The FCC has repealed a 42-year-old rule blocking broadcast media mergers

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-switch/wp/2017/11/16/the-fcc-just-repealed-decades-old-rules-blocking-broadcast-media-mergers/

by uptown • 9 years ago

368 153 9 years ago

washingtonpost.com

Top19• 9 years ago

I hate mergers and think they’re dumb, but maybe this is for the best. Isn’t the problem with internet news is that it comes from everywhere, enforcing a kind of chaos of truth and a race to the bottom? Maybe we should have near monopolies in media, so that a certain laziness pervades and people don’t care about ratings?

Sir_Cmpwn• 9 years ago

I upvoted you not because I agree (or disagree) with you, but because I think you politely presented a well-reasoned opinion and shouldn't be in the grey.

thephyber4• 9 years ago

I didn't downvote, but I don't see it as well reasoned. It's essentially the "two wrongs make a right" fallacy[1]. In this case, increased media consolidation has nothing to with how fake internet news is.

In fact, I'm of the opinion that further media consolidation will move us further from low-bias information sources and towards more MSNBC / FoxNews extreme partisan news sources. It will likely continue the convergence of entertainment and journalism which only serves to dilute the little media literacy that we still have in the USA.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Two_wrongs_make_a_right

sinatra• 9 years ago

Isn’t the problem with internet news is that it comes from everywhere, enforcing a kind of chaos of truth and a race to the bottom?

No, the problem with internet news is that it's getting easier and easier to promote a lie as truth. With a monopoly in media, promoting lies will become even easier (for that monopoly).

AnimalMuppet• 9 years ago

This worked, once upon a time, when the major media outfits were close to the center, and cared about doing their jobs of reporting rather than trying to push a viewpoint. If we got those conditions again, sure, this could work.

If we don't get those conditions, though...

thephyber4• 9 years ago

That only existed for television news and only because the FCC required television stations to air after-work news without commercials (making it a cost center) as a condition of their FCC airwaves licenses. Reagan's administration dropped that rule, deregulating television stations, turning news departments in to potential profit centers, and further merging entertainment and journalism.

As far as I can tell, the current administration and Congress are more interested in moving further away from regulations than closer to the pre-Reagan regulation regime.

To be fair, I don't think it will work today even if that regulatory rule was re-implemented. At the time, the vast majority of the US only had a choice of 3 major television networks, which were more or less equally non-partisan. Currently, there are too many channels and people that tune into certain channels do so to avoid being challenged by ideas they don't already believe.

aaronbrethorst• 9 years ago

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.

Sinclair requires its TV stations to air segments with a conservative bent: https://www.nytimes.com/2017/05/12/business/media/sinclair-b...

Edit: Check out John Oliver's segment on this topic. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GvtNyOzGogc

bduerst2• 9 years ago

The best part of that is when Sinclair's Terrorism Alert Desk ran a piece about burkinis. They require all their stations to broadcast it.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GvtNyOzGogc&feature=youtu.be...

not_that_noob• 9 years ago

The ghosts of Pulitzer and Hearst thank you - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Propaganda_of_the_Spanish–Amer...

Qw3r72• 9 years ago

Someone needs to go wake up Teddy Roosevelt. As rude as it would be to wake him up, we need someone to recognise that the amount of consolidation the country is reaching is incredibly dangerous. This teetering near Deus Ex level amounts of consolidation. Yes, the current aims at Google and Facebook are nice to see. But, the deregulation of media companies is allowing anti-consumer practices. Even the video game industry is starting to receive backlash for its "non-gambling" practices and the lootbox.

Pardon for the rant, that kind of seems everywhere. But, allowing something like this to form is dangerous, especially with how strong lobbying is now. With facebook actively suppressing certain ideologies, the soon to be larger media companies will now have no issue writing off conflicting ideas as well.

spaceseaman4• 9 years ago

I completely agree with you, however I find this bit a little mysterious:

With facebook actively suppressing certain ideologies

The only ideologies I've heard of Facebook suppressing lately are Neo-Nazi and alt-right groups following the Charlottesville stuff. I don't take issue with these ideologies being suppressed.

