NEWS & LETTERS, December 2006 - January 2007

Union fights FCC on media monopoly

LOS ANGELES--On Oct. 3, the Federal Communications Commission held two hearings in Los Angeles, the first of six national public hearings. The session held at USC focused on independent production and "Big Media's" relation to creative programming. It drew an overflow crowd of more than 500 people.

There was loud applause for the many diverse speakers against further consolidation, many of whom were members of the American Federation of Television and Radio Artists and independent activists. Of 50 people making public comments, only one person spoke in favor of consolidation, citing the free market.

Six conglomerates that own the media in the Los Angeles area--Clear Channel, Viacom, General Electric/NBC, Disney/ABC, Rupert Murdoch's News Corp and Univision--already own most of the nation's television stations, thousands of radio stations, cable and satellite networks, movie and music companies, Internet providers, newspapers and publishing companies.

At the evening session at El Segundo High School, Mexican-American youths commented on their absence from television, as if they do not exist in U.S. society. They also spoke against Disney's "Hate Radio," KABC AM's campaign against indigenous peoples and Mexican immigrants, calling them terrorists and criminals.

The FCC had tried to push through this same deregulation in 2003 under then-Chairman Michael Powell. Three million people protested then. The FCC approved the rules change despite the protests, only to see them overturned by the courts (www.freepress.net).

--Activist