back to article Civil war erupts at top of FCC over Sinclair's creepy grasp on US telly

Internecine fights at America's Federal Communications Commission (FCC) have broken out in public at an industry event in Las Vegas. In a series of speeches given by four of the watchdog's five commissioners at the National Association of Broadcasters annual event in Sin City, the policymakers traded barbs over its apparent …

  1. Frumious Bandersnatch

    Well, Ted,

    I'm very sceptical, as you know, but here's one for you: "How do you get to Carnegie Hall?"

    1. Ole Juul

      Re: Well, Ted,

      Well, if we're talking America's Got Talent here, then my vote goes to Jessica Rosenworcel.

  2. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    I raised this Sinclair comedy Sock-Puppets incident in another forum...

    Mostly because it's very funny.

    Geesh, big mistake. One of the members of that other forum turned out to be an angry Alt-Right nutter. He came out swinging. His words made sense, but the ideas that they represented certainly didn't. I was forced to flee the forum (never wrestle a pig, etc.).

    1. kernelpickle

      Re: I raised this Sinclair comedy Sock-Puppets incident in another forum...

      ...did this "angry Alt-Right nutter" like to RANDOMLY capitalize entire WORDS, for NO REASON?!

      Wait, never mind--I just re-read your post and saw that you also said "His words made sense..." so, I think we're clearly talking about a different guy.

  3. elDog

    The trump/repuglicans have no shame.

    I don't know how to say this more eloquen8tly.

    Everything that has been done by the repuglican-controlled congress and recently their clown-in-chief has been in order to benefit a few already filthy-rich people around the world and to reduce the US potency to a level that is even below England's (that's a bit of yankee humor...)

    Finding out that the same cabal is responsible for Putin's machinations in the (former) USSR, the Brexit campaign, and several others around the world is cold comfort.

    First, deny berthing rights to any yacht over 50 feet (20m?). Keep them all offshore until their booze and blonds and petrol run out.

  4. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    No news here

    IME the FCC / FTC / EPA are politically oriented worthless government entities that do whatever they like regardless of the damage to the populace. IMNHO these politicians should all be terminated and replaced with competent people who desire to serve the best interest of the populace.

    1. Charles 9

      Re: No news here

      One problem. The ones most deserving of the position are too dedicated to their jobs to go into politics. Politics almost requires a sociopathic streak.

    2. Stoneshop
      Pirate

      Re: No news here

      IMNHO these politicians should all be terminated

      with extreme prejudice.

  5. JLV

    >"You either believe broadcasters should be allowed to innovate, or you don't,"

    Not sure what term describes this debating sleight of words and specious argument. How about something more like doing his job in an unbiased manner:

    Should broadcasters be:

    a) totally regulated

    b) totally unregulated

    c) somewhere in between, which I assume most competent adults would aim for. Certainly, most voters seem to feel that way about Net Neutrality and ISPs sharing their private info.

    We know what choice Pai is being wined and dined into taking, don't we? Darn, I wish I could see the future and who he's lined up to get a gig with after the FCC. The Japanese have a term for it, Amakudari—meaning descent from heaven.

    Methink El Reg needs a "sleazebag" icon, we're hearing so much of this kinda crap from everywhere.

    1. Citizens untied

      Only a Sith deals in absolutes.

  6. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Red tape is socialist

    Pai "cutting the red tape that's jamming up broadcasters and discouraging investment and innovation."

    I'm fully behind this, as red tape is communist. The markets will regulate themselves just fine. We need to be pro-business, and flexible.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Red tape is socialist

      Pro-business should not be anti-citizen.

      "The markets will regulate themselves just fine."

      Umm, no.

      "Bankers are smart people. They know what they're doing." (heard pre-2008, and now 2018)

    2. Charles 9

      Re: Red tape is socialist

      The problem with self-regulation is that there is incentive to CHEAT. Think Volkswagen.

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: Red tape is socialist

        It isn't self-regulation, it's free market competition, something red tape strangles. It's the artificial red tape and its associated rules that lead to cheating.

        1. Anonymous Coward
          Anonymous Coward

          Re: Red tape is socialist

          Lack of regulation sets up the same conditions that the Presidents Roosevelt worked against and in so doing helped create the middle-class as we knew it from the 1950s through the crash of 2008. things haven't been as good for many since then. Trump and his cohort of greed are increasing the speed downward spiral.

          1. tom dial Silver badge

            Re: Red tape is socialist

            The "middle-class as we knew it from the 1950s through the crash of 2008" originated from the huge scientific and industrial investment occasioned by WW II together with release of large amounts of semi-compulsory personal savings resulting from the concurrent war financing and rationing. It was given an extra kick by the GI Bill and the consequent step increase in the number of people with significant post-secondary education.

