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SUPREME COURT URGED TO LIFT POLITICAL AD RESTRICTIONS
[SOURCE: CNSNews.com, AUTHOR: Randy Hall]
With an eye on the 2008 elections, a number of groups from across the political spectrum are asking the U.S. Supreme Court to overturn a ban on organizations airing issue advertisements on TV or radio 30 days before a primary and 60 days before a general election. "The work of the government does not cease in the days leading up to an election, and those who seek to comment on key political and cultural issues should not be silenced during that period," Jay Sekulow, chief counsel of the conservative American Center for Law and Justice (ACLJ), said in a news release. Moreover, he said, "citizens enjoy a fundamental right to petition for a redress of grievances. To prohibit the use of genuine issue advertisements by grassroots lobbying organizations is not only wrong, but it also violates that sound constitutional principle." "The Supreme Court has an important opportunity to end this censorship and should do so without hesitation," he added.
http://www.cnsnews.com/ViewPolitics.asp?Page=/Politics/archive/200703/PO...
http://www.cnsnews.com/ViewPolitics.asp?Page=/Politics/archive/200703/POL2007032…
NEXSTAR: RETRANS CONSENT KEY TO 2007 REVENUE
[SOURCE: Broadcasting&Cable, AUTHOR: Michael Malone]
On the heels of recent retransmission consent victories, Nexstar CEO Perry Sook vowed to be “right back at the trough†in the coming months. Speaking at the Bank of America Media, Telecommunications and Entertainment Conference, Sook pointed out Nexstar’s $13.7 million in retrans cash in 2006 and $49 million over the last five years, and predicted a bigger windfall: “That’s without the telephone companies delivering TV service,†he said. “They’re just starting to talk to us.â€
http://www.broadcastingcable.com/article/CA6428820?title=Article&spacede...
http://www.broadcastingcable.com/article/CA6428820?title=Article&spacedesc=news
SURPRISE: STUDY FINDS ONLINE USERS FINISH MORE STORIES THAN PRINT READERS
[SOURCE: Editor&Publisher, AUTHOR: Joe Strupp]
In a surprise finding, online readers finish news stories more often than those who read in print, according to the Poynter Institute’s Eyetrack study released Wednesday at the American Society of Newspaper Editors conference here. When readers chose to read an online story, they usually read an average of 77% of the story, compared to 62% in broadsheets and 57% in tabloids. The research also found that 75% of print readers are methodical in their reading, which means they start reading a page at a particular story and work their way through each story. Just 25% of print readers are scanners, who scan the entire page first, then choose a story to read. Online, however, about half of readers are methodical, while the other half scan, the report found. The survey also revealed that large headlines and fewer, large photos attracted more eyes than smaller images in print. But online, readers were drawn more to navigation bars and teasers.
http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/news/article_display.jsp?vnu_con...
http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/news/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=…
WEB FUELS 'DEMOCRATIZATION' OF KNOWLEDGE
[SOURCE: eSchool News]
Getting into college might be tougher today than it used to be -- but an increasing number of top schools are now offering courses free of charge online. What's more, some program administrators report giving away course content actually is having a positive impact on student recruitment. The moves--which differ from the distance-education courses that many schools offer for credit and charge for--come as colleges and universities say they want to democratize education, making the best resources available to more people. But the schools also hope such efforts lead to more interest from potential applicants and inspire alumni in far-flung locales to make a donation.
http://www.eschoolnews.com/news/showStoryts.cfm?ArticleID=6958
http://www.eschoolnews.com/news/showStoryts.cfm?ArticleID=6958
A RADIO STATION JUST FOR YOU
[SOURCE: New York Times, AUTHOR: Wilson Rothman]
For all the talk about satellite radio, the most vibrant frontier in radio may be the Web. Many traditional AM and FM stations have begun streaming on the Internet, along with hundreds of smaller online-only operators. Even subscription download services like Napster, Rhapsody and Urge from MTV have preprogrammed radio for users who are not in the mood to hunt for tracks. Currently, the most compelling online radio is interactive. Services like Pandora, Last.fm and Slacker evaluate your musical tastes, then serve up a continuous stream of programming to match. They mix familiar songs with new material you might like. They all do it by harnessing the technological forces of social networking, data mining and music analysis, though each uses a slightly different technique. With so much momentum, there are still plenty of bumps. The Copyright Royalty Board of the Library of Congress recently announced a Web-radio royalty payment plan that has caused many free Internet broadcasters to fear for their fragile business models. Some new interactive music services choose not to stream anything. Instead, they rely strictly on music the listener already owns or new tracks donated by publicity-hungry independent artists and labels. Others are becoming as creative with the way they license content as they are with the way they personalize it for you.
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/03/29/technology/29basics.html
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A Radio Station Just for You
SEARCHING FOR ADS OFFLINE
[SOURCE: New York Times, AUTHOR: Miguel Helft]
If there was any doubt about the scope of Google’s ambitions in the advertising world, one of its recent job postings should dispel them: It seeks a “head of national TV sales†to help build “a world-class national TV advertising sales team.†Then there is radio. Google’s chief executive, Eric E. Schmidt, said last year that the company would eventually have 1,000 employees dedicated to radio advertising alone. Google may one day rock the television and radio advertising markets. But its TV plans have yet to take shape, and its other efforts to extend its dominance over online advertising into offline media like newspapers and radio are inching along. The early results are mixed, suggesting that Google’s successful transition from online kingpin to credible player in traditional media is far from assured.
