Re: Donna gets heard - and seen! (on Nightline, of course)

["Dan Billings" <billings@suscom-maine.net>]

If the cross ownership rules had never been in place, I think we would have
a lot fewer one newspaper towns today.  The cross ownership prohibition
eliminated the most likely buyers of a failing paper in many towns.  Would
the Herald still exist if Murdoch had not bought it and kept it alive?  I
don't think we'll see any papers coming back if the rule is eliminated, but
it might help keep papers alive in the few places where there are still two.

I also don't see the big deal about letting the networks own stations
covering 45% of the country instead of 35%.  Network programming dominates
affiliates programming anyway.  The networks will own more stations instead
of one of the chains.  Big deal.

-- Dan Billings, Bowdoinham, Maine