Have you ever heard about the Telecommunications Act of 1996? Probably not. There’s a reason for that: the act affects the media, and they don’t want you to know.
The T-Act was the most important piece of media legislation since the Federal Communications Commission was established in 1934, when radio was in its infancy. The T-Act, which was pushed by former President Clinton, lifted regulations on consolidation of media ownership. The bill eliminates some restrictions on corporations moving into additional areas-for example, newspaper conglomerates owning TV stations, or companies that produce cable shows taking over cable distribution companies. It also lifted restrictions on the number of radio stations one company can own. Now, a single firm can own up to eight stations in a single market.
According to the FCC, “the goal of this new law is to let anyone enter any communications business-to let any communications business compete in any market against any other.” But in reality, the act has only lead to an increased consolidation of power, and it was never intended to do anything else. Restrictions ensure that each competitor can only remain a certain limited size, and that enables some competition and new entry into the market. When restrictions on mergers are relaxed, the medium-sized fish gobble up the little ones, and the big ones gobble up everything. As firms get bigger, it becomes impossible for a non-billionaire to compete.
Current FCC regulations make it virtually impossible for the average person to, say, set-up a low power community radio station that has quality, locally oriented programming. And if you think public radio and television is providing an adequate alternative to corporate owned media, you’re wrong. While PBS and NPR are important, they are woefully underfunded by the government (especially in comparison to public media in many other countries) and are forced to rely on big corporate subsidies, as well as donations from privileged audience members in order to survive. That’s why you see advertisements before most shows on channel 2, and most of the programming on MPR is geared to the middle-aged, upper-middle class, white demographic.
One study estimates that Americans consume 11.8 hours of media a day, and half of those media sources are now under the control of a handful of huge firms, including the giants like AOL/Time Warner, Disney/ABC. NBC/General Electric and Viacom. This concentration of power has tremendous consequences for media, and for American society, in an age when children spend as much time watching TV as they do in school. Socially responsible programming is generally not profitable, that’s why it doesn’t exist on commercial radio and television. And consolidation hinders creativity. It’s really cheap, and profitable, for Disney to milk the Lion King for all it’s worth, and it’s expensive to come up with new, quality ideas. That’s how we got Rush Hour 2. That’s why there are 500 channels and still nothing decent to watch.
As newspapers are swallowed by big firms, quality journalism is compromised. Companies that own newspapers as well as other media, like Tribune Company, focus on “synergies,” hoping to use print stories for television and vice versa to save money. This further limits the amount of information and analysis available to the citizen who wants to be informed. It’s also a lot cheaper and easier to cover stories like car chases and celebrity appearances rather than hard-hitting news, especially news that might conflict with advertiser (or corporate owner) interests.
And when the name of the game is profit, advertisers call the shots, not editors and reporters. The stories of advertiser influence on news are too numerous to mention. (This conflict of interest is in addition to those that involve owners of media. NBC, for example, is owned by a defense contractor, and journalists have been prohibited from covering issues that would affect General Electric.) In some cases, like in a new Miramax/Hilfiger movie, program producers create the show with the advertiser in mind. Disney recently started a radio station for kids to satisfy advertiser demands for such a station. And all TV networks have increased their commercial time by 34 percent since 1989.
The FCC was established in 1934 to oversee broadcast media because the public owns the airwaves. That’s right, CBS and NBC and all the rest are using public property to make billions of dollars producing shitty, socially irresponsible programming. Theoretically, everyone should have equal access to, and control over, those publicly owned airwaves, not just huge transnational corporations. Historically, the FCC, which is currently run by Colin Powell’s son Michael, has been anti-regulation and subservient to corporations. When it tries not to be, media tycoons like Rupert Murdoch have put pressure on Congress and the FCC has been pulled back into line.
The Telecommunications Act left some room for movement. There are still bans on cross-ownership of two different types of media in a single market. (But, knowing how corporation-friendly the FCC is, tycoons like Rupert Murdoch have already violated the rule in anticipation of the ban being lifted.) This is where you come in. On Sept. 13, the FCC voted to review the cross-ownership bans, as well as a regulation on the percent of the national audience that a single cable company can reach. An FCC review requires a mandatory public comment period, since, after all, the body is supposed to exist for the protection of the public. Comments about the cross-ownership ban are due Dec. 3, and comments on the cable ownership cap are due Jan. 4.