at both sessions.
Part One
1:00p.m. – 4:30 p.m.
University of Southern California (USC)
Los Angeles, CA
Part Two
6:30 p.m. – 10:00 p.m.
El Segundo High School
El Segundo, CA
For more information about these two hearings, and for ways that you can help out, click here.
All five FCC Commissioners are expected to attend what may be the public’s last chance to speak out against Big Media before Martin moves to lift the last significant limits to runaway consolidation.
A broad-based coalition of local and national groups is urging their members to attend the hearings and testify about the impacts of media consolidation. They include the American Federation of Television and Radio Artists, California NOW, CALPIRG, Free Press, Media Alliance, MoveOn.org Civic Action, National Association of Broadcast Employees and Technicians-CWA, National Hispanic Media Coalition, National Latino Media Council, Newspaper Guild-CWA, Prometheus Radio Project, local churches and many others.
Jean Thomson of Los Angeles puts the hearing into perspective:
“My family has totally given up watching the broadcast channels for news. Now the newspapers are consolidating for greater profits. With the large conglomerates taking over all outlets in the area, the news is no longer news — it is just the spin of the owner’s philosophy. We see the same information in the newspaper, television, radio — word for word. If we don’t speak up now, we will not longer have a chance to be heard.”
Click here to read the Coalition press release.
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Thursday, September 21st, 2006 by jhoward
During a national press briefing, two Federal Communications Commissioners and a group of civil rights leaders expressed outrage over the appalling lack of diversity in TV station ownership uncovered in the Free Press study, Out of the Picture.
The exhaustive research conducted by S. Derek Turner and Mark Cooper revealed that women and minorities have been almost completely shut out of TV station ownership.
Both FCC Commissioners cited the study’s findings as a chief reason to put the brakes on any rules that would further media consolidation.
FCC Commissioner Michael Copps:
“There is something terribly wrong when women and minorities comprise such substantial parts of the U.S. population but own so few broadcast television stations. This isn’t just a problem. It’s a national disgrace. We just should not be voting again on changing media ownership rules unless and until we have tackled this problem and come up with initiatives to redress a crying national need.”
FCC Commissioner Jonathan Adelstein:
“A bad situation has gotten worse while the FCC sat idly by and did nothing. We have a legal and moral obligation to take immediate steps to make broadcast media and coverage more diverse. This study shows that allowing more media concentration will only aggravate what is already a pitiful lack of minority voices over the airwaves.”
Civil rights leaders blasted the FCC for its failure to adequately address the persistent underrepresentation of women and minorities in media ownership, resulting in the invisibility of issues and ideas from an enormous segment of the population.
Nancy Zirkin, Leadership Conference on Civil Rights:
“The findings here - the low levels of female and minority ownership - should be a national embarrassment. And the fact that some on the recent FCC have been more interested in giving more power to those who already have too much, rather than addressing decades of discrimination and ensuring that the little guy will get a chance, should be a national scandal.”
Kim Gandy, National Organization for Women:
“There are so few women’s voices on broadcast television, and part of the absence of women’s perspectives stems from the absence of women owners. We are half of the population but only 5 percent of station owners. And the problem is getting worse — the increasing consolidation of ownership is making women invisible.”
Janet Murguia, National Council of La Raza:
“This is a critical issue for our community. Latinos continue to be severely underrepresented in the mainstream media in terms of employment, content, and ownership. This report confirms what we strongly believe — that increased media concentration has significantly exacerbated this situation and that increasing diversity in media ownership could help stem it.”
Gary Flowers, Rainbow/PUSH Coalition:
“This attempt by the FCC to change ownership rules once again will result in too few owning too much, at the expense of too many.”
David Honig, the Minority Media and Telecommunications Council:
“In addition to being morally wrong, the lack of minority ownership is anticompetitive and inefficient. It deprives America’s television viewers of the entrepreneurial, managerial and creative skills of a third of the nation’s people.”
Cheryl A. Leanza, United Church of Christ, Office of Communication Inc.
“Today Americans are realizing that it is important that each of us own a stake in America. This study demonstrates something we already intuitively realize that the people running the media industry do not represent most Americans and are not based in our communities.”
Today’s press call can be heard at: www.stopbigmedia.com/files/minority_call.mp3
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Wednesday, September 20th, 2006 by jhoward
Another report has been released — this time by members of the StopBigMedia.com Coalition. Free Press’ study, Out of the Picture, is the first complete assessment and analysis of female and minority ownership of broadcast television stations. It shows the consequences of further consolidation — and not surprisingly, the results were grim.
- Women comprise 51 percent of the entire U.S. population, but own only 4.97 percent of all TV stations.