Am I missing something?

EDIT: Apparently so because someone just went through my history and down-voted all my comments...

Qw3r72• 9 years ago

I do not agree with what you have to say, but I'll defend to the death your right to say it.

Evelyn Beatrice Hall

Suppression of opinion implicitly violates the Bill of Rights.

rodgerd• 9 years ago

Unfortunately HN has apparently become a haven for Nazi sympathisers.

thephyber4• 9 years ago

The only ideologies I've heard of Facebook suppressing lately

Conservatives put up a fit when they accused Facebook employees of censoring or otherwise biasing the "Trending Topics" feature to prevent conservative stories from appearing there.

Last I heard, about 2 FB employees were suspended or fired over the story, but that's just from memory so I could be completely wrong. As a result of the accusations, FB reportedly converted Trending Topics to be completely automated. It was probably easier to abuse for coordinated troll armies once it was automated.

mschuster913• 9 years ago

Am I missing something?

Yep, both Facebook and Twitter regularly plop up on media for shutting down or suspending left-wing sites. For example, "Kein Mensch ist illegal" was even awarded a prize by FB (2014) and in 2016 their admin got suspended (https://www.mimikama.at/allgemein/facebook-sperrt-admin-von-...). Problem here is that the alt-right (ab)uses the reporting features combined with sensitive anti-spam measures at the providers. Given enough reporting Nazis, even the biggest accounts are easy targets. That the Big 3 (FB, Twitter, Youtube) don't have a way to reach a human or file an appeal at a court of law (which I can do, for example, if my telco provider shuts down my internet access and with it my email account) doesn't exactly help either. Big-ish accounts with media influence or people with connections to employees of the companies may help, but this is a luxury only a few people have.

EDIT: Apparently so because someone just went through my history and down-voted all my comments...

Don't worry - had the same thing happen to me recently, I believe after the Charlottesville murder.

beedogs3• 9 years ago

EDIT: Apparently so because someone just went through my history and down-voted all my comments...

It should be easy for the admins to find and promptly IP-ban the creep who did this.

nl2• 9 years ago

EDIT: Apparently so because someone just went through my history and down-voted all my comments...

That happens to me a lot these day. Just try saying anything about Russian propaganda on Twitter, and watch all your old comments get voted down.

sliverstorm• 9 years ago

It's wild how we can look back in history, identify a time just like this with all the same problems, and pick out the very man perfect for these circumstances. Hell, at this point we just need to locate his spiritual reincarnation and turn him or her loose, knowing they are perfect for the job.

They said history is a circle, but this is just so blatant.

jmcgough• 9 years ago

It's even more concerning now, considering how much control and visibility into our lives companies have, thanks to mobile phones and digital tracking.

nawtacawp2• 9 years ago

I don’t game. Trying to find more info on the “non-gambling”? Not sure what that is.

spaceseaman4• 9 years ago

Just look up the EA Star Wars Battlefront 2 stuff. It's a big old mess. You pay money for crates which randomly drop items that improve the game experience.

Some people consider it gambling because you are preying on the same tendencies in people for your own gain. People also don't get any real value for their "gambling". Other people say this makes it not gambling, etc. That's a very simple oversimplification of the subject - there's a lot of articles out there about it right now.

fnovd• 9 years ago

EA recently released a statement that their "Loot Box" mechanic, a system by which players can only purchase items by buying them in a randomly-generated bundle, does not constitute gambling. If you were looking for a specific item, you may have to purchase hundreds of these boxes. EA argues that since the box you purchase is guaranteed to have some kind of item, the rules and regulations that apply to gambling with legal tender do not apply.

cokeandsympathy2• 9 years ago

The current aim at Facebook book is to harvest as much of the world's attention as possible to resell to advertisers. Users are not it's customers, the businesses that pay it to advertise are. It's primary goal is to suck you in and keep you using it by any means necessary, ethics be damned

notyourwork• 9 years ago

Even the video game industry is starting to receive backlash for its "non-gambling" practices and the lootbox.

