What Price for Local News?

Big trouble is brewing, and it’s more threatening to Long Island’s future than any other issue that’s been laid on the table.

The sale of Newsday trumps affordable housing, taxes, energy and even brain drain as the most critical topic affecting Long Island right now, and the reason it takes precedence is quite simple: The flow of information is about to be interrupted. And that is the exact reason the sale of a newspaper should be of utmost concern to the 2.7 million people who call Long Island home.

Potential bidders for the paper surprise no one, as their names have been bandied about for years: Murdoch, Dolan, Zuckerman. What mega-media company would not have an interest in a newspaper that still boasts one of the highest concentration rates in one of the most desirable markets in the country and, until recently, served as the fabled cash cow that helped offset losses at other Tribune Co. newspapers, including the perpetually troubled L.A. Times.

Yet, Newsday and the people of Long Island, deserve better.

Should any of the named prospects take title of Newsday, we face the ramifications of uber media consolidation, at levels unprecedented in our region. Since the Telecommunications Act of 1996, we’ve watched media companies acquire and merge, FCC regulations lessen and newsrooms disintegrate. Much of the M&As are reported to be for reasons of “synergy.” Since 2000, such synergy has borne witness to more than 72,000 media job cuts. If news and information put into perspective is what you want in your local news, you’ll find plenty of wire copy and repackaged content from other media properties in the same family to take the place of what you want, need and expect in your local news. If media companies as local businesses and employers speaks to your interests, you’ll find an incredible track record of downsizing combined with profits going to headquarters, instead of reinvested in the local property and its people.

Under Tribune Co. (prior to Sam Zell’s recent purchase of the company), Newsday has gone from a regional player with a strong track record for carefully chosen, well crafted national and international news, to a daily paper operating without a national desk, no foreign bureaus and a regional and local staff so slimmed down it’s bordering on anorexic. The product has changed greatly. With it, Long Island’s perspective of itself is shifting. Heavy on police blotter and random acts of crime, it’s an eye opener: Despite all the talk of the Island’s stronghold as a sleepy suburbia, those things do happen here. To give credit where it’s due, perhaps Newsday Editor John Mancini’s biggest achievement has been to abruptly awaken this place into recognizing it’s not so sleepy, nor as suburban as it pretends. New York Newsday was once touted as the tabloid in a tutu. Now, its provincial sister paper has turned tabloid, without the benefit, nor the budget, for frills.

What Long Island needs most at this moment is not what any of the Big Three can provide. Mort Zuckerman’s holdings concentrate too much power within the New York metro area, but pale to those of Rupert Murdoch. Murdoch’s News Corp.’s recent acquisition of weeklies in the Bronx, Brooklyn and Queens give his empire too much say in too little space. To acquire the dominate voice on Long Island takes Montauk to New York and turns it into a highway littered with News Corp.-driven information. Conversely, the concept of the Dolan family’s Cablevision acquiring Newsday places total control of the information Long Islanders receive in the hands of two properties, Newsday and News12, squarely in the hands of one owner.

There’s another aspect of information control that seldom sees the light of day: it has nothing to do with how a story is covered and has everything to do with which stories are ignored. Reporters won’t cover stories that present a conflict of interest, and editorial writers face the same dilemma. The conflicts increase as media companies are bought by larger entities. Depending on how centralized a media company, certain topics may be mandated as off limits. It’s a much more subtle threat to the free flow of information, yet it happens.

While the price of Newsday’s worth may be speculated between $300 million to $1 billion, those numbers don’t and can’t reflect its true value in the right hands. What is the real value to keep a region informed and therefore, vibrant and competitive? What would you pay for someone to trust your word? Local news is a valuable natural resource, just like the water you drink and the air you breathe. Information has the ability and the power to open your mind to new ideas, solutions and philosophies. The power of the press, when placed in the wrong hands, or too few hands, changes the fundamental concept of all American freedoms and goes straight to the heart of a democratic society. Since 1996, has America been that strong of a country? Recently, we’ve seen war on our own soil. More recently, we’ve lost our super power status and watch as three countries are poised to overtake the United States as the place where your children are guaranteed a better life. A strong, responsible news media keeps society healthy. The formula is proportional.

Is Long Island so strong we can afford to lose our only daily newspaper to big media?

We’ve seen what media consolidation has done across America, and Long Island has been bleeding all along: Our 19 commercial radio stations have not one news reporter among them, leaving us highly vulnerable in times of emergency. Put into such context, it’s imperative that Newsday end up in the hands of an independent owner who values Long Island. That won’t happen under the helm of a mega-media company.

Like it or not, Long Island’s future is tied directly to Newsday’s future. And now that our lone daily is no longer quietly being shopped around for prospective buyers, what happens next has the power to change your life.

What can you do to help? Ask your friends and family to read this piece. Forward it to your local politicians and the FCC, and let them know you care about the quality of your local news and you need a local daily newspaper that cares about Long Island.

Big News, Little Coverage, No Surprise

On Tuesday, the biggest news of the day never made the headlines.

That’s because the news was about the news itself -- and how the FCC gave a gift to the media and a lump of coal to the public.

It was on Tuesday that, despite public outcry to the contrary, the FCC loosened its broadcast-newspaper cross ownership rule. The rule, created in the ‘70s, was meant to protect and ensure a diversity of voices within a market.

Times have changed.

At the FCC today, there’s no concern for diversity of any kind, whether it be voices or demographics. Now, this ruling change has ushered in the ability for big media to get bigger and – can you imagine? – your news to have even less substance.

With Newsday owned by the Tribune Co., which also owns the CW 11 here in the New York market, the Trib needed the ruling change in order for the company to be sold. But on Nov. 30, the FCC voted to allow Tribune a waiver from the cross-ownership ban. Yesterday, the FCC announced more than 40 waivers have been granted. Clearly, the Trib’s needs were just the tip of the iceberg.

FCC Chair Kevin Martin argued that the cross-ownership ban was unnecessary in today’s marketplace, what with the rise of the internet as a communications medium – and all those cable channels.

But the reality is, the Internet as a source for public opinion and debate came about in reaction to media consolidation. Disenfranchised and disheartened by not having a place to tell their truths, bloggers and citizen journalists were born. And, yes, while we could argue there is a cacophony of voices available to anyone with a computer, those voices have few followers and not everyone has a computer. Hovering on the horizon, too, is a movement to silence the Internet, as four companies stand to gain control of the content. If that happens, your searches will bring you content preferred by advertisers -- and gone will be what had momentarily, at least, been a promising frontier for free speech. It should come as no surprise: Anyone who’s watched independent bookstores, movie theatres and even local coffee shops be replaced by national chains can easily see how our media now suffers in the same manner. Lacking depth and breadth of knowledge, news today offers immediate information instead of perspective.

As for having hundreds of channels and more choices than ever, what we really have is more delivery channels and less news coming at us from fewer people with less experience. Every time a media outlet consolidates, the news staff is among the first to be cut. Out the door goes the institutional knowledge, the street smarts and the product itself. Next goes investigative journalism: the kind of news that tells you where your tax dollars are really going, what’s happening inside your children’s schools and whether or not your drinking water is safe.

If we have so many options and varied voices, and our media is as healthy as the FCC claims it is, then how does a story such as the “miracle in the mine” happen across the nation? The one that erroneously reported the miners in Sago were still alive? The same story ran on cable and broadcast, and in your daily newspapers. When all was said and done, the media took pride in noting which outlet broke the misinformation first.

Clearly, something rotten’s in Denmark.

Here on Long Island, we could be the poster child for the ills of media consolidation. While we boast 19 