By Christine Tomlinson
Winter 2003

If you listen closely to the public airwaves you might hear the FCC soliciting public comment on deregulation. Actually, it depends on which airwaves you’re tuned into. The story doesn’t necessarily make for prime copy. With a total of one public meeting and a couple of congressional hearings, the FCC is building up to a policy shift, one that may change the very nature of media as we know it. The last time the FCC made waves, in 1996, it deregulated radio-ownership restrictions. The biggest obstacle the agency faces now involves the repercussions of that move.

The 1996 Telecom Act allowed the expansion of the behemoth Clear Channel, which went from owning 40 radio stations to owning more than 1,220 stations across the country. The company’s hold on the industry includes a 20 percent share of the ad revenue and a quarter share of the American listening audience, with about 10 percent of the stations nationwide. Even the deregulation-minded FCC chairman, Michael Powell, conceded in congressional hearings earlier this year that Clear Channel’s chokehold on the radio industry was something he’d rather avoid in further deregulation.

Musicians claimed that Clear Channel locks out artists who don’t sign on to its concert promotion division, a claim that Clear Channel Chairman L. Lowry Mays denies. Broadcasters say the company uses its size to squeeze out local competitors. According to an FCC study, ad rates have increased by 68 percent over the rate of inflation since 1996. Sen. Ernest "Fritz" Hollings (D-SC) says the number is even higher. Some listeners contend that Clear Channel’s cost-cutting style is taking the heart out of their kind of radio.

Clear Channel uses voice tracking, which means it fills– local shows with national talent, national call-in traffic and centralized formatting, blurring, if not erasing, the local edge. Clear Channel claims that while it uses voice tracking only for the less popular weekend and graveyard shifts, the practice brings greater diversity of programming to smaller local markets. DJs suggest that the graveyard shifts often allow local talent to hone their skills. Each of these arguments assumes that the values of localism and diversity still are the cornerstone of radio. The difference is, for corporate media, localism, competition and diversity are defined in terms of the bottom line. For listeners, the ideals of localism, competition and diversity mean something very different.

The FCC built the process of regulating the airwaves on the values of localism, diversity and competition. The 1934 communications act cited the need to distribute licenses to as many communities as possible. If the FCC now continues to deregulate the broadcast industry, lifting the barriers to further consolidation of television, newspapers and radio, what is to become of these founding values? And what will it mean to the quality of news and information?

FIRST RADIO, NOW THE NEWS

The nature of competition in the news-media marketplace today is increasingly big business. In Minnesota, most of the largest newspapers and local television stations are publicly owned by national corporations whose business it is to provide a competitive product that makes its shareholders money. Corporate parents squeeze profit margins that far exceed anything news organizations were expected to maintain in the even recent past. It’s not unusual to expect profit margins of between 20 and 70 percent from news programs. Profit margins are threatening publicly owned newspapers as well. In January, the Duluth News Tribune, a profitable newspaper, was forced by Knight Ridder, its owner, to cut eight workers to make up for missing its revenue goal.

In a culture dictated by profits, news organizations rely on cost-cutting measures that may very likely mean the consolidation of content across newspapers, radio and television, especially with further loosening of ownership restrictions. Currently, a single media company is not allowed to own both a newspaper and a TV station in the same market. Some currently do, but through grandfather clauses and waivers. That restriction is in jeopardy.

In order to meet the lofty profit goals of a publicly held company, consolidation of resources seems almost inevitable. Advocates of consolidation argue that the shared content may, in fact, improve the quality of the news we citizens consume. And it’s hard to disagree that the quality could use some improvement. The Project for Excellence in Journalism published a study in the Columbia Journalism Review examining content in news coverage. Despite declining crime statistics, coverage of crime increased in 2001, and coverage of nearly everything else, including the economy, decreased. Dramatic crime coverage fits nicely into the revenue-grabbing thirst for ratings that permeates local television news.

The argument that consolidation will mean less reporting and more hype is almost moot, as the news we are already seeing on television reflects a steady decline in enterprising news stories, investigative journalism and local-interest stories. That kind of coverage costs big money. If consolidation belies diversity, the competitive system that already exists in news hasn’t produced much that is better. Most major news organizations are already a profit-driven enterprise, one that squeezes out much possibility for diversity or experimentation.

WHOSE VOICES ARE WE HEARING?

The immediate dangers of consolidation are more subtle. The radio industry is already experiencing the watering down of diversity. Clear Channel argues that it’s bringing a wider variety of music to small markets. But the reality of that variety is that it’s the same no matter what small market you visit. Call-in radio shows feature callers from generic locales. Drive across country, and you may hear the same voice from coast to coast.

In broadcasting, consolidation of ownership affects the origin of viewpoints, which is the real cornerstone of diversity. Many minority-owned media companies are selling to mainstream corporations. Harper-Collins bought Amistad Press. Essence Communications is now in a joint venture with Time Inc. And Time Warner owns Africana.com. BET is now owned by Viacom/CBS, and Telemundo is owned by GE/NBC. As most of these are recent developments, it’s hard to judge the direction of their content. But at their core, these organizations are no longer controlled by minority voices.

Instead, they, and most major news media, are controlled by corporate voices. Big media now have the strength and bravado to raise these voices in support of media-friendly public policy. Media companies lobby the FCC. They lobby Congress on issues from the death tax to intellectual property to rules for political advertising. Media corporations spent more than $30 million in 2000 on lobbying efforts, according to The Center For Public Integrity’s report, Off the Record. The report also stated that media corporations gave $18.9 million in the 1997-1998 election cycle, a 61 percent increase over the 1993-94 cycle.

That is not to say, again, that the content of the news is directly affected. But, we, as members of the public who are watching the news, are today more often considered consumers rather than citizens. Today, the FCC is looking to the public for proof that increasing media consolidation will adversely affect the public interest. In 1934, it was the other way around. The FCC set up its rules to protect the public interest. It regulated public airwaves in terms of the interests of localism, diversity and competition. Today corporate interests are quickly and fundamentally defining the interests of localism, diversity and competition in terms that not surprisingly mirror the financial interests of the media ownership, and not of the citizenry.