I'm not understanding how this is related?

jack93• 9 years ago

The phrasing was poor.

But, the deregulation of media companies is allowing anti-consumer practices. Even the video game industry is starting to receive backlash for its "non-gambling" practices and the lootbox.

The implication is that it's standard to implement anti-consumer practices like gambling (not called gambling) into consumer products (games). The VAST majority of games now, in a trend starting since circa 2005, has been to milk the customer via chance-based microtransactions, aka the "freemium" model. Games that do not use this, are heavily criticized by industry and critics as oversights or even unfair. i.e. You mean I might pay $X for a game and what if I don't like it? Now I'm out all $X!

JumpCrisscross3• 9 years ago

The political mood on media regulation has shifted, at least from where I sit, in the the past weeks. Twitter blew its hearing. Facebook and Google failed to salve the wound by sending deputies.

The belief I'm sensing is that the only way to check these companies is through competition from traditional media, including ISPs. If Google and Facebook and Twitter are running roughshod with our data, this thinking goes, maybe the solution is letting others challenge their data monopoly.

You and I see the problem with this. It's harder to evade Comcast than Google or Facebook. But every day, that becomes less true. In any case, this is the first step in Silicon Valley's price for what is broadly seen as its arrogance.

jonny_eh• 9 years ago

This is about local TV stations getting gobbled up by a single company, Sinclair. I don't see what Twitter/FB/Google have to do with this.

threeseed2• 9 years ago

Exactly. This has absolutely nothing to do with internet companies.

It's all about Sinclair, Tribune and lots of political donations and favours.

JumpCrisscross3• 9 years ago

I don't see what Twitter/FB/Google have to do with this

Why are "religious rights" and low taxes in the same envelope? Because they're the same constituency. There is no underlying sense to it other than political sense.

Media mergers of the kind Sinclair or TWC have pursued, or are pursuing, have traditionally been argued against by Google et al's lobbyists. There just isn't another organized constituency who cares about local radio. But the precedents from local radio spilling into ISPs? Now there's a worry.

Those same lobbyists now represent politically wounded clients. When the cats are away, the mice come out to play.

adventured• 9 years ago

It was pretty staggering to see AT&T basically threaten the White House over the DOJ's attempts to stop their Time Warner merger (threatening to investigate whether Trump had any influence on the DOJ's attempt to stop it).

MBCook2• 9 years ago

I kind of see their point. It’s totally unprecedented for the WH to tell a company what they should get rid of to be able to pass a merger.

threeseed2• 9 years ago

Sorry but no.

In many places of the USA there is only a single ISP to choose from. Where as there are many search engines and many social networks available to choose from. No one has ever forced you to use Google or Facebook but for many people they are forced to use a particular ISP.

Spivak• 9 years ago

And no one has ever forced you to watch a particular TV station or read a particular news paper. By this reasoning nobody has ever forced you to use the internet either.

If the internet has a strong enough network effect to make its use basically mandatory then so does Facebook.

ABCLAW• 9 years ago

In his remarks Thursday, Pai said it was “utter nonsense” that his agency's decisions on media ownership would lead to a company dominating local media markets by buying up newspapers and radio stations.
“It will open the door to pro-competitive combinations that will strengthen local voices,” he said, and “better serve local communities.”

How?

I'm not quite sure how the combination of a more consolidated industry and the removal of local studios results in stronger local voices.

jacquesm• 9 years ago

That's the same kind of thing companies will say when they remove a bunch of features and drop a product: it is to better serve you, the customer. Never mind that it is complete nonsense.

amptorn• 9 years ago

"No, see, us making more money always makes it possible for us to serve you better."

And do you serve us better?

"Oh no. God, no."

hexane3602• 9 years ago

"The intent is to provide players with a sense of pride and accomplishment for unlocking different heroes.

As for cost, we selected initial values based upon data from the Open Beta and other adjustments made to milestone rewards before launch. Among other things, we're looking at average per-player credit earn rates on a daily basis, and we'll be making constant adjustments to ensure that players have challenges that are compelling, rewarding, and of course attainable via gameplay.

