Good article touching on some forgotten history about the lineage of the whole ‘decency’ thing on the radio (and television), and the importance George Carlin held not only in the annals of comedy, but in our civic history as a society and what the value and role of speech is in our society. The article also features some comments by Tony Riddle, the former executive director of the Alliance for Community Media, a colleague and friend of mine, now serving as the general manager of WBAI radio in NYC.

As the encomiums for George Carlin have rolled in from stand-up legends, celebrities and scholars, his death at 71 has also been noted at a diminutive, iconic and iconoclastic radio station in Manhattan, WBAI-FM.

Its broadcast of the comedian’s “Seven Words You Can Never Say on Television” became a landmark moment in the history of free speech. In a 1978 milestone in the station’s contentious and unruly history, WBAI lost a 5-to-4 Supreme Court decision that to this day has defined the power of the government over broadcast material it calls indecent.

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Now, broadcasting the seven words „would cost us $360,000 per incident “so those seven words would cost us $2.5 million,” Mr. Riddle said, about equal to the station‚s annual budget. “Now we’d be severely limited in taking a chance on protecting people’s free-speech rights.”

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The station that for generations has spoken truth to power is incongruously situated on the 10th floor of 120 Wall Street, and smack in the middle of the FM dial, at 99.5. Now in its 48th year, WBAI was both an expression, and ringleader, of the counterculture during its peak in the mid-1960s through the Vietnam War.

Observers have said that in its heyday, its on-air personalities, like Mr. Josephson, Steve Post and Bob Fass, extended the popularity of FM radio and explored the possibilities of the medium.

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Mr. Riddle, who joined the station in February, said that “it’s always difficult to run a democracy,” adding that “a lot of people believe in the kind of radio we provide,” since the station does not accept advertising, underwriting or grants.

Read the Full Article

The switch to digital TV is essentially a $70 billion gift from taxpayers to broadcasters. So, what will we get in return?

On Feb. 17, 2009, a massive but so far little-noted corporate theft of the public airwaves will be consummated as U.S. analog TV stations switch to digital TV (DTV) broadcasting. Digital broadcast technology enables three, four and sometimes more separate channels to be compressed into the space formerly occupied by a single old-fashioned analog TV channel. So when the transition from analog to digital TV occurs nationwide, each of the nation’s more than 1,700 broadcast TV license holders will suddenly have two, three or more additional channels, a gift from the taxpayers worth an estimated $70 billion.

Back in the mid-1990s, the owners of TV stations promised Congress that the advent of DTV would bring with it a wide selection of new programming, educational and children’s shows, frequently updated local newscasts and interactive content, all free, over the new digital broadcast airwaves. Of course, they lied.

Read The Full Report

Amy Goodman is one of the leading journalists of our time. She is executive producer and host of Democracy Now!, a daily, independent radio and television news program broadcast on 650 stations around the world. “I’ve always been surprised that people say it’s a hopeful program because we deal with such difficult subjects,” she says. “But I think it’s hopeful because of the people we interview. They are both the analysts and those that are doing something about it, wherever they might be.”

Read The Interview published in The Progressive

An insightful article from The Guardian…

But there are more important questions buried in Unesco’s briefing paper, Freedom of Expression, Access and Empowerment, which says that the role of open and pluralistic media in holding a mirror to society “has fallen increasingly to the smaller community media sector as financial imperatives drive corporate media away from these core principles and into profit centres that do not cater to smaller or marginalised populations.”

Since this was written for an international audience it is not a whole accurate description of the situation in Britain, but there are enough points of similarity to cause concern. The more important question is whether or not the market is killing journalism? It is a particularly important question outside the metropolis.

Why is ITV so keen to shed its regional obligations? Why have newspapers shed so many journalists, in the centre and in regional and local newspapers, often stripping out the journalistic investment that made them saleable? Why have our UK newspapers become essentially newspapers of the south-east? Why were the owners of the Financial Times under such pressure to sell the paper? Why have we had to invent community radio while allowing the existing independent local radio network to become less local and less independent in a process of consolidation that has precious little editorial purpose?

