Please, please, please, FCC

Coverage Type: 

PLEASE, PLEASE, PLEASE, FCC
[SOURCE: Seattle Times, AUTHOR: Lynne Varner]
[Commentary] The FCC wants to change the media ownership rules some more so big media can go on another binge. The commission has held public hearings around the country to gauge the public's reaction, but it feels like window dressing on an already done deal. Cementing my suspicion was the FCC's decision late last Friday to hold its sixth and final hearing on media ownership in Seattle this coming Friday. Whoa! What's the hurry? The FCC's Dec. 18 deadline has the effect of moving big-business interests from the fast track to a bullet train. From Oregon, Idaho and Alaska, people with a stake in this fight should be in Seattle on Friday afternoon. The five commissioners want our opinion. Here's mine: Media outlets owned by diverse communities are slowly but surely growing. So is the appetite for these niche markets. Supporting independent media helps outlets like The Seattle Times. Newsrooms have been broadening the kinds of people who help decide what makes news and who is considered news. An added benefit is that when a publication is owned by members of a community, employees are likely to come from within the community, too. The direction the FCC is taking us, one where the media are controlled by a few with goals less about journalism and more about creating wealth and consolidating control, is not where I want to go.
http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/opinion/2003997845_lynne07.html?sy...

* Democracy will be heard
[SOURCE: Seattle Times, AUTHOR: Editorial staff]
[Commentary] The undemocratic tactics of the Federal Communications Commission chairman to blunt public input at a Seattle media-ownership hearing will not work.
http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/editorialsopinion/2003995687_latee...


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