This Week in Media





Another week of action for those concerned with the state of the media in this
country.  The battlegrounds are ownership rules, the transition to
Digital TV, and the broadcasting company that is owned by US, the
Corporation for Public Broadcasting.  




The biggest news has to be the resignation of Kenneth Tomlinson from
the Corporation for Public Broadcasting Board.  It was first
thought that his resignation
was caused by an upcoming Inspector
General  report on his efforts as the Chair of CPB to impose his
partisan agenda at PBS and NPR.  It then was learned he is now
under investigation for misusing funds and hiring “ghost employees” as
Chairman of the Broadcasting Board of Governors — which oversees Voice
of America, Radio Free Europe, TV Marti and other “public diplomacy”
programs.  Here is the short version by Free Press and the long version by the New
York Times.
 


The issues for Digital TV this week are broadcast flags,  indecency, and the date for stations to
complete conversion.  In addition,
the FCC announced a notice of proposed rule making regarding the
franchising process for multi-channel video providers.  They also  extended the
emergency alert system to digital TV stations, and modified the
DTV-tuner mandate to cover TV sets smaller than 13 inches.




The battle over ownership rules is still in its early stages, but public interest groups are beginning to define the issues.




And lastly, an important event that didn’t happen – the
almost total absence of media coverage of the GAO report identifying
serious flaws in the 2004 election and our voting process in general. 



The MP3 version of  Media Minutes from Free Press is here.