Read The Full Article Here

The effects are starting to take full hold in regards to the destructive elements of these video franchising bills being fraudulently promoted around the country, Indiana and Florida in these instances.

These writers are a bit late to the party as to noticing what is really going on, but at least they are finally noticing. What is happening in these states is just part and parcel of what is transpiring in ever-increasing amounts of communities nationwide.

The End of Cable Access TV in Northwest Indiana?

Apparently, the Indiana Assembly, in their infinite wisdom, passed a telecom reform bill, HB 1279 that took control of cable franchises away from local authorities in Indiana and gave it to the state for centralized control, allowing the cable companies to screw localities on their contracts. In exchange for some pathetic promises of jobs and infrastructure, the state let them basically write the new regulations.

The new law basically gave carte blanche to the cable companies to do whatever they wanted. Some of the provisions of the law include (taken from www.indyaccess.org):

* Eliminate basic cable rate regulation (yay, they can raise rates! woohoo!)

* Reduce franchise fees paid to local government (20-30% for Indianapolis) and eliminate audits (they have to pay less to operate in each town)

* Threaten the financial viability and growth of public, education and government (PEG) access TV channels (basically get rid of public access)

* Eliminate basic telephone rate regulation and enable local measured phone service (yay, they can raise these rates too! woohoo!)

* Curtail the development of municipal broadband projects, including those with corporate partnerships (say good-bye to free local Wifi provided by the city, bye Valpo Wireless)

So, what has this meant on the ground? Well, cable access television in Northwest Indiana and statewide is pretty much gone. The law does not force or even compel the cable operators to continue providing the public service of providing cable access.

According to the Fort Wayne Journal Gazette, last fall Comcast sent notice to many municipalities such as Valparaiso and informed them they did not have to provide facilities anymore for public access TV. They demanded all the towns in NWI get together and jointly create and manage new facilities. Of course, this did not happen.

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It’s very clear that HB 1279 is a terrible law for the consumers of this state and Northwest Indiana most of all. It has given more monopolistic controls to the big media conglomerates and silenced local voices. Nice to know Mitch continues to be on our side!

I’m sure if the cable companies had their way, they’d get rid of C-SPAN too.

And more of the same in Florida…

Strategizing To Save Public TV Channels

The Washington, D.C., based Media and Democracy Coalition is collaboration of more than two dozen public interest organizations whose aim is to amplify the public’s voice in media and telecommunications issues. The coalition funded the grant for Hart’s organizer position, and executive director Beth McConnell says that the loss of PEG stations is a threat occurring around the country.

“We are very concerned about a trend that’s happening in many states, including here in FL, where local PEG channels are going dark due to cable franchising rules,” McConnell said. “And we think that the loss of PEG channels is a real threat to democracy arts and culture, and to having a more vibrant, inclusive media. So we’re supporting the efforts of TBCN, FL PIRG and FMC to save PEG in FL.”

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Beth McConnell: “Right, some people who have never seen a PEG station don’t realize the vibrant and innovative programming that’s happening on these stations. It’s true there is some programming not of interest to everyone, but that’s the beauty of a public station, is that everyone has a chance to create something and put it on the air. And it might not be of interest to five million people, but for the 50 or the 5 that it is valuable to, they have that space and place when they don’t have it in main stream media”.

Read The Complete Report Here

Bruce Kushnick of Teletruth News is one of the most lucid and knowledgeable analysts today regarding telecommunications issues. Here he dissects the fraudulent nature of Verizon’s advertising claims, and reveals how this corporation has been receiving billions in public money for services never rendered.

Economic growth, advanced telecommunications networks, education and entertainment would flourish. Sound familiar?

Think of it as — A Company is paid billions from state residents in the form of higher rates/taxes to upgrade the roads to a new super highway. Instead, the Company supplies inferior dirt roads but continues to collect the fees. Then it says, “We’ll start rolling out new stuff — but we own it and we decide which cars can be on it. Keep paying and shut up or we’ll just stop building anything. In the meantime, we’ll charge you more for the current roads.”