We appreciate the candid feedback, and the passion the community has put forth around the current topics here on Reddit, our forums and across numerous social media outlets.

Our team will continue to make changes and monitor community feedback and update everyone as soon and as often as we can."

Quote from EA when asked why heroes took ridiculous playtime to unlock, skippable with microtransactions, for a $60 game.

fancyfacebook• 9 years ago

Is "pro competitive combination" the new nonsense phrase everyone is going to start repeating? The people who come up with these things sure do have a sense of humor.

ProAm• 9 years ago

I'm not quite sure how the combination of a more consolidated industry and the removal of local studios results in stronger local voices.

Hearing once voice will be more clear and therefore stronger.

ChuckMcM• 9 years ago

It isn't of course. And one only has go back and read the history of the National Broadcasting Company (NBC)[1] where it was sued by other voices trying to break into a market dominated by a single media company.

Oddly enough it is exactly like Google in a way, the ability to sustain a network depends on the ability to sell advertising which depends on viewership for pricing. And being unable to get viewership denies an ability to exist through advertising. So having a monopoly on advertising makes you the defacto monopoly on the viewership because it denies capital to a competitor to develop additional viewership.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NBC

Delmania• 9 years ago

It won't; this move was done to benefit a media company known as Sinclair. This company has a decidedly pro-Trump stance, and they require the local stations they control to air pro-Trump commentary.

Make no mistake this is a political move, and one that is right out of a fascist/authoritarian playbook.

RIMR• 9 years ago

Here's a sample of some of the propaganda Sinclair requires its stations to broadcast: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xu6uKOS3S2E

Seattle's KOMO news crams all of these ridiculous political segments (including Clinton smear-pieces and other alt-right recruitment videos) into their 2-4am slots just to keep too many viewers from seeing them.

wyldfire2• 9 years ago

The Sinclair move to dominate airwaves and include media-agenda-framed-as-individual-opinion-pieces on TV news is very concerning to me. It's disappointing that this rule change will only help them continue their domination.

But I wonder if this might incidentally happen to be the right move for the government to make? The flow of information and news is very different today from the landscape that existed in the 1970s. Maybe letting investment flow into some of these businesses makes sense.

rayiner5• 9 years ago

Note the new rules only permit one entity to own two of the top four stations in a market, addressing the only real consolidation concern (that the natural scarcity of radio channels would allow natural radio monopolies to form).

But as far as I can tell, there is nothing about newspapers that makes them a natural monopoly. Why should anyone regulate combinations in that area?

wfo2• 9 years ago

But as far as I can tell, there is nothing about newspapers that makes them a natural monopoly. Why should anyone regulate combinations in that area?

Very, very few regulations are designed with the sole purpose of dealing with natural monopoly. Most are there to prevent some monstrous or dystopian consequence of unfettered capitalism that we as a society have decided is undesirable.

Having a tiny group of wealthy oligarchs own all media, press, acceptable thought in an area is one of those horrifying dystopian consequences that we apply these regulations to prevent.

Be careful any time you see an analysis of media consolidation that ignores the reality on the ground -- the media's unique ability to define and shape public opinion. Such an analysis is either so purely academic as to be not relevant to any actual political or social discussion, hopelessly naive or, worse, willfully ignorant in service of a particular ideology.

forapurpose2• 9 years ago

there is nothing about newspapers that makes them a natural monopoly

While I can't provide theory, in practice they certainly are. Every city has one or two papers of any significance; it's hard to name a new major newspaper that started in the last 50 years. In many places, the leading papers have combined for economic survival, but kept their editorial pages separate, for diversity of voices.

Maybe it's due to high barriers to entry? You need a printing press, distribution, and a reputation for reliability - the last probably being a newspaper's most valuable, irreplaceable asset.

The Internet provides more competition and lower barriers to entry, but I'll bet the leading Internet news source almost every town is the local newspaper(s).

Clubber• 9 years ago

But as far as I can tell, there is nothing about newspapers that makes them a natural monopoly. Why should anyone regulate combinations in that area?

