FAIR is the national progressive media watchdog group, challenging corporate media bias, spin and misinformation.
FAIR values the opportunity to comment on the rules currently under consideration in the FCC’s 2002 Biennial Review. Unfortunately, the complicated and technical nature of the FCC’s public comment procedure does not encourage–and some would argue actually discourages–significant participation from the public, the citizens whose interests the FCC is supposed to safeguard. In addition, the […]
The review of media ownership rules underway at the Federal Communications Commission will have an enormous impact on the future of broadcasting and on media diversity. The FCC is considering repealing or altering a number of key rules that limit media consolidation. But you wouldn’t know any of this from watching network television news. Media […]
If the Bush administration lets large media conglomerates and local telephone companies have their way, the Internet as we know it—that free-flowing, democratic, uncensored information superhighway—could soon be a thing of the past. The Internet itself is not going away. Rather, technological advances, changes to the rules governing its use and the continued consolidation of […]
A dispute between Canada’s largest media company and its journalists has put media concentration on the political agenda as seldom before. In January, organizations representing journalists across Canada called for a parliamentary inquiry into media concentration, especially at CanWest Global Communications. The Canadian Association of Journalists (CAJ) and the Quebec Federation of Professional Journalists (QFPJ) […]
In response to reports that ABC is considering plans to replace “Nightline” with a David Letterman show, FAIR issued the following statement: “If Disney/ABC replaces Nightline with more entertainment programming, it will be strong evidence of the threat to journalism represented by TV networks that have been taken over by entertainment conglomerates,” said FAIR’s Peter […]
Last week, the District of Columbia Court of Appeals overturned one of the country’s last-remaining regulatory protections against media monopoly, and ordered the review of another. The court overturned the rule that had prevented one company from owning both television stations and cable franchises in a single market. The court also ordered that the FCC […]
The Federal Communications Commission is moving to eliminate one of the few remaining vestiges of public interest regulation on media concentration– the rules that limit the percentage of the national audience that a single cable company can reach. If existing rules limiting a single company to 30 percent of the national market are abandoned, the […]
Just two days after the September 11 attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, the FCC moved to eliminate some of the last remaining restraints on media concentration. With all eyes elsewhere, the FCC voted unanimously to “review” regulations that limit the percentage of the national audience that a single cable company can […]
Just two days after the September 11 attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, the FCC began to eliminate the last remaining shreds of regulation on media concentration. With all eyes elsewhere, the FCC voted unanimously to “review” laws that prohibit the same company from owning both a newspaper and a TV station […]
On June 28, 1995, FBI agents swarmed the headquarters of Archer Daniels Midland, “Supermarket to the World,” in Decatur, Illinois. So began the sensational unraveling of the biggest price-fixing scandal ever, involving a secret FBI informant, a suicide attempt, top ADM officials being sentenced to prison and the largest criminal anti-trust fine in history. Throughout […]
When a regulator’s appointment is hosannaed by the corporations he is supposed to be regulating, the public should be concerned. When the person charged with defending the public interest in telecommunications acknowledges that he has “no idea” (Columbia Journalism Review, 7-8/01) what the public interest is, telegraphs his willingness to eliminate virtually every remaining check […]
“I challenge anybody to show me an example of bias in Fox News Channel.”—Rupert Murdoch (Salon, 3/1/01) Years ago, Republican party chair Rich Bond explained that conservatives’ frequent denunciations of “liberal bias” in the media were part of “a strategy” (Washington Post, 8/20/92). Comparing journalists to referees in a sports match, Bond explained: “If you […]
Introduction Surveys of working journalists have found that they experience pressure from powerful interests, outside and inside the news business, to push some stories and ignore others, and to shape or slant news content. The sources of pressure include the government, which enlists media to support its actions and policies; corporate advertisers who may demand […]
The FCC (Federal Communications Commission) is moving to weaken or eliminate two of the few remaining broadcasting rules that protect some degree of media diversity. On April 19, the FCC voted 3-1 in favor of eliminating the “dual network” rule, which had prevented one television network from buying another. This rule change will immediately benefit […]
In September 1999, the Associated Press published a dramatic investigative story documenting a massacre of civilians by American soldiers during the Korean War. Eyewitness testimony was gathered from American veterans who said that they had fired—on the orders of their superiors—into a group of hundreds of Korean civilians fleeing the fighting at a place called […]
At the end of Sesame Street, the show traditionally announces that the episode has been brought to you by, say, “the letter Z and the number 2”–a daily reminder of the show’s commitment to non-commercial educational programming. But these days, the tradition has been co-opted for profit: Today after the show, you might hear an […]
At the end of Sesame Street, the show traditionally announces that that the episode has been brought to you by, say, “the letter Z and the number 2”–a daily reminder of the show’s commitment to non-commercial educational programming. But these days, the tradition has been co-opted for profit: Today after the show, you might hear […]
The January announcement of the proposed merger of AOL and Time Warner–the largest deal in history–crystallizes one trend, and may trigger another, more ominous one. It can be seen as yet another of the colossal media deals that has dotted the past decade, such that only a handful of conglomerates now own almost all the […]
The last few media mergers have attracted an enormous amount of press attention, and this was certainly true when America Online (AOL) announced its plans to buy media giant Time Warner on January 10. Nonetheless, certain issues were obscured in the initial press treatment of the deal, which has been called the largest business merger […]
Viacom‘s planned purchase of CBS—which, if approved, would be the “biggest media deal ever”—is getting a lot of coverage as a business story, but very little attention as a public interest issue. If the merger goes through, it will create the second largest media corporation in the world, worth about $80 billion. Viacom/CBS‘s holdings would […]
