Fairness Doctrine

[machinehead]

Here's some fodder for discussion. Interesting piece by Tim Rutten in today's Los Angeles Times, which picks up the topic of the Fairness Doctrine about halfway through, in relation to recent colossus ignoramus moves by moveon.org and comedian Rush Limbaugh.

http://www.latimes.com/entertainment/news/la-et-rutten6oct06,0,1622621.story?coll=la-home-center

The final line is the most telling, and the one I most agree with. The last consideration in all of this is the public. As I like to say, "well said, and I agree."

Here's a copy and paste of the Fairness Doctrine portion of the piece, below:

In America today, talk radio is a wholly owned subsidiary of the Republican Party's conservative wing. GOP partisans will argue that's because deregulation subjected radio to the discipline of the marketplace, and, when that market expressed itself through ratings, it stated an overwhelming preference for conservative talk-show hosts.

[EDIT-Thanks to the poster for properly attributing the citation and including a URL so interested users can read the rest of it. As essentially the entire post has been pulled from a copyrighted source, there are concerns that it violates our terms of service regarding unauthorized use. The post has been truncated as a result. In the future, please paraphrase such large citations or crop them within fair use standards.]

 

[davideduardo]

They point to the fact that deregulation freed big corporations to acquire hundreds of radio stations at about the same time that satellite transmission made syndicated radio programming decisively cheaper than locally produced shows. It was an easy call for the corporate station managers, who quickly filled their airtime with cheap, syndicated programming. Most of the first wave of syndicated programming was talk by conservative commentators, who'd long been shut out -- or felt they were shut out -- of mainstream media.

What an absolute crock. What a lie.

"Syndicated programming" that could be delivered cheaper than the local equivalent goes back to the late 20's when CBS and the Red and Blue nets of NBC were formed and nearly all radio was distributed by telephone lines.

The delivery method had nothing to do with the success of syndicated programming... the talent of the people on the shows did.

 

[Lopaka]

I am for freedom of speech but there needs to be responsibility attached. It is fine with me if GE and MSNBC and NBC and Fox and Clear Channel and ABC, did I leave anybody out? all want to propagandize for the Republican Party. Fine. But let them also be financially responsible for the consequences of their acts. Let them be the ones to pay for the war that started as a direct and predictable result of their incessant attacks against Democrats and glorifying Republican politicians. Billions of dollars have been squandered, billions of dollars have been stolen, thousands slaughtered for oil, maybe millions, and a good deal of this has been because the radio industry has deliberately propagandized. It is clear proximate cause. Let them pay for the consequences of their wrongdoing. Its the only morally right thing to do. The innocent should not have to pay, only the guilty. Fortunately there has been so much criminal stealing in this administration that it is no exaggeration to call it a criminal enterprise, the RICO anti racketeering statute should be used to indict everyone involved with its creation and that would certainly include the broadcasting companies previously named and perhaps others as well. I will not hold my breath.

 

[smedge2006]

What an absolute crock. What a lie.

"Syndicated programming" that could be delivered cheaper than the local equivalent goes back to the late 20's when CBS and the Red and Blue nets of NBC were formed and nearly all radio was distributed by telephone lines.

The delivery method had nothing to do with the success of syndicated programming... the talent of the people on the shows did.

But the delivery method was a major factor in the turn to local radio in the 1950s. The old AT&T setup was too inflexible and too expensive to deliver meaningful options for stations that were trying to remain relevant in the face of television as they evolved from block programming to dayparting to formatting -- and instead of getting better, it got worse as the networks cut fidelity from 8 to 5 kHz (and Mutual went far below that). ABC couldn't network its successful Top 40 stations over phone lines without ticking off all the MOR stations and primitive news-talkers like KABC and KGO that also carried the network's programming. If AT&T had had 12 sets of 15 kHz stereo pairs criss-crossing the country instead of four 5 kHz lines, who's to say that the local radio renaissance of the 50's would have even occurred.

 

[SeanMGilbow]

Stephanie Miller said it best: Progressive talk hosts do not want a return of the Fairness Doctrine, just fairness.

http://youtube.com/watch?v=MGkoKLVj_ZI

Her show would suffer if the Fairness Doctrine were revived because she wouldn't have enough right-wing material to poke fun at during the first hour of her shows--which, according to Talkers Magazine, grew its audience to more than 1.5 million listeners in spite of losing a number of affiliates.

Talk about the Fairness Doctrine being a non-issue. This wouldn't have anything to do with Rush Limbaugh's "phony soldiers" remarks, would it?

http://youtube.com/watch?v=vjp5tzarRXw

 

[gr8oldies]

I grew up 150 miles away from Detroit. I grew up listening to CKLW. I got great music, great personalities and absolutely no local content relavant to me in farm country in Ohio. The weather forecast wasn't even right for us. We didn't follow th Pistons, Tigers or Lions and didn't even go their to shop. Yet I listened. Is there that much difference between me listening to a non-local station and someone today listening to a syndicated program or satellite service?

 

[kaufcom]

What an absolute crock. What a lie.

"Syndicated programming" that could be delivered cheaper than the local equivalent goes back to the late 20's when CBS and the Red and Blue nets of NBC were formed and nearly all radio was distributed by telephone lines.

The delivery method had nothing to do with the success of syndicated programming... the talent of the people on the shows did.

So, let me understand, when KABC in LA dropped all the local talkers like Michael Jackson (who they were paying a high six figure salary), and other local hosts to pick up Sean Hannity and Bill O'Reilly, who they are paying nothing that decision was made totally because of the ratings. By the way, you're a active player in the LA market. Have you noticed how WABC's ratings have tanked over the past ten years?