- Minorities make up 33 percent of the entire U.S. population, but own only 3.26 percent of all stations.
- While the level of female and minority ownership has advanced in other industries since the late 1990s, it has worsened in the broadcast sector.
- Hispanic- or Latino-owned stations reach just 21.8 percent of the Latino TV households in the United States.
- 91 percent of African-American TV households are not reached by a black-owned TV station.
- Markets with minority owners are significantly less concentrated than markets without them - even if the size of the market is held constant.
Out of the Picture criticizes the FCC for abandoning its responsibility to monitor and foster the diversity of media owners, and ignoring the impact of its own policies.
S. Derek Turner, research director of Free Press and co-author of the study explains:
“This is a very important study, but it is one that we should not have had to write. The FCC has the duty and responsibility to monitor and foster female and minority broadcast ownership. But the FCC has failed.”
Mark Cooper, director of research at Consumer Federation of America and co-author of the study adds:
“This is the first study to show the direct link between increasing media concentration and the lack of minority ownership in the media. It not only presents statistical analysis but also provides a detailed assessment of the stations that left minority hands as a result of specific policies adopted by the Congress and the FCC to allow media concentration.”
The full study is now available at: www.stopbigmedia.com/files/out_of_the_picture.pdf
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Monday, September 18th, 2006 by tkarr
Surprise! Another Federal Communications Commission study on the negative impacts of media consolidation came to light today after being buried at the agency for at least two years — the second suppressed FCC ownership study to surface in as many weeks.
It’s clear now that FCC’s top brass under then FCC Chairman Powell were willing to deep-six any research that contradicts the media industry’s pro-consolidation claims. The question now is what’s current Chairman Kevin Martin going to do about it?
The more recently spiked study, a “Review of the Radio Industry” conducted by the FCC Media Bureau, found that the Telecommunications Act of 1996 had led to a drastic decline in the number of radio station owners — even as the actual number of commercial stations in the United States had increased.
Last week, Senator Barbara Boxer uncovered a buried federal study that showed media consolidation is harmful to local news reporting. The 2004 report found that locally owned stations produced - on average — five minutes more local news coverage in a half-hour newscast than their consolidated competitors. Upon seeing the results, senior managers at the FCC ordered that “every last piece” of that study be destroyed, according to the Associated Press.
The unraveling controversy has been met with denials from both FCC chairmen.
Members of the StopBigMedia.com Coalition have sent a letter to Chairman Kevin Martin to “immediately seek an independent investigation, through the Office of the Inspector General, to determine the circumstances under which the public was denied access to this important, taxpayer-funded research, the parties involved and the processes that may have allowed any record of its existence to be destroyed.”
As Martin considers eliminating local ownership caps and the longstanding prohibition on newspaper-broadcast cross-ownership, he should heed the public concern. Ninety-seven percent of the public feedback received by the FCC in 2003 opposed further media consolidation, and more than 100,000 people have already filed comments this time around. Yet Chairman Martin continues to push for rules that will let a small handful of companies swallow up more of our local media.
Maybe Kevin Martin should start reading his own research.
He and the agency’s GOP majority are continuing Powell’s plan to gut the last remaining limits to local media conglomerates, but before he can proceed, Chairman Martin has promised to hold at least six public hearings, to make a show of his planned rule changes with average citizens. So far he has scheduled only one - in Los Angeles on Oct. 3.
Update: Late last night, the unfolding controversy prompted Martin to order an independent investigation into why the two studies on media ownership were never made public, yet he remains adamant with Powell in denying any knowledge of a cover-up.
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Friday, September 15th, 2006 by jhoward
This just in from AP: Former Federal Communications Commission Chairman Michael Powell says he never saw a study that suggested greater concentration of media ownership would hurt local TV news coverage.
Powell, now a consultant, said through his assistant Judy Mann that “he never saw the report, he never heard of the report until yesterday and he certainly never ordered anything destroyed or stopped.”
But the ex-FCC lawyer who exposed the scandal is sticking to his story. Adam Candeub, now a law professor at Michigan State, tells AP that senior managers ordered that “every last piece” of the report be destroyed. “The whole project was just stopped — end of discussion,” he said.
>> Click Here to Protest the FCC Cover-up
Barbara Boxer has demanded answers from Chairman Kevin Martin (pictured above) about the buried 2004 FCC study on local news. The report was given to her by an anonymous whistle-blower, who worked at the FCC during the time of the study.
She grilled Martin about it at a Senate hearing on Tuesday. Now we’ve got the tape.
>> Watch Boxer Press Martin for Clues
In a letter responding to Senator Boxer, Martin admitted that the buried study is relevant to the localism and media ownership proceedings.
