Everybody and their mother who watches Federal Communications Commission politics wrote up pretty much everything proposed FCC Chair Julius Genachowski said at his Senate Commerce Committee nomination hearing on Tuesday. But a lot less got written about the comments of the other nominee: Republican Robert M. McDowell, he up for a reappointment. And even less […]
Here’s an interesting skirmish that has already gotten lost in all the growling over the Performance Rights Act. This month the Federal Communications Commission received a Petition for Declaratory Relief (PDR) from the MusicFIRST Coalition. The charges that it levels are pretty serious. MusicFIRST says that broadcast radio stations are pressuring artists to oppose or […]
Representative Mike Doyle was on a roll today at a Capitol Hill hearing on getting more Lower Power FM radio stations rolled out across the country. He had the Federal Communications Commission and National Association of Broadcasters before him, and wanted to know why, if LPFM third adjacent interference is such a concern for commercial […]
On Tuesday, the Federal Communications Commission, by a bare majority, voted to lift its over three decade old prohibition against an entity owning a newspaper and a television station in the same market. Most FCC watchers will now shift their visors to Congress and the circuit courts, where media reform activists will doubtless turn in […]
Merger proposals are dangerous moments for the masters of our telecommunications sector. When two or three media moguls go hat in hand to the Federal Communications Commission, asking for permission to unite, they unleash a public comment cycle on the question. That always releases the dreamers and reformers, who come up with alternative scenarios for […]
Four radio giants have agreed to pay the United States government a total $12.5 million dollars to settle an Federal Communications Commission investigation into their “payola” practices—the undisclosed play of music in exchange for cash, gifts, or favors. The FCC says that CBS radio, Entercom Communications, Clear Channel Communications, and Citadel Broadcasting will agree to: […]