            The post-war growth spurt was plainly on its way out well before 2008, as evidenced by the fact that from the 1970s or so maintaining the life style came to require two employed adults per household, where through most of the 1960s one often was sufficient. The crash of 2008 (and the somewhat similar savings and loan debacle of the late 1980s and early 1990s) resulted to a considerable degree from attempts, encouraged by the federal government, to kick the can down the road for a few more years, augmented by financial ignorance in the population, dishonesty of real estate lenders and buyers both, and probably a bit of bad luck.

        2. JLV

          Re: Red tape is socialist

          you know, I agree that over-regulation can cause problems. So let's stay away from Pai activities that could be, by reaaaallly stretching it, be constructed as freeing up investment. cuz, you know, Commies and all that.

          How does allowing selling off your net access habits "free up" anything? Please explain. How about your doctor can do same? Your lawyer? Make you happy? Somehow unfetters capitalism?

          The US has some of the stronger anti monopoly laws in the world. How does redefining broadband speed to pretend there is local choice promote a healthy and competitive local free market?

          Nah, just Godwin it by saying "Commie". Or Socialist, cuz you're too thick to see the difference between folks who ran the Gulags and people with a different perspective than yours.

        3. Robert Helpmann??
          Childcatcher

          Re: Red tape is socialist

          It's the artificial red tape and its associated rules that lead to cheating.

          I might concede that without rules, there would be no cheating, but I don't think that this is the direction you wanted to take your argument. There can and never will be such a thing as an unregulated free market because as soon as one company achieves the upper hand, they crush the competition and have a perpetual self-serving monopoly thus making the market significantly less free. The only thing that makes self-governing associations work is the threat of outside governance and even then it is often a case of setting the fox to watch the hen house.

      2. Eddy Ito

        Re: Red tape is socialist

        The problem with self-regulation is that there is incentive to CHEAT. Think Volkswagen.

        I don't follow. If you're making the rules, "self-regulating", how do you cheat?

        1. Anonymous Coward
          Anonymous Coward

          Re: Red tape is socialist

          "I don't follow. If you're making the rules, "self-regulating", how do you cheat?"

          Beauty! Heh?

        2. Charles 9

          Re: Red tape is socialist

          "I don't follow. If you're making the rules, "self-regulating", how do you cheat?"

          Put it this way. Say you lay the rules that one gets to cut the cake while the other gets to choose his/her share, you would think that would enforce fairness...until one or the other things outside the box: stealing either the cake so there's nothing to cut or the knife so there's no way to cut it. And once you have enough power, like the big chip leader at the poker table, you can use that power to bully the rest into following your rules instead.

    3. Slef

      Re: Red tape is socialist

      JEEZ, Is this a post from a reconstituted Senator McCarthy? Red tape is communist but it is OK for a bunch of immoral bankers to screw over ordinary people is OK or chemical companies to poison people or car manufacturers to kill people with badly designed cars.

      Perhaps the anonymous coward should grow a set of balls and buy a dictionary and find out what socialism actually is rather than copy and paste from Pai's arse cheeks.

    4. phuzz Silver badge
      Thumb Up

      Re: Red tape is socialist

      "I'm fully behind this, as red tape is communist"

      What if we made the tape a nice shade of blue? Wait, I've got it! Lets make the tape red, white and blue!

      We could call it Freedom Tape!

    5. Sandtitz Silver badge
      Mushroom

      Re: Red tape is socialist @AC @Big John

      "I'm fully behind this, as red tape is communist. The markets will regulate themselves just fine. We need to be pro-business, and flexible."

      Riddle me this:

      The fishing industry is fishing more than is sustainable in many areas around the world - do you honestly think that removing all regulation would somehow end up all fishing companies coming together and regulating their fishing quotas, and everyone would adhere to that?

  7. tom dial Silver badge

    It is not at all clear why one should attach significance to Sinclair's potential capability to reach 72% of the US public. No similar concern is expressed over the fact that ABC, CBS, Fox, NBC, and PBS each now reach 95% or more of the US public. Sinclair stations' local news reports in one broadcast area are unlikely to be passed to other broadcast areas, and certainly nowhere near 72% except as they report items of regional or national interest ilikely to be covered by the big 4 commercial networks and PBS.

