May '11 PR Rankings Issue - Odwyerpr.com

Commissioner warns of Internet’s corporate takeover
Exiting Federal Communications Commission Commissioner
Michael Copps warns that media consolidation is even more
dangerous today because the big money crowd is eyeing the
world of broadband and Internet.
By Kevin McCauley
Copps told the National Conference
for Media Reform on April 9 that the
same hedge fund, banking trust and
private equity firm gang that nearly brought
down the global financial system now have
“visions of gated Internet communities”
dancing in their heads.
The absentee landlords who put local programming
on a “starvation diet and feed us
instead monotonous homogenized music
and mindless infotainment masquerading
as ‘news’” are now working to consolidate
and ‘cable-ize’ the Internet under the control
of corporate gatekeepers.
The rallying cry of “Don’t regulate the
Internet” keeps reformers at bay, but what
big corporations really mean is “Don’t let
anyone but us control the Internet,” said the
Commissioner.
Noting that Secretary of State Hillary
Clinton warned that the U.S. is losing the
global information war, Copps believes
defeat is present on the home front.
In his view, an informed electorate
depends on facts, not talking heads hurling
opinions at each other. It’s the absence of
facts, not the presence of opinion — right or
left — that hurt us, said Copps.
The speaker recalled Senator Daniel
Patrick Moynihan’s remark that each is
entitled to an opinion, but not to one’s own
set of facts.
“That’s where the problem is — facts that
never get dug up, stories that just don’t get
told. I’m not advocating taking anyone off
the air — I want to make room for facts on
the air,” said Copps.
“What we’re dealing with here is a bad
case of big media substance abuse — and
they just can’t break the habit. These folks
have no intention, even as the economy
improves, of reopening shuttered newsrooms
or rehiring laid-off reporters. They
might even fire more, just to prove to Wall
Street that they understand the bottom line
still rules.”
The FCC is readying a report that will
assess the media landscape. If this report
doesn’t come filled with strong, hard-hit-
ting, public interest recommendations, it
won’t be worth the paper it’s written on,”
said Copps.
However, Copps
believes the future of
media is not an
“inside-the-Beltway”
issue.
“Winning the battle
for America’s media
future is the single
most important thing
you and I can do to
preserve this democracy
of ours,” he said.
Copps has served
as FCC commissioner since May, 2001. In
January, Copps was the sole FCC commissioner
to vote against Comcast’s purchase
of NBC Universal.
Speaking on the merger, Copps said the it
is “simply too much, too big, too powerful,
too lacking in benefits for American consumers
and citizens ... the public interest
requires more-much more-than it is receiving.
The Comcast-NBCU joint venture
opens the door to the cable-ization of the
open Internet. The potential for walled gardens,
toll booths, content prioritization,
access fees to reach end users, and a stake
in the heart of independent content production
is now very real.”
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