Re: Broadcast speech regulation

["Dan Billings" <dib9@gwi.net>]

----- Original Message -----
From: "Garrett Wollman" <wollman@khavrinen.lcs.mit.edu>
To: "Dan Billings" <dib9@gwi.net>
Cc: <boston-radio-interest@khavrinen.lcs.mit.edu>
Sent: Friday, November 30, 2001 12:35 PM
Subject: Broadcast speech regulation


> In recent years, the Supremes have shown rather more tenderness
> towards the free-speech rights of broadcasters, and I suspect that
> precedents such as /Pacifica/ might well be open to reconsideration
> today.

You may be right.  Those cases were based, in part, on the idea of spectrum
scarcity and the limited number of voices.  Those ideas are less significant
in the digital age with the Internet, cable TV, satellite radio, and digital
TV.

My comments were based on Supreme Court precedent.  I think broadcasters
should have the same free speech rights as publishers, but that's not the
law and not what the Supreme Court has said to date.

-- Dan Billings, Bowdoinham, Maine