The dirt roads in this case were ADSL, Asymmetric Digital Subscriber Line, which was rolled out around 1998 as an afterthought. It allows the customer to use their phone line for faster Internet service. It was considered an inferior technology in 1992, as it is carried over the old copper wiring, not upgraded fiber optic cables. It can’t handle delivering high quality video services and so instead of a Ferrari on the Information Superhighway, New York and the rest of the country got a skate-board on dirt roads.

Verizon’s FiOS, if built, is now defined as an ‘interstate information service’ by the FCC, not a ‘telecommunications service’. By this decision, Verizon does not have to open their new networks to competition of any sort and is essentially being funded through the upgrading construction budgets for local phone service. Verizon used to be a telecommunications utility which was funded through local rates. It had obligations to the public and based on the Telecom Act of 1996, the incumbent was supposed to be open to competition and have ubiquitous deployments What we have now is a ‘free market’ company who can now build the new networks with our funding and then keep it with no obligations and negotiate whether areas get built at all.

Read the rest of this highly informative and insightful post Here, which includes a complete timeline of the history of Verizon’s scamming of the public trough.

I would like to pass along my own public declaration of gratitude and appreciation for Denis’ work with Democracy Now! all of these years, My personal association with Denis goes back a number of years through a whole host of cooperative efforts (including bringing Democracy Now! to the Dayton region) and affiliated organizations, and I wish him the very best of happiness and success in continuing his work for building a more democratic media system with his new endeavors at Free Speech TV.

Democracy Now! Bids Farewell to Denis Moynihan, Now CEO of Free Speech TV

- Andy Valeri, USTV Media

For those trying to figure out what the deal is in regards to state video franchising and why these bills are of such concern, this posting is one you may want to read. It is one of the better and more concise descriptions of the cause and purpose of these destructive bills sweeping the nation, state by state. This is in reference to the Louisiana situation, but much of the information is applicable to the laws being established everywhere, including Ohio.

It was no accident that Cox Communications announced its latest rate increase just as the Legislature was heading into its Regular Session. That enabled the various astroturf movements to begin flooding newspaper editorial pages with letters to the editor, condemning the cable companies and singing the praises of competition. Think of this as a choreographed fight for the benefit of the viewing audience, rather than a brawl. The cable companies and AT&T are partners in this dance. Cox stepped on a lot of consumer toes in order to make them receptive to the competition paeans that the phone company allies would produce.

That ability to selectively deploy new network technology is the heart of the issue. How do I know this? Because John and I sat in on the 2006 negotiations on that year’s version of these bills when the phone company (still called BellSouth at the time) flatly refused to deal on offers that did not free them from community-wide build-out obligations.

Read the Complete Post Here

Lafayetteprofiber.com has a good follow up posting, doing a clear and concise job in deconstructing the ramifications of this whole issue and the effects on both your cable service and the public communications infrastructure.

This clever dance that these two corporate giants are staging for us is an elaborate flim-flam. The fact is that this legislation will not bring new competition to Louisiana. How do we know this? Because similar legislation has not brought competition to Texas, North Carolina or Ohio.

But, the Louisiana version of this legislation will do long term damage to at least the 55 communities with franchise agreements by allowing companies like Cox and AT&T to discriminate against low- and middle-income neighborhoods in the delivery of modern network services. For that reason it is particularly disheartening to see the head of the Louisiana chapter of the NAACP fall for the competition scam at the heart of this legislation.

The Louisiana Legislature is being bamboozled by AT&T and the big cable companies which are acting in concert to get legal permission to leave significant portions of this state on the far side of the digital divide. “Competition” is a sirens’ call that is only being used to convince our tech-illiterate legislators to sell out the hopes and aspirations of Louisiana citizens and communities to become full participants in the network-dependent global economy.

This legislation serves no other interests but those of the phone and cable companies. It is terrible policy for Louisiana citizens, consumers and communities. Rate relief will not come, but a widened gap between the tech haves and have-nots will.