Not yet, but as local newspapers continue to lose readership to the internet, the will start consolidating and/or failing. After say 20 years of this, there will be only the big online national papers, NYT, WaPo and some others that serve a large niche. There will always be room for the smaller niche papers though.

grapeshot• 9 years ago

The other two can be owned by the Educational Media Foundation, and all the programming can be sent in by satellite now that broadcasters no longer have to have a local presence.

nicolashahn• 9 years ago

war is peace

freedom is slavery

ignorance is strength

ksk• 9 years ago

It seems like one of the provisions was blocking local stations from jointly negotiating on advertising. I don't know if makes sense to limit broadcast media this way. Google is allowed to buy properties in different markets (search/youtube/mobile/news) to consolidate their position. I suppose now the non-internet media can compete with Google on advertising by consolidating.

Anyway, this is just my take after a cursory glance. Happy to listen to other viewpoints.

1_2__4• 9 years ago

Remember that you can pretty much bank on:

. When a Republican politician accuses someone else of something, they're doing it themselves.

. When a Republican politician makes a claim on controversial legislation, the opposite of that claim is the truth.

You can claim this is partisan grumbling, or you can pay attention and realize this is far more true than anyone would want to believe.

oarsinsync• 9 years ago

Remember that you can pretty much bank on: . When a politician accuses someone else of something, they're doing it themselves. . When a politician makes a claim on controversial legislation, the opposite of that claim is the truth.

Fixed that for you.

colordrops• 9 years ago

Just Orwellian doublespeak.

corndoge• 9 years ago

Never forget Clear Channel

jack93• 9 years ago

Now called I Heart Radio, iirc

redler• 9 years ago

The use of words and phrases like "utter nonsense", or "absurd", or "it's offensive to even suggest..." is rampant in Trump administration officials' hyper-defensive interactions with the public -- especially if there's even the slightest adversarial questioning of policy elements on merit. It's like some sort of winking signal that rational discourse is no longer to be tolerated. I don't know if this is somehow coordinated, these administrators all have chips on their shoulders, or they're simply following the model.

EGreg2• 9 years ago

Trump handpicked these people to dismantle the Federal government's executive branch, and his base things it's gotten too strong. To them, regulations are overall an example of the problem.

Tax reform - less taxes

EPA - hired a guy who fought the EPA, authorized keystone pipeline immediately.

Betsy Devoss - privatizing stuff and slashing budgets

HUD - Ben Carson, neurosurgeon

Department of Energy - Rick Perry who didn't know what it does and wanted to close it, who isn't a scientist

And of course Ajit Pai, probably the best example of rollback of progress.

Jeff Sessions disappointed Trump when he recused himself.

You gotta understand... Trump's a fiscal conservative's dream. Short of Ron Paul no conservative would have the guts to sabotage the executive branch with crazy directors as much as Trump.

forapurpose2• 9 years ago

I think it's an important point, but I think it extends far beyond and predates the Trump administration.

It happens all over the political spectrum to a degree, but the GOP and its supporters have really embraced it and have been using that kind of rhetoric for a long time (and it's worked very well for them in terms of framing and dominating debate): Consider talk radio, such as Limbaugh, which goes back to the 1980s or early 90s; Fox News hosts, such as O'Reilly and Hannity; and the Wall St Journal opinion pages. Look at the rhetoric used by Cheney and Rumsfeld in the Bush administration, or, for a specific example, the GOP congressman who yelled 'you lie' during an Obama State of the Union speech. Over-the-top, hyper-aggressive attacks on the other side is their common rhetorical tactic; they are demonstrations of aggression, for their supporters and for anyone who might disagree. (That's not meant to be partisan; I believe those are the facts and it would be false to say the politically correct thing, 'everyone does it equally':)

It's much broader than politics too. It's in reality TV, but by far the biggest example is Internet discussion boards. It's a continuing problem on HN, though my impression is that it's improved significantly here (thank goodness!). Certainly that predates Trump!

