Is bigger really better?

Published November 23, 2017

By Tom Campbell

by Tom Campbell, Producer and moderator of NC SPIN, November 22, 2017.

For the first twenty years of my career I was a radio broadcaster in Greenville, Wilson, Elizabeth City, Fuquay-Varina, and later Raleigh and Durham. At these stations employees often performed multiple tasks and, while we never made a lot of money, the work was rewarding because we believed we performed a valuable public service to our community.

The media landscape was simple. We received four TV stations (the three networks and PBS), generally two or more AM radio stations and the local newspaper, most owned and managed by local people. Everyone had a place at the table and we each knew and accepted our roles. The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) regulated broadcasters, especially through ownership rules that ensured no group dominated the options the public could choose in media voices. While some considered the rules restrictive, I agreed with not giving too much control to too few.

Things began changing in 1980, when Ted Turner started CNN and cable TV became a viable option for subscribers. UHF stations (those above channel 13) popped up everywhere. President Reagan deregulated broadcasting, among other industries, and suddenly ownership groups could buy large numbers of radio stations. President Bush later did the same for TV, even though there were restrictions as to how large a percentage of the national audience an ownership group could reach.

We witnessed a spending spree of large corporations merging or purchasing radio and TV stations and newspapers. Advocates claimed that changing economic factors dictated the need to achieve economies of scale through owning multiple properties in the area.

While most agree that competition and the free market is good, many began questioning whether bigger was really better. Suddenly programming, news content and public service decisions, previously determined by local owners and managers based on what was best for their community, were now being made by corporate executives in far away cities. Just recently the FCC ruled that these groups didn’t even have to have their main studios in the communities to which they were licensed. Many radio stations have become little more than automated jukeboxes or satellite delivered talk programming and you are hard pressed to find local news on some group-owned TV stations, unless they rebroadcast newscasts from other stations in the market.

Now the FCC is considering eliminating essentially all ownership rules for TV and radio broadcasting, including the cross-ownership of newspapers. It is not far-fetched to envision a time when a handful of large corporations control what we are able to see, hear or read. Not only will we have the loss of local input but will get the political or philosophical slant from large corporations.

You may think this is free enterprise at work and we should not interfere with the flow of commerce. Maybe so, but I challenge you to tune in your local TV or radio station or pick up your local paper and make the case that each is doing as good a job of serving their community as the previous local ownership was doing.

Count me as one who believes that our country benefits when the press and media offer many opinions and we can select the ones we prefer rather than be forced to choose between only a few.

We need more media voices, not fewer.

November 24, 2017 at 9:55 am
Susan Young says:

Monopolies hurt us all. We are losing our democracy to the power of the very rich. Perhaps we will start our own news organizations again someday that will not be controlled by a few wealthy people with a bias.

November 25, 2017 at 2:32 pm
Brooks O’Quinn says:

November 25, 2017 at 9:54 pm
Susan Young says:

You are right, of course. A true democracy has proved to be too cumbersome with every citizen voting on every proposal. So we elect a representative to vote for us. That idea is the one we are losing. We don't have a government of the people, by the people and for the people anymore.

We still have a framework in America to save it. I hope people will vote to do it.

November 24, 2017 at 11:30 am
Ed Tilley says:

Thank you for posting this article. I find it so frustrating with local news. I subscribe to the Raleigh News and Observer and check the Charlotte paper daily. I find many of the same articles in both papers. I live in Wilmington and news coverage is dismal. There is a new entry called Port City Daily which comes via email. I am not sure of their funding, but they have articles that I do not find elsewhere.

November 24, 2017 at 2:07 pm
Ken Rice says:

I was once a young optimist. I am now an old cynic. Like many Americans, I have lost all faith in the ability of my government to do what is right. The FCC is now just one more arm of a corrupt system that only answers to the highest bidders. I believe we have passed the point of no return, and there is no hope that the small number of honest politicians will ever muster enough power to bring about positive change. It seems that the only hope now is a complete collapse of our government, after which, maybe something good will emerge from the rubble.

November 25, 2017 at 2:40 pm
Brooks O’Quinn says:

True, and all Federal agencies have just become an extension of the party in office at any given time. Sadly, if the agencies were set up to run as initially envisioned, without polictical interference, this country would be a better for it. Also, if federal agencies were run by qualified individuals and held to accountability and transparency, I seriously doubt few would gripe about the agencies are their functioning.

November 25, 2017 at 10:52 am
Bruce Stanley says:

I fondly remember when Senator Helms urged conservatives to buy CBS stock so they could become "Dan Rather's boss"!