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/03/29/technology/29google.html
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Searching for Ads Offline
PACKET POLITICS
[SOURCE: Wall Street Journal, AUTHOR: Daniel Henninger]
[Commentary] Computer, the Internet and changing screens hundreds of times each day to access different gobs of "information" has changed the way our brains order the world, which is known as human consciousness. This "change" is having a material effect on just about everything else; why not on who gets elected president next year? In 1996, an eon ago, Steve G. Steinberg wrote a prescient article in Wired magazine on the battle between what he called Bellheads and Netheads. This was essentially an argument over the network design of the Web between engineers for the established phone companies, the Bellheads, and the anarchic engineers of the Web, Netheads. It was a war between the old world of circuit-switching and the new world of packet-switching, the one we inhabit today. Today, the Bellheads are long-form TV, traditional political ads, 74-minute CDs, two-hour movies -- predetermined A-to-B formats. (Newspapers are in fact a collection of "packets," a subject for another time.) The Netheads are YouTube, shared playlists, remixed videos, the idea of personal choice, and randomly arriving political ads such as "Hillary 1984." That Netheads are chop-shopping "The Daily Show" or "The Colbert Report" is ironic, but as the Yoda of old-media Walter Cronkite said, "That's the way it is." Prepackaging versus packets. And so in politics.
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB117513310695452758.html?mod=todays_us_op...
(requires subscription)
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB117513310695452758.html?mod=todays_us_opinion
CHILD WANTS CELLPHONE; RECEPTION IS MIXED
[SOURCE: New York Times, AUTHOR: Lisa Foderado]
After securing a foothold in the teenage market, cellphones are quickly emerging as the must-have techno-toy among elementary-school society. Companies are sating the appetite -- and expanding demand -- by offering special phones for children like the bright blue Firefly, which features only five keys, including ones with icons for speed-dialing a parent, and allows users to call a maximum of 22 numbers. Industry analysts say the ’tween market, defined as 8- to 12-year-olds, represents one of the major growth opportunities for the wireless industry. Some 6.6 million of the 20 million American children in that age range had cellphones by the end of 2006, according to an analysis by the Yankee Group, a technology consulting firm in Boston, which projects there will be 10.5 million preteen cellphone users by 2010. The number of 8-year-olds with phones, Yankee Group estimates, more than doubled to 506,000 over the past four years while the number of 9-year-olds jumped to 1.25 million from 501,000. Children want a cellphone for reasons obvious to them. It looks cool and makes them feel grown-up. It conveys a certain status. And it lets them stay in near-constant touch with friends and (oh, yeah) parents. For parents, the decision of when, or whether, to buy children cellphones -- paralleling the age-old debate over the appropriate age for ear piercing — is emotionally charged and value-laden, raising ticklish questions about safety and status, maturity and materialism. Some parents and child psychologists say the need for cellphones among such young children, who are rarely without adult supervision, is marginal, and the gadgets serve mainly as status symbols, quickly lost in a tangle of toys, batteries hopelessly out of juice. Others, though, say the phones are an electronic security blanket for both parent and child in a world of two-career households and split-custody arrangements, Amber alerts and color-coded terror threat levels.
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/03/29/fashion/29cell.html
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Child Wants Cellphone; Reception Is Mixed
AMP'D MOBILE FACES $100,000 FCC FINE
[SOURCE: Associated Press]
The Federal Communications Commission is proposing a $100,000 fine against Amp'd Mobile, the wireless phone company aimed at the youth market, and two other companies for failing to protect consumers' personal calling records from thieves. The FCC has proposed such fines against at least three other U.S. companies since January 2006 for failing to comply with rules requiring that consumer phone records be protected by internal safeguards. The FCC promised "aggressive, substantial steps" to crack down on phone companies that fail to protect such records.
http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/A/AMPD_PHONE_FINE?SITE=CACRU&SECTIO...
http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/A/AMPD_PHONE_FINE?SITE=CACRU&SECTION=HOME&T…
"FAMILY FRIENDLY" INTERNET PROPOSAL CHALLENGES STATUS QUO ON FCC AUCTION
[SOURCE: Lasar's Letter on the FCC, AUTHOR: Matthew Lasar]
Over the last nine months, hundreds of organizations, community leaders, and politicians have written to the Federal Communications Commission in support of M2Z Network's proposal for a free national broadband service. But while the idea may stumble over FCC auction rules, it has stimulated an interesting debate about the agency's competitive bidding system for spectrum. Menlo Park, California based M2Z petitioned the FCC for their proposed "family-friendly, free, nationwide wireless broadband service" in May of 2006. M2Z says that it wants to roll out the network to 95% of the population of the United States within ten years of receiving a license. One of the proposals' biggest selling points is its claim that the network will save the FCC's Universal Service Fund billions of dollars by taking on the USF's mission of bringing broadband to poor and rural areas. Needless to say, the smut free aspect of M2Z's proposal makes it a strong sell with parents, community, and indecency groups across the United States, who have filed hundreds of pro-M2Z comments with the FCC.
http://www.lasarletter.net/drupal/node/384
"Family friendly" Internet proposal challenges status quo on FCC auctions