On Thursday Free Press, Consumers Union, Media Access Project and the Consumer Federation of America sent a formal letter to the FCC urging Martin to: “immediately seek an independent investigation, through the Office of the Inspector General, to determine the circumstances under which the public was denied access to this important, taxpayer-funded research.”
Members of the StopBigMedia.com Coalition are outraged that the FCC destroyed evidence of the damage done by media giants — and they want answers. Read their reactions:
Josh Silver, Free Press:
“The FCC can no longer pretend Big Media does a better job of serving local communities. As millions of have told the FCC time and again, they want more local news and a diversity of voices on the public airwaves. Maybe now they’ll finally start listening.”
Jonathan Rintels, Center for Creative Voices:
“This is a body blow to the FCC and its renewed drive, under Martin, to try again to loosen those crucial ownership limits that promote local news coverage.”
Harold Feld, Media Access Project:
“The public deserves to know the truth about whether Martin’s predecessor tried to destroy valuable evidence about the most critical question facing the FCC then or now.”
Pete Tridish, Prometheus Radio Project:
“This study alerts us to the possibility that further ownership consolidation could lead to the substitution of non-local news for local content. A remote, corporate owned media can undermine our participation in a democracy.”
Beth McConnell, PennPIRG Education Fund:
“First, the FCC ignored public support for local media. Then, the agency ignored its own research showing local media ownership is in the public interest. Now, the FCC has the opportunity to change course and reject the weakening of media ownership limits.”
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Thursday, September 14th, 2006 by tkarr
There’s more on the story that under former FCC Chairman Michael Powell a federal study was buried that found media consolidation was harmful to local news reporting.
The study was commissioned in hopes it would show that consolidated ownership didn’t negatively impact local communities. The Associated Press reported Wednesday afternoon that upon seeing the results, it was ordered that “every last piece” of the study be destroyed.
Powell suppressed the 2004 study to protect the interests of his friends in the corporate media lobby. It revealed that locally owned stations produced more local news than those owned by media giants — such as ABC/Disney, Fox Television, Viacom and Sinclair Broadcast Group.
Here’s the study that Michael Powell didn’t want you to see: “Do Local Owners Deliver More Localism?” It shows that, on average, locally owned broadcasters devote an additional 20 to 25 percent of their newscasts to local news stories — approximately 5.5 more minutes per half hour broadcast. It also found that Network owned and operated stations (belonging to ABC, CBS, NBC and Fox) aired significantly less local news.
The report was an inconvenience to Michael Powell, who, throughout his tenure at the FCC, aided efforts by large media companies to further consolidate their power over local news outlets.
Had it seen the light of day, the FCC and their Big Media allies could no longer deny that locally owned media do a better job of covering local news.
While Powell has left the FCC, his legacy is being carried forward by FCC Chairman Kevin Martin. The new chairman has made it clear that he intends to side with Big Media interests in the current rewrite of FCC ownership rules.
During Martin’s confrimation hearings earlier this week, Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.) asked him about the report, which was given to her by a whistle-blower, and pledged to pursue an investigation into its cover-up.
>> Watch Boxer grill Martin on the report.
On Thursday Free Press, Consumers Union and the Consumer Federation of America (all StopBigMedia.com Coalition members) sent a formal letter to the FCC urging Martin to: “immediately seek an independent investigation, through the Office of the Inspector General, to determine the circumstances under which the public was denied access to this important, taxpayer-funded research.”
In July, Martin kick started the latest effort to rewrite FCC rules when he asked the public to comment on his plans to let conglomerates buy up more local news outlets.
The only way to stop media is through public involvement in the rule making. Act now to rollback media consolidation and defend local control of our media.
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Wednesday, September 13th, 2006 by caaron
At yesterday’s Senate reconfirmation hearing for FCC Chairman Kevin Martin, California Democrat Barbara Boxer expressed outrage that the FCC had suppressed a two-year-old study showing that locally owned stations produce more local news than those owned by media giants.
StopBigMedia.com has obtained a copy of the draft report – and it’s a blockbuster.
Titled “Do Local Owners Do More Localism? Some Evidence from Local Broadcast News,” the study shows locally owned stations produced five-and-a-half minutes more local news in a half-hour newscast than their consolidated competitors — meaning 33 more hours of local news per year.
The study also found:
- Locally owned stations also aired 3.5 more minutes’ worth of on-location local news reports than non-locally owned stations.
- Network owned and operated stations (those owned by ABC, CBS, NBC and Fox) aired significantly less local news.
- Owners who controlled stations in multiple markets aired less local news content.
- Station owners who also control newspapers did not air more local news content.
- Owners who also controlled radio stations aired significantly less local TV news content.