    1. Charles 9

      Guess you didn't read the story where ALL (repeat, ALL) Sinclair newsrooms were ordered to read THE SAME commentary piece (and someone proved it was the same piece by stitching different stations in a YouTube clip). At least the big networks compete against each other, but Sinclair's control is, pardon the pun, closer to home.

      1. Eddy Ito

        Except that it's far from control. Their current 39% reach doesn't imply market share neither does the post merger 72%. In each market area there are other sources of news and programming. Consider that only about 9% of people watch TV solely by rabbit ears; it hardly indicates any danger of them controlling anything. Even a simple antenna is capable of picking up well over a dozen stations in my area so even among that 9% they don't have "control" as there are plenty of other local alternatives. This nonsense about them being the only source of news is just that, nonsense.

        Haven't we been here before with the whole AOL-Time Warner merger, which isn't a thing anymore, to the ClearChannel now iHeart buy up in the late '90s, now filing Chapter 11. Oh Conan has been doing the creepy mashup thing a lot longer.

      2. tom dial Silver badge

        So what? I read the text (at ThinkProgress); there is nothing in it that would have raised an eyebrow if it had appeared in the New York Times which, as a matter of fact, employs a full-time staff member (Margaret Sullivan) whose duties include receiving comments about incorrect, incomplete, or biased reporting.

        1. Mike Moyle

          "So what? I read the text (at ThinkProgress); there is nothing in it that would have raised an eyebrow if it had appeared in the New York Times which, as a matter of fact, employs a full-time staff member (Margaret Sullivan) whose duties include receiving comments about incorrect, incomplete, or biased reporting."

          Oh... So if the New York Times publishes a slanted editorial piece, You *KNOW* that it came from the Times' editorial board, or from the person whose byline it ran under, and they *TELL* you whom to contact *AT* the Times to complain to...?

          Now, if you see an editorial that you disagree with from one of the three Sinclair stations in Syracuse, NY, or the four Sinclair stations in Wichita, KS, or the seven covering the Redding, CA area, how do you contact the home office that required their local news anchors to read it without attribution? If the local newsreaders were allowed/required to bracket one of the "must-reads" with something like: "The following is an editorial from Sinclair Broadcasting, the corporate owner of Station [CallLetters] and does not necessarily represent [CallLetters]'s point of view," and "The preceding has been (...). Comments or corrections on this editorial can be made to [PRFlackName] at [SinclairContactAddress]," I would have a lot fewer problems with the company's apparent intention to flood local markets across the country with different-looking fronts for the same agenda.

          As it actually IS, though, I have major problems with it.

    2. Mike Moyle

      Here's the thing: Unless you go looking, Sinclair may not show up anywhere on your local Sinclair-owned station. Many of them are affiliate stations of the national broadcast networks -- WPRI in Rhode Island, for instance, is an NBC affiliate while KDSM in Iowa is a Fox network (not Fox News) affiliate. In fact, Sinclair owns 33 ABC affiliate stations, 27 CBS affiliates, 2 NBC and 47 Fox affiliate stations. Further, in many cases, they own multiple stations -- often "fronted" by competing networks -- in the same market. And, since most affiliate channels are just that -- voluntary affiliates, not owned and operated by the national networks, their local editorial slant -- as in the case of the Sinclair-owned affiliate stations -- may not match the views of the owners of the national networks with which they are affiliated, although many people (like yourself, apparently) assume that they DO march in lockstep with the national branding on their identification slugs.

      Now, I would have less concern if companies owning multiple stations were required to declare that ownership with every station identification slug -- in fact, IIRC, when I was growing up in the '60s, this was the case. The local NBC affiliate's slide included the call letters and channel number, the NBC logo and, in one corner, "A Westinghouse Broadcasting Company",or some such, identifying the company that owned the chain of stations of which it was a part.

      (...This was also a time when station editorials ended -- by law! -- with some phrase like "This has been an editorial from [CallLetters]'s General Manager [Name]. Station [CallLetters] recognizes its responsibility to present opposing points of view from responsible spokesmen," and then would DO SO when called on it... Don't even get me started!)

      The point of all of this is that, currently, one company can own APPARENTLY competing stations in one market, not identify their actual ownership of those stations to the viewers, present matching viewpoints that appear to come from opposing sources, not identify the ACTUAL source..., AND are no longer required to present genuinely opposing points of view.

      ...and according to some people, this is all a Good Thing (TM) because "Unfettered capitalism is Good and regulation is Bad, m'kay...?"

      Does that clear everything up?

      1. Mike Moyle

        Ooops... didn't notice in time: The appropriate sentence in the first paragraph in my post just above should read:

        "...Sinclair owns 33 ABC affiliate stations, 27 CBS affiliates, 22 NBC and 47 Fox affiliate stations."