It's an obvious tactic in an argument: Act so aggressively and angrily that the other side is intimidated, and at worst no serious discussion is possible. It ends the discussion.

wyager• 9 years ago

Attempting to rhetorically preclude logical discussion is not even remotely new in politics.

762236• 9 years ago

Duterte just said something of the same formula to Trudeau when Trudeau brought up Duterte's human rights violations.

EGreg2• 9 years ago

It's just rhetoric, no one including the speaker actually believes it.

"What we are doing will lead to more...

Freedom

Access

Competition

Quality"

Regardless of the logical content of the argument.

It's done on the Left as well, but Pai is especially egregious in his lack of steps of reasoning.

bcoates• 9 years ago

Traditional local media (broadcast radio, newspaper, broadcast TV) are oversupplied and under severe economic/competitive pressure; there needs to be less of them which means consolidation and winding down marginal operations.

It's kind of unreasonable for regulators to be too harsh on consolidation in a shrinking market, what else are they going to do to survive?

heroprotagonist• 9 years ago

Broadcast for free online to increase their ad buys?

GiraffeGlove• 9 years ago

I'm not quite sure how the combination of a more consolidated industry and the removal of local studios results in stronger local voices.

It literally does the opposite

rayiner5• 9 years ago

Non-paywall article here: http://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-media-regulation/u-s-r....

In my view, the media ownership rules were indefensible. First, they were not driven by the sort of legitimate economic concerns that usually drive anti-consolidation efforts. They were not (at least, not primarily) justified, for example, on the basis of media companies being able to exercise market power to charge too much for advertising. Instead, they were justified by the government's desire to influence the content of media. A well meaning desire, perhaps, but still a fundamentally illegitimate exercise of government power.

Second, the broadcasting-license tail was wagging the merger dog. The FCC's purpose is to address the "tragedy of the commons" that might result if people could use public broadcast frequencies freely without concern for others. It's not an antitrust agency, and has no expertise in that area. It has overextended its authority over broadcasting licenses to exercise control over mergers in industries it has no jurisdiction over (in this case, newspapers).

jnordwick2• 9 years ago

This is a very underrated comment.

The second point, that the FCC is not the correct body, was something I had never thought of before. Why is the FCC trying to make anti-trust rules? The FDA doesn't make anti-trust rules for companies it oversees.

ikiris2• 9 years ago

Because Congress specifically delegated that authority to them for this domain. Go read a history book.

makomk• 9 years ago

Curiously enough, one of the other controversies in the news right now is the DOJ - which normally enforces anti-trust rules - supposedly telling AOL that they'd have to sell off either Turner Broadcasting or DirecTV if they wanted to merge with Time Warner due to competition concerns. Apparently this was an evil attack by Trump on the media, nothing whatsoever to do with the issues caused by one company owning both a major pay TV provider and a major provider of content.

Lev1a• 9 years ago

"greater consolidation" == "easier establishment of monopolies" (probably)

campuscodi• 9 years ago

Pai should be in jail. This is absurd. The guy is lying to everyone's face from a government function. When has ever a consolidation not lead to a monopoly and when has a monopoly not been abused?

cletus• 9 years ago

So:

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.

Now, let me first say that Trump and Ajit Pal have been, are and will be a disaster for media and broadband regulation. That out of the way, let me say this:

These rules were crafted in an era when we had:

- Local newspapers

- A limited number of more broadly distributed papers (state, national)

- 3 Broadcast TV networks (4 including PBS) where local stations were affiliates.

- The importance of radio for entertainment and news

- Limited market penetration of cable TV and far less channels and content choice than we have today

So compare that to today:

- We can have a virtually unlimited number of TV channels through cable and the Internet

- Radio has a vastly greater array of options through satellite radio (eg Sirius) and the Internet (eg podcasts)

- Newspapers are a dying breed, replaced with online news distribution.

- The barrier to entry to creating, promoting and getting an audience for, say, a local issue blog is comparatively cheap now. Previously it either wasn't possible or was orders of magnitude more difficult.

So it would be foolish to say the the media landscape hasn't changed drastically in 40 years.