The report was originally commissioned in 2004 by former Chairman Michael Powell – who hoped to show that media concentration didn’t impact localism. But when his own researchers found the opposite result, he buried the results.
Someone leaked a copy to Senator Boxer – who scolded the agency for failing to make such significant findings public.
“Now this is not a matter or national security, for God’s sake,” Boxer said. “This is important information about issues that are key to the people. So I don’t understand who deep-sixed this thing. I’m going to get to the bottom of it and find out if any commissioners saw this.”
Martin – who was a commissioner at the time — denied any knowledge of the study but promised to read it and fold it into the long-mothballed localism proceeding started by Powell.
Click Here to file your comments about the cover-up to the FCC
Click here to listen to the hearing
Click here to read the full report
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Monday, September 11th, 2006 by jhoward
After months of silence, the FCC finally announced that it will conduct its first official public hearing on media ownership in Los Angeles on Oct. 3. Six public forums were promised in June when the FCC launched the rulemaking that could change local ownership limits.
This announcement comes just days before FCC Chairman Kevin Martin’s scheduled testimony at his confirmation hearing before the Senate Commerce Committee.
Martin has promised to “hold public hearings in diverse locations around the country to fully involve the American people” in the FCC’s review of media ownership rules.
For more information, click here.
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Friday, September 8th, 2006 by nbastek
Technorati Profile
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Thursday, September 7th, 2006 by tkarr
On September 9 and 10, local ABC stations nationwide plan to broadcast a two part mini-series that is riddled with falsehoods and political bias about events that lead to the September 11 terrorist attacks.
Stations have been instructed by the Walt Disney Company — the massive media conglomerate that owns ABC — to air “The Path to 9/11” without commercials. ABC claims that the six-hour “docudrama” is based on the 9/11 Commission’s findings, despite the fact that it blatantly distorts the bi-partisan report and replaces history with propaganda.
Once again, a large media conglomerate is abusing its stewardship of the public airwaves to spread untruths and push its political agenda. Local broadcasters must serve our interests first and not those of ABC and its owners at Disney:
Don’t Let Disney Airbrush History
“The Path to 9/11″ reportedly features a series of fictionalized scenes, written by a right-wing activist, that are in direct conflict with the bi-partisan 9-11 Commission’s report. Now, Disney is forcing local broadcasters to air these falsehoods in our communities.
Disney knowingly got the facts about September 11 wrong. Now, it’s forcing local broadcasters to air these falsehoods in a bid for higher ratings and political gain.
Tell the FCC to Stop Big Media’s Abuse of the Airwaves
No matter your politics, we must all embrace the public’s right to have a strong voice in broadcasters use our airwaves. Sadly, the local station owners that are most responsive to our interests are being pushed around by conglomerates like Disney.
And it could get a lot worse. The Federal Communications Commission is poised to permit giant media companies to buy up even more of our local stations. FCC Chairman Kevin Martin has asked the public to comment on his plans to let conglomerates like Disney become even more powerful. Tell Disney and the Chairman Martin that enough is enough:
You now have an opportunity to do just that. In June, Chairman Martin to convene a series of public hearings on consolidated media ownership. To date he hasn’t convened a single such forum.
Without full public engagement in the issue, massive media conglomerates like Disney will continue to abuse our airwaves and mislead the public with impunity. The FCC needs to hear us out and act against efforts by companies like Disney to spread its influence over more local media outlets.
It’s time that the FCC
took action to limit Big Media’s damaging influence on our democracy.
Disney Plays Politics:
Fiction over Fact: In a July 5 press release, ABC claimed that the film “absolutely … get[s] it right” in its “historic” portrayal of events prior to 9-11, marketing “Path to 9/11″ as an accurate retelling of the 9-11 Commission. But on September 7 it shifted gears, claiming in a realease: “for dramatic and narrative purposes, the movie contains fictionalized scenes, composite and representative characters and dialogue, and time compression.” (more)
The Land of Make Believe: It’s so rife with falsehoods that an FBI agent who was brought in to consult on the docudrama quit because, he said, “they were making things up.” (more)
Ad-Lib History: The docudrama’s scriptwriter– a noted conservative – admits that the film’s most controversial scene – where a Clinton administration official passes up an opportunity to kill Osama Bin Ladin — was based on nothing at all, telling a right-wing radio station that the scene was “improvised.” (more)
Re-Education: ABC/Disney also planned to distribute the historically false “Path to 9/11″ to tens of thousands of American classrooms, via lesson plans created by Scholastic – the world’s largest publisher of children’s books – with whom Disney has lucrative content sharing deals. The study guide suggested that former Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein had a role in the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. Yesterday, Scholastic cancelled distribution after thousands wrote the company to complain. (more)
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