FCC Has No Issue With David Ortiz’s Pregame Speech

[KeithE4]

"We must think of the tiny tots..."

--from Stan Freberg's "Elderly Man River"; Stan sings "Old Man River" but the "CBS Censor" (Daws Butler, aka the voice of Yogi Bear etc.) keeps correcting him--"we must think of the tiny tots". Stan is forced to correct it: Elderly Man River, he must know something but he doesn't say anything..." Finally when Stan gets to the part about "you get a little drunk" he realizes he has met his match

;D ;D ;D

Freberg was decades ahead of his time. Elderly Man River was probably the first satire on political correctness, 25 years or so before the term was invented.

 

[raccoonradio]

>>But the FCC has no say-so over David Ortiz or any other person who is not an employee of a broadcaster, and has a microphone in front of him.

Right but what about, say, a caller to a talk radio show that swears and the station lets it go through? The caller isn't penalized but the station could be. In the early years of talk radio
there were concerns about something profane or slanderous getting out there and there was no
delay. Some hosts actually would listen to a caller on the phone and repeat what they said--
the caller's voice wasn't broadcast. Then the delay was invented and implemented. (A promo for
the Jerry Williams show in those days talked about the innovation where callers could actually
get their voices on the air! Wow!)*

On the day of the bombings, just after 7 pm, I heard a caller to Jeff Kuhner on WRKO: "So when
they catch these sick f---s...''. It got by the board op and Jeff apparently; I heard it. So stations could get in trouble for stuff like this. The woman wasn't a WRKO employee, but it's supposedly
up to the broadcaster to use the "dump button". And even if the FCC allowed some profanity to
get through, advertisers might fear a backlash if they sponsor a station's programming and it were to happen. (John DePetro lost his job at WRKO due to a couple of his comments--and I'd bet
that some sponsors were upset and may have pressure them to dump him).

But here we're talking FCC and fleeting expletives and safe harbor, etc. We're talking about a Pacifica station in NYC that got into trouble for airing George Carlin's 7 Dirty Words routine
and a father and son happened to be tuned in, etc.

http://transition.fcc.gov/eb/oip/

>>In addition, because cable and satellite services are subscription-based, viewers of these services have greater control over the programming content that comes into their homes, whereas broadcast content traditionally has been available to any member of the public with a radio or television. Regarding the safe harbor period, Congress and the courts have instructed the Commission only to enforce the indecency standard between the hours of 6 a.m. and 10 p.m., local time. - when children are more likely to be in the audience

--------------
*--This system was introduced in 1952 when WKAP started a talk show called "Open Mic". It is believed that this was the first time a telephone call-in show was broadcast with the telephone conversation "live" on the air. The FCC rules at the time prohibited the broadcasting of a live phone conversation. However, there was no rule prohibiting a taped playback of a phone call, provided that a "beep" tone was heard by the caller every 15 seconds so that the caller knew he was being recorded.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Broadcast_delay

 

[mescutia]

David Ortiz is a baseball player, not a broadcast licensee. He is not subject to FCC rules and regulations. He is subject to MLB rules and regulations. If Bud Lite or the Red Sox think he should be fined over this, he will be. But the FCC has no say-so over David Ortiz or any other person who is not an employee of a broadcaster, and has a microphone in front of him.

But if a licensee is fined because of Ortiz's choice of words, they [the licensee] would have the right to turn around and sue Ortiz for damages equal to at least half of the amount of the fine.

Just like CBS should have had the right to sue Janet Jackson and Justin Timberlake for damages resulting from Nipplegate -- and in that case, there should have been a clause in the contract between CBS and Jackson/Timberlake/the production company responsible for the halftime show that allowed that.

 

[TSBench]

As an example of real, raw, radio star power, look to Howard Stern. Affiiates were willing to eat multiple fines, for substantial bucks, without blinking. Evidently, there was no such thing as 'bad' publicity when it came to Stern.

Gives you an idea of how much they were making off Howard.

Regards,
TSB