Notes for October 1

Sorry this is late, but here are the notes:

2) Magazines
A. Tend to have a much smaller circulation.
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3) Radio
A. Began commercial operation in 1920s and made celebrities out of news personalities.
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4) Television
A. Grew explosively after the end of World War II.
B. Increased visibility of broadcast journalists and promoted careers of politicians who learned to use the medium.
C. Extensively used for campaign advertising.
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5) Modern forms of group media include fax transmission and the Internet.
A. Fax
B. Internet 1) Began to explode in the mid-1990s with the development of “browser” technology. 2) Today “blogs” and list servers devote much to political topics and provide and interactive forum for people to express and react to political opinions. 4) Newspapers, magazines, radio, and the television maintain websites with late-breaking news—like school closure for snow.
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The mass media are privately owned in the United States and has more implications than first meets the eye.

1) Private ownership of the mass media gives the news industry more political freedom in the U.S. than in most other countries. A. But private ownership also makes the media more dependent on advertising for profits. B. Political news stories are judged for their newsworthiness. i) Newsworthiness means audience appeal. Led to the introduction of infotainment—the mixing of journalism with theater. Can be defined in terms of potential.

2) Media owners acquire additional media outlets to increase their profits. A. The result has been a growing concentration of ownership in both print and broadcast journalism. B. Fears of concentrating broadcast media under a single ownership had led to government regulation of ownership patterns.
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Government regulation of the broadcast media historically has addressed three aspects of this operation and has witnessed two political eras.

1) The 1934 Communications Act created the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) and formed the basis for media regulation for more than 60 years.
A. Technical regulations arose because of the limited number of frequencies available for broadcasting.
B. The FCC has also regulated the ownership of electronic media. These regulations were essentially lifted by the Telecommunications Act of 1996; now there are no limits on the number of TV stations one company may own, so long as that company does not extend beyond 35% of the nationwide TV market. The 21st century has begun with a flurry of mega-mergers (like AOL/Time Warner).
C. The FCC has also regulated broadcast content. (Content regulation has only applied to broadcasters, not newspapers, because broadcasters use the public airways and must obtain a license from FCC.) Howard Stern’s problems fall into this category.
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Under the 1934 Communications Act:
1) The equal opportunities rule provides that a station must make available an equal amount of time under the same conditions to all political candidates.
2) The reasonable access rule required stations to make their facilities available to conflicting views from all responsible elements in the community.
3) A U.S. Court of Appeals struck down both the equal opportunities rule and reasonable access rule in 2000.
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Many charges began to undermine the basis for the 1934 Communications Act.
A. Technological change.
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The content of radio and TV is still regulated in a way that newspapers and magazines are not.
A. Equal Time Rule: Required a station selling time to one candidate for office to make the same amount of time available for the other.
B. Right-of-reply Rule
C. The Fairness Doctrine was in place for many years but was abolished by FCC in 1987. Most broadcasters still follow this rule voluntarily.
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The media make the news by deciding what to report as news.

1) Major news media maintain journalists in major cities and government centers to report (Leaks and trial balloons are special cases.).

A. Washington, DC, has the largest press corps of any city in the world—over 6,000 reporters. B. White House correspondents rely heavily on info they receive in the pressroom in the West Wing of the White House. C. They receive stories routinely through news releases, news briefings, and news conferencing. D. Reporters are expected to observe rules associated with news given “on background” (Info given can be used but source cannot be named) and “off the record” (Info cannot be printed or broadcasted). E. The White House feeds reporters the information and photo opportunities they need. F. Fewer reporters regularly cover Congress, which does not maintain as tight control over news stories as the White House does. G. TV coverage of the House of Representatives and Senate has attracted a small but loyal audience.

2) Media executives, news editors, and prominent reporters set the political agenda and function as gatekeepers in presenting the news and deciding which excerpts to report and how to handle their elements.

A. Network TV is partially operated under server time limitations, and the average news story lasts about one minute. B. Cable TV has made round-the-clock news reporting possible. C. TV news devotes far more time to the president than to Congress or the Supreme Court. D. The media tend to personify issues for the purpose of audience appeal. G. Many news events are staged as media events to attract coverage because of the audience appeal and to gain more press coverage. H. TV news is particularly partial to news that has visual impact. E. The result in covering election campaigns in horse race journalism, which focuses on “who’s ahead” rather than on what the candidate stands for.