FCC about to reduce media diversity
The Federal Communications Commission is in the midst of dismantling even more restrictions on US media oligopolies. The only question in dispute is by how much. In an article in May 19 edition of that Business Week, journalist Catherine Yang points out that in a June vote, the FCC will make it easier for media oligopolies to expand even more than they have.
A handful of rules, adopted between 1941 and 1975, prohibit newspaper, radio, and broadcast TV companies from consolidating. Newspapers, for instance, can't merge with local TV station, and TV networks can't own stations covering more than 35% of the national audience.
As Yang points out, there are now court orders to change the remnants of the older system. One proposal is to set a rating system so that no company can control more than a third of all news sources (TV, newspapers, radio) in a single city. The other is to set higher limits and thresholds for ownership than exist now. For example, the same company will be able to have a newspaper and TV stations in large cities, and that one company can own audiences with up to 50% of the national audience.
All this is hair-splitting. Basically, oligopolies are about to get another green light for further expansion. The familiar refrain is that here are now so many sources for news (broadcast TV, cable, radio, newspaper, the Internet), that the old rules about competition need not apply. But that this kind of thinking does not take into account two factors: first, that oligopolies converge, that after a while all news outlets become more an more like each other, run by executives who, often enough, have learned their jobs by working in other, similar companies. Second, that although there is lots of nominal variety, this opens the door to ever increasing consolidation into even fewer companies then are around now.
And the prospect of the few existing companies becoming even more powerful is a scary one, as Yang points out elsewhere:
If the FCC relaxes or axes the rules as early as next year, regulators could unleash a massive consolidation, resulting in "a tectonic shift in the landscape," says New York media consultant Peter A. Kreisky. The $40 billion AOL Time Warner, for example, conceivably could own its existing CNN and HBO cable channels and Time Warner cable systems even as it snaps up the NBC network and its local TV affiliates--and a few newspapers if it wanted. That's a nightmare scenario to a lot of consumers, already worried about the growing power of big media conglomerates to snuff out independent viewpoints and charge exorbitant prices for basic services.
