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Fcc relax ownership Original Source Link: (May no longer be active)
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/ap/20030107/ap_on_hi_te/media_ownership_3http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/ap/20030107/ap_on_hi_te/media_ownership_3
Technology - AP
FCC Decisions May Change Media Landscape
Tue Jan 7, 8:46 AM ET Add Technology - AP to My Yahoo!
By DAVID HO, Associated Press Writer
WASHINGTON - Rules on delivering news and entertainment to the public are on the verge of a broad overhaul that could pave the way for more media mergers and alter the landscape of television and radio programming.
The Federal Communications Commission (news - web sites) is studying whether decades-old ownership restrictions are appropriate in a market changed by the Internet, satellite broadcasts and cable television. The review is expected to be completed within a few months.
It's widely believed FCC (news - web sites) Chairman Michael Powell and the two other Republicans on the five-member commission are intent on loosening regulations. Powell has expressed concern that many of the agency's rules are antiquated.
Jonathan Adelstein, one of two Democrats on the commission, used his first public speech since joining the agency last month to warn that more mergers could mean less diversity in programming.
"Any changes that the FCC makes to its media ownership rules could massively and irreversibly change the media landscape," Adelstein said Monday at Georgetown University.
"The FCC must proceed very cautiously, because if we permit further media consolidation and it turns out to be a mistake, we will find it difficult, if not impossible, to put the toothpaste back in the tube."
Blair Levin, a former FCC official and now an analyst with the Legg Mason investment firm, said the FCC's two Democrats can bring attention to the issue, but are unlikely to alter the outcome sought by Powell.
A 1996 telecommunications law required the FCC to periodically review ownership rules in light of greater competition and other changes in the industry.
Separately, the FCC is considering relaxing rules involving the leasing of telephone networks, changes that could benefit regional Bell companies who have been required to provide parts of their local networks to competitors at discount rates.
The agency is also considering exempting high-speed Internet service over phone lines from certain restrictions to promote investment in that broadband technology.
To get public opinion on the six media ownership rules under review, the FCC plans to hold a hearing in Richmond, Va., next month. The agency already has received nearly 1,700 comments, with many of the major supporters and critics weighing in last week.
NBC; News Corp.'s Fox Entertainment Group; Viacom Inc., which owns CBS, MTV and UPN and the Paramount movie studio, joined in asking the FCC to abolish all of its media-ownership rules. The companies said FCC regulation "unfairly and unnecessarily constrains very able and effective competitors."
Walt Disney Co., owner of the fourth major television network, ABC, submitted a separate comment urging an overhaul of the rules.
An array of groups representing consumers, broadcasters, writers, entertainers and other media workers say the existing restrictions should remain to prevent a handful of giant companies from controlling what people watch, hear and read.
Opponents of the six media ownership rules under review already have successfully challenged two of them in the courts.
Viacom was one of several companies that questioned a rule prohibiting any company from controlling television stations that, together, can reach more than 35 percent of U.S. households. An appeals court ruled last year that the FCC's rule was too sweeping and sent the regulation back to the agency.
The courts also last year rejected restrictions on companies that want to own two television stations in the same market.
Other rules under review concern the number of television and radio stations a company can own in one market; a ban on mergers between the four major television networks — NBC, CBS, ABC and Fox; limits on radio station ownership; and a restriction prohibiting one company from owning a broadcast station and a newspaper in the same market.
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FCC: http://www.fcc.gov
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