Cross-ownership rules

[Garrett Wollman <wollman@khavrinen.lcs.mit.edu>]

<<On Tue, 26 Aug 2003 22:32:57 -0400 (EDT), Sven Franklyn Weil <sven@gordsven.com> said:

> What I don't understand is what's the big deal if the networks continue to
> buy more O&Os in other cities to pipe their programming through?  Or is
> the whole panic about networks owning more TV stations because of the
> duopoly thing?

I think Blethen is tilting at windmills here.  Legally, the
cross-ownership rule would not stand even if the FCC were firmly
behind it; the weight of recent First Amendment jurisprudence stands
arrayed against it.

The big deal, as it were, is different for different interest groups.

- Smaller program producers (i.e., those not vertically integrated
with a ``distribution channel'') are worried that greater horizontal
integration on the part of the already vertically integrated networks
will even further reduce the opportunity to sell their programming
directly to stations without the involvement of a network.  Most of
these producers have been feeling the squeeze for some time as a
result of fin-syn.

- Advertisers are worried that greater national ownership (whether or
not by the networks) will make it more difficult and expensive to
purchase advertising targeted at a particular market.  This is
particularly worrysome for smaller companies that may not have the
economic clout to bargain with the large conglomerate broadcasters;
McDonald's or Sears may be able to buy time on every NBC O&O in the
country, but H.P. Hood can't, even if they had a reason to.

- ``Cultural critics'' (usually a code word for left-wing academics,
but in this case it applies to right-wing think-tankers, too) fear
that greater concentration of station ownership will enforce a
stultifying likeness of programming and editorial choice on an
ever-larger number of stations.  (The natural counter-argument is
thatr this has already happened.)

- Small station owners -- at least, those who aren't looking forward
to cashing out big time -- are concerned about the prospect of having
to compete in their local market against the money that a corporate
behemoth can bring to bear.  Blethen's position would seem to be a bit
unusual in this regard (and probably motivated, as Dan suggests, by
the newspaper situation in Seattle); most small groups do better in a
regulatory environment which encouraged local media consolidation but
limited the national scale of media companies.

The actual record is mixed, but in markets where one of the TV owners
has a strong local presence in other media, that station has usually
managed to hold its own against incursions from the networks.  In
Raleigh-Durham, for example, locally-owned WRAL-TV managed to hold its
own with ABC O&O WTVD for quite some time; even NBC's arrival in the
market with tabloid style and big-city production values did not
manage to break old viewer loyalties (although WNCN captured a
sizeable portion of the viewership among non-natives).  In some
markets, even fairly large ones, the networks have managed to make
such comical missteps as give lie to their predatory image, as witness
NBC's KNTV fiasco in San Jose, or CBS's perennial-loser WWJ-TV in
Detroit.

-GAWollman