Count on it.

Read The Complete Post Here

I don’t really follow the actions of folks who are often derided as ‘actorvists’, but this speech by Tim Robbins is not only laced with spot on acidic humor, but climaxes with some really serious and salient analysis of the current state of our media, the responsibility it holds in our society and the ethical call to action that we all must insist on in transforming our society to truly confront the real problems we face today. This is the kind of speech that a few short years ago would have never been provided for at an event like this. I guess reality is starting to sink in to a number of people. A highly recommended listen (and/or read).

The following is my opening keynote speech for the National Association of Broadcasters Show in Las Vegas, which I delivered Monday night.

Hello, I’m Tim Robbins. I’d like to thank you for the invitation to address you here at the National Association of Broadcasters. When I first received the invitation I was a little confused because the last time I had contact with the national media I seem to remember them telling me to shut the hell up.

I would like to start with an apology. To Rush and Sean, and Billo and Savage and Laura what’s-her-name. A few years ago they told America that because I had different opinions on the wisdom of going to war that I was a traitor, a Saddam lover, a terrorist supporter, undermining the troops. I was appealing at the time for the inspectors to have more time to find those weapons of mass destruction. I was a naïve dupe of left wing appeasement. And how right they were. If I had known then what I know now, if I had seen the festive and appreciative faces on the streets of Baghdad today, if I had known then what a robust economy we would be in, the unity of our people, the wildfire of democracy that has spread across the Mideast, I would never have said those traitorous, unfounded and irresponsible things. I stand chastened in the face of the wisdom of the talk radio geniuses, and I apologize for standing in the way of freedom.

So when they asked me to come speak to you I said, “Are you sure? Me?” And they said, “Yes.” And I said, “You know, I have a tendency to say things that I believe at the time to be well-intentioned but that are actually traitorous.” And they said, “Sure, cool.” And then I read the press release and it said, “Mr. Robbins will be speaking about the challenges of new media and delivery systems.” Oh, OK. But I just want you to know I’m not sure I know what that f**king means. But it is an honor to be speaking to you here at this years National Association Broadcasting convention even if I don’t know what the hell I’m talking about.

Something that Edward R. Murrow would probably give an approving nod to.

Read/Listen to the complete speech at The Huffington Post

It is also posted with additional comments at AlterNet

Does Big Media’s One-Two Punch Knock Out the Internet?
Jonathan Rintels
SavetheInternet.com

Last week saw Big Media deliver a powerful one-two combination of punches that may knock out today’s wide open Internet. First, in a speech delivered by Motion Picture Association of America President Dan Glickman, the nation’s media conglomerates vowed to fight increasingly vocal calls from policymakers and the public for “network neutrality”, a requirement that broadband Internet consumers be permitted to access the lawful content of their choice.

That’s hardly a revolutionary concept, unless you’re a broadband gatekeeper like Comcast that makes its customers‚ choices for them by discriminating against some websites and favoring others.

To justify allying with Comcast, ATT, and their ilk in a mega-million dollar lobbying campaign to beat back government action that might prevent such anti-competitive, anti-consumer discrimination, the media congloms cited the need to combat piracy of their valuable content over broadband networks.

But as much as we also support fighting piracy, the MPAA’s invoking that fight here is a diversionary smoke screen for what’s really going on. The existing FCC policy principles that call for network neutrality, as well as every proposal to turn those principles into enforceable rules, speak to ensuring that broadband providers allow consumers “to access the lawful Internet content of their choice.”

By definition, pirated content is not “lawful content.” Big Media’s claim that Net Neutrality rules will prevent it from combating piracy goes way too far, as evidenced by Comcast’s recent blocking and slowing of its customers‚ access to content distributed by BitTorrent. In kneecapping BitTorrent, Comcast didn’t just block pirated content, but all BitTorrent content, including legitimate un-pirated content such as a file containing the text of the King James Bible, and video that BitTorrent was distributing on behalf of its clients Fox, Time Warner, and Viacom - all card-carrying members of the MPAA!…

Read The Rest of Report