Re: New Report Faults Commercial TV Broadcasters

[Donna Halper <dlh@donnahalper.com>]

Well, I'm not terribly surprised by this... are any of you???

>News Release
>
>         Benton Study Finds That Commercial Broadcasters Fail
>                 to Provide Communities With
>               Local Public Affairs Programming
>
>                 Benton Calls on FCC to Adopt
>                   Viewers Bill of Rights
>
>
>WASHINGTON, D.C. (March 27, 2000) - In a major new study released today, the
>Benton Foundation finds that commercial broadcasters are forsaking local
>public affairs programming. Despite promises from broadcasters that market
>competition and deregulation will lead to a diversity of voices and an
>allegiance to localism, the report, "Market Conditions and Public Affairs
>Programming," highlights that during a typical fortnight, only 0.3 percent
>of the total commercial broadcast time is devoted to local public affairs
>programming.
>
>The report also underscores that competitive conditions, market
>demographics, and station characteristics had no significant effect on the
>quantity of local public affairs programming provided by individual
>broadcast stations. [snip]

To read this very enlightening and thorough study of 24 markets, and how 
little public service they do, go to the Benton page:

>Benton's filing is available online (www.benton.org/Television/noi.html);
>the new report will be available shortly at 
>(www.benton.org/Television/lpa.pdf).