      2. Eddy Ito

        Seriously? I'll tell you what, here's the list. One of the places where they have a fair number of stations is the Chico/Redding, California market where it looks like they have 9 stations/affiliates. That sounds like a lot but it isn't quite so impressive when you realize there are 52 other stations in that area which aren't related to Sinclair in any way. You also might notice that prior to Sinclair buying out Bonten Media Group last year that all of those stations were owned by Bonten yet nobody was screaming doom and gloom for Redding then.

        Maybe there are other markets where Sinclair owns almost 15% of the stations but people are free to choose whatever they like from the other 85%. It doesn't make sense to worry about having a 15% footprint in 72% of markets because that only means they have 10.8% of stations and oddly folks are still free to choose any of the remaining 89.2% of broadcasters even though only 9% of people won't be able to choose from all the other cable or internet channels. Unless you consider a monopoly to consist of owning about 1% of the available options. This is much less than a tempest in a teacup, it looks more like a tantrum in a thimble.

        As to the "not identify their actual ownership" charge. It doesn't stand up.

        1. Eddy Ito

          My bad, Sinclair says they have 11 stations in the Chico-Redding market so almost 17.7%. KRCR, KRCR-2, KRCR-3, KRCR-4, KKTF-LD, KRVU-LD, KRVU-LD-2, KRVU-LD-3, KCVU, KCVU-2, & KUCO-LP.

          Still not impressed.

          1. Anonymous Coward
            Anonymous Coward

            The UHF discount is the real shady part of this

            The UHF discount originated over half a century ago as a way to encouraging stations to use UHF frequencies, which didn't travel well for analog broadcasts. With the switch to digital UHF is actually superior to VHF in most cases - that's why most stations moved from VHF to UHF when they went digital.

            Bringing the UHF discount back and counting UHF stations as less than a full station for ownership purposes is a scam to allow Sinclair to control more stations, plain and simple.

            1. Frumious Bandersnatch

              Re: The UHF discount is the real shady part of this

              Bringing the UHF discount back ...

              Sure thing. I'm all for reintroducing the time-limited codes they aired for a discount at Spatula City.

        2. Mike Moyle

          "As to the "not identify their actual ownership" charge. It doesn't stand up."

          Do they clearly identify "Part of Sinclair Broadcasting Corporation" in on-air station identification breaks? Does it appear on the identification slides?

          No...?

          Then it's not really the same thing, is it?

          1. Eddy Ito

            I don't know that they do or don't as I don't watch much TV but I see no reason why they wouldn't. I also can't even check because they don't have a station here in SoCal. It also seems you don't know either so unless you can show they aren't it's mere speculation on your part. Perhaps someone will record it and post it on youtube or similar. They do spell it out clearly at the bottom of the stations websites and I've never seen a corporation not take the opportunity to advertise themselves especially when it's free. I will say I did catch a news show recently while traveling on a Hearst station and they did indeed advertise that they were a part of Hearst Television. Maybe on my next trip I'll check if there's a Sinclair station and find out.

            There are also very clear rules as to what goes into station identification breaks. If Sinclair is the license holder then it is absolutely required that it be stated.

            It's funny to think that CNN was spewing all kinds of warnings about fake news during the election and now when Sinclair tries to warn about fake news it's CNN throwing shade for doing exactly what they did only a little over a year ago. Maybe CNN is just jealous because Sinclair is using their schtick.

            Oh, I did find out that not all Sinclair stations ran the piece, funny that.

            1. Anonymous Coward
              Anonymous Coward

              "Oh, I did find out that not all Sinclair stations ran the piece, funny that."

              No, it'll be funny if those stations don't suffer repercussions as a result.

  8. Wolfclaw

    When Sinclair's chairman oes to the loo for a number two, does Pai wipe his backside and puckers up for big kiss ?

  9. FlossyThePig
    Joke

    Not Sir Clive then!

    Oh silly me. I saw Sinclair in the headline and thought "What is Clive doing now?", but it's some trouble in Trumptonshire.

    P.S. I hear there are plans to remake Worzel Gummidge, I wonder who could play the part.

    1. Uncle Slacky Silver badge

      Re: Not Sir Clive then!

      Apparently Mackenzie Crook is in the frame for the role of Worzel Gummidge.

  10. JohnFen

    What I believe

    Either Pai and his cronies are lying or they are deluded. Either way, they are wrong, and their efforts are harmful to society, the nation as a whole, and the goal of encouraging progress and innovation.

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