Now the devil is in the details here. So if there can be less than 8 independent stations in a market, how many can there be? 6? 4? 3? 2? Because there's a difference.

Honestly there's far more scandalous and outright dangerous things to get outraged about with this administration.

lsiebert• 9 years ago

Barrier for entry is lower, but it's also harder to get paid for local news. Local coverage of political activities pretty much sucks except in major cities.

adjkant• 9 years ago

Just because the landscape has changed does not mean that the rule is irrelevant today. This change is politically motivated, not one of "this rule is outdated".

There's a very low barrier to entry for new tech companies these days, but they all get bought out by Facebook, Google, Amazon. The end result, despite this low barrier to entry, is a conglomeration of power. If a single company buys up many small media companies and forces content, there is incredible power in that and frankly one of the most dangerous things that this administration has actually accomplished. Sinclair is just one example.

dragonwriter4• 9 years ago

Radio has a vastly greater array of options through satellite radio (eg Sirius)

Satellite radio is one provider since the XM/Sirius merger. Broadcast radio is vastly more consolidated in ownership and in operation within each of the small number of ownership groups.

Radio may provide a greater illusion of choice with more stations in the dial, but there is less actual diversity in control.

hysthola• 9 years ago

The rationale that seems to be put forth now is that there's so much competition between mediums that it's ok to allow monopolies of each one of them.

I think this is absurd of course, but that's the argument that's always made implicitly or explicitly.

It's also scary as hell because ISPs have disproportionate control.

And once they're granted all sorts of freedoms to screw over consumers, it's going to be a lot more difficult to take it away from them.

All Pai has to do is set the ball rolling and it won't stop.

I don't really see a political landscape in the near future where you have anti-monopoly laws being enforced. All the current corporate monopoly whores will have to die of old age first.

elihu• 9 years ago

If all of your alternative media sources are available via the Internet, there is one decent internet service provider in your area, and network neutrality rules are suspended, then we're back to just a couple companies (or one) that control what media is available in an area.

freeloop3• 9 years ago

That's a little paranoid to think that a network service provider is going to outright block media sources they don't like.

liveoneggs• 9 years ago

cox communications must be salivating to finish dominance on the atlanta market

shmerl2• 9 years ago

FCC working for monopolists - that's already not news. How can this garbage be stopped though? It's like the sickest plutocracy in the works.

dragonwriter4• 9 years ago

There's a political party that has stated opposition to this kind for consolidation and resisted industry pressure to remove this regulation, and one which has stated it's support for this kind of deregulation and actively pursued it.

There's times when the relationship between public posturing, voting, and policy results in murky and opaque, but this isn't one of them.

shmerl2• 9 years ago

There's a political party that has stated opposition to this kind for consolidation

Someone like the Pirate Party? It never made it in US somehow.

And for the reference, previous FCC approved Charter + TWC merger, despite being better in general than the current horror.

js22• 9 years ago

The conclusion of this paper from 2001 supports revoking the rules, or at least that the rules aren’t necessary for their stated goal of providing diverse opinions:

"A Tale of Three Cities: “Diverse and Antagonistic” Information in Situations of Local Newspaper/ Broadcast Cross-Ownership"

http://www.repository.law.indiana.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?ar...

From the conclusion:

This Article examined whether three existing newspaper/broadcast combinations in major markets provided information about the 2000 presidential campaign from "diverse and antagonistic sources." The results show clearly that they did provide a wide range of diverse information. In other words, the Commission's historical assumption that media ownership inevitably shapes the news to suit its own interests may no longer be true (if it ever was).

The September 2001 Notice of Proposed Rulemaking demonstrated the Commission's interest in solid empirical evidence about newspaper/broadcast combinations. The evidence of the study reported in this Article suggests that the prohibition on newspaper/broadcast cross-ownership has outlived its usefulness.

eonst430eoan• 9 years ago

The conclusion of this paper from 2001 supports revoking the rules, or at least that the rules aren’t necessary for their stated goal of providing diverse opinions

Hmm... From reading your quote, it sounds to me like it's saying that the rules are working properly. What these changes are going to allow is a single company with a known one-sided agenda to buy up all media in several markets. How will that work out?

js22• 9 years ago

The study looked at three cities where the newspaper and radio station were owned by the same company (“cross-ownership”), due to having been grandfathered in when the FCC rule was created in 1975.

The FCC revoked multiple rules, but one of those prevented cross-ownership. The stated goal of all of the rules was to encourage a diversity of views. At least with respect to the cross-ownership rule, this study found it wasn’t necessary for a diversity of views to exist.

dmode• 9 years ago

This rule was repealed for one and one purpose only. Allow Sinclair Media, a pro-Trump media organization, to buy up local TV stations and blast propaganda news during your 9'o'clock news hour. Here's a great article covering the motivations of Sinclair. It is time to fight back and get rid of Ajit Pai

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/08/14/us/politics/how-a-conserv...

meri_dian2• 9 years ago

If a media outlet wants to buy stations and supply more conservative friendly news, how is that any different from Jeff Bezos buying the Washington Post and supplying liberal friendly news?

For those who would want to counter that buying many local stations outweighs buying a single outlet in the Washington Post, I would bet WaPo reaches as many or more people as all local stations put together in the US through their massive social media and generally online presence. Not only that, while local stations only air news at a set time each day, WaPo articles are persistent and ubiquitous.

The scale of outreach and influence for a site like WaPo is really tremendous when you think about it.

eropple• 9 years ago

One: you have a long row to hoe before asserting that the Washington Post supplies "liberal-friendly news." They may (I would say do) have a moderately liberal-friendly editorial board. Much as the WSJ may (and again, I would say does) have an extremely conservative-friendly editorial board. To conflate the editorial board and reporting is, frankly, either disingenuous or bordering on it.

Two: you have an even longer row to hoe to tie together buying one paper and buying as many TV stations as one can to blanket an area. We all know about what Sinclair's up to--given the levels of handwringing put out by the folks on Pai's side of the aisle about the (non-existent, but whatever) suppression of right-wing speech, maybe the notion of choking off differing voices under the Sinclair umbrella rings just a little bit hollow?

bo1024• 9 years ago

It is incredibly different.

* One person/company buying one newspaper, vs

* One company buying every news channel that serves a given area.

The first is just an entrant in the market. The second is anti-competitive and propagandizing.

nrb• 9 years ago

The difference is that broadcast spectrum is limited in a geographic area and licensed for the benefit of the local community, not as a propaganda mouthpiece of a single politically-motivated organization who doesn’t even have a presence in that community.

dguaraglia• 9 years ago

Weird that you would focus on Bezos and not Rupert Murdoch, who is already what you fear Jeff Bezos could become. In fact, it'd take decades for Bezos to acquire the amount of media influence Rupert Murdoch has on several continents.

thomastjeffery• 9 years ago

liberal friendly news

Could you define "liberal" in this context?

I honestly am unsure what its meaning is here.

SN76477• 9 years ago

this is in line with the current republican structure. they want to dismantle any regulations, minimize government and let the pieces fall where they may.

The problem is that this isnt the 1850s anymore.

ikiris2• 9 years ago

Make America Gilded Again

truxus• 9 years ago

Don't you think it's about time we removed all the unnessecary independent voices from media so we can stop confusing people? The Russians and Chinese are doing it; we need to catch up - we've got to have unity in our messages. /Sarcasm

sodosopa• 9 years ago

Those fuckers are gonna kill the web, aren't they?

beedogs3• 9 years ago

Another horrible idea from the worst Administration any of us will ever live through.

Friedduck• 9 years ago

It’s a perfect storm. Kill net neutrality and then restrictions preventing local media monopolies.

People have been manipulated by their chosen media like no other time in history, and I can’t see where we go from here.

Enterprises will have the singular ability to control what vast swaths of the populace hears and believes. At best it’s a continuance of recent trends, and at worst the failure of the republic.

The FCC has repealed a 42-year-old rule blocking broadcast media mergers

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