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FCC Loosens Media Ownership Rules Amid Concerns
Aired June 02, 2003 - 13:16 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
MILES O'BRIEN: Is it keeping up with the times or creating media monopolies? It all depends on how look at it.
As effect petted today the Federal Communications Commission, FCC, voted to ease regulations on media ownership. That has media companies cheering, at least the big ones, and critics calling for congressional action.
Joining us now from Washington, following every step of this, CNN financial news correspondent Greg Clarkin. Greg, no surprises here, obviously?
GREG CLARKIN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Exactly, miles. The vote breaking down as expected, 3-2, with the three Republicans on the FCC in favor of doing away with some of the decades-old restrictions on media outlet ownership.
And then you have two Democrats opposed to it.
FCC chairman Michael Powell was successful in his efforts to overturn some of the decades-old rules on who owns the nation's newspapers, radio stations and TV stations. And really key here is to know that some consolidation probably will occur in the media business where you see companies getting together or swapping or buying TV stations to give themselves more clout in any one market. So you may have a company that owns a newspaper, as well as a local TV station in more cities than you do today.
Now amid shouts of protests by many of the opponents of this, the FCC voting on this rather quickly at the end of a 90 minute meeting today and again, bringing in, ushering in a new era of media ownership.
Now, the opponents to this were many. They vow legal action, with Michael Powell, the FCC commissioner, saying that they have done their due diligence here and he believes that these will hold up in court.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
MICHAEL POWELL, FCC COMMISSIONER: I think we will evaluate how this goes, whether our judgments were sound. I think one of the most important things that we'll get is when we get sued, as we will, by seemingly everyone, the court decision will give us guidance about whether we got back on the right track.
(END VIDEO CLIP) CLARKIN: Now, again, this was a diverse group of opponents out in opposition to this today. We saw civil rights groups, we saw the National Rifle Association.
There's a number of concerns they have. One is the continued consolidation in the media company will put just too much power in the hands of too few. You'll have just a couple of companies controlling a large portion of the newspapers, radio and TV stations in this nation. They fear that.
And then Michael Copps, he's a Democrat commissioner on the FCC, he believes that local news would be adversely affected because once the companies get together and buy various media outlets in any one given market, they may merge newsrooms and that is going to affect the quality of local news.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
MICHAEL COPPS, FCC COMMISSIONER: What happens to local news, what happens to knowledge about community events, what's going on on the city council, how is the hometown ball team doing, what is the service club up to, what good projects are going on, that's going to suffer.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
CLARKIN: Now legal challenges definitely are in the offing and also in the immediate future on Wednesday, Senator John McCain has hearing where he's going to want to hear some answers from these five commissioners as to how this vote will impact the business.
As for the media companies themselves, not expected to set a wave of big mergers but we are expected to see a fair amount of deals where companies get together and maybe buy and sell radio and TV stations to give themselves more clout in one any particular market or city -- Miles.
O'BRIEN: So more or less, stations swapping or property-swapping for now?
CLARKIN: Exactly. That's the feeling on Wall Street, at least, is that you'll see a lot of companies that have already got targeted cities that they want to kind of fill out their portfolios. And that's what they'll be trying to move to do.
O'BRIEN: All right. Greg Clarkin in Washington, thank you very much.
TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com
Aired June 2, 2003 - 13:16 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
MILES O'BRIEN: Is it keeping up with the times or creating media monopolies? It all depends on how look at it.
As effect petted today the Federal Communications Commission, FCC, voted to ease regulations on media ownership. That has media companies cheering, at least the big ones, and critics calling for congressional action.
Joining us now from Washington, following every step of this, CNN financial news correspondent Greg Clarkin. Greg, no surprises here, obviously?
GREG CLARKIN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Exactly, miles. The vote breaking down as expected, 3-2, with the three Republicans on the FCC in favor of doing away with some of the decades-old restrictions on media outlet ownership.
And then you have two Democrats opposed to it.
FCC chairman Michael Powell was successful in his efforts to overturn some of the decades-old rules on who owns the nation's newspapers, radio stations and TV stations. And really key here is to know that some consolidation probably will occur in the media business where you see companies getting together or swapping or buying TV stations to give themselves more clout in any one market. So you may have a company that owns a newspaper, as well as a local TV station in more cities than you do today.
Now amid shouts of protests by many of the opponents of this, the FCC voting on this rather quickly at the end of a 90 minute meeting today and again, bringing in, ushering in a new era of media ownership.
Now, the opponents to this were many. They vow legal action, with Michael Powell, the FCC commissioner, saying that they have done their due diligence here and he believes that these will hold up in court.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
MICHAEL POWELL, FCC COMMISSIONER: I think we will evaluate how this goes, whether our judgments were sound. I think one of the most important things that we'll get is when we get sued, as we will, by seemingly everyone, the court decision will give us guidance about whether we got back on the right track.
(END VIDEO CLIP) CLARKIN: Now, again, this was a diverse group of opponents out in opposition to this today. We saw civil rights groups, we saw the National Rifle Association.
There's a number of concerns they have. One is the continued consolidation in the media company will put just too much power in the hands of too few. You'll have just a couple of companies controlling a large portion of the newspapers, radio and TV stations in this nation. They fear that.
And then Michael Copps, he's a Democrat commissioner on the FCC, he believes that local news would be adversely affected because once the companies get together and buy various media outlets in any one given market, they may merge newsrooms and that is going to affect the quality of local news.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
MICHAEL COPPS, FCC COMMISSIONER: What happens to local news, what happens to knowledge about community events, what's going on on the city council, how is the hometown ball team doing, what is the service club up to, what good projects are going on, that's going to suffer.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
CLARKIN: Now legal challenges definitely are in the offing and also in the immediate future on Wednesday, Senator John McCain has hearing where he's going to want to hear some answers from these five commissioners as to how this vote will impact the business.
As for the media companies themselves, not expected to set a wave of big mergers but we are expected to see a fair amount of deals where companies get together and maybe buy and sell radio and TV stations to give themselves more clout in one any particular market or city -- Miles.
O'BRIEN: So more or less, stations swapping or property-swapping for now?
CLARKIN: Exactly. That's the feeling on Wall Street, at least, is that you'll see a lot of companies that have already got targeted cities that they want to kind of fill out their portfolios. And that's what they'll be trying to move to do.
O'BRIEN: All right. Greg Clarkin in Washington, thank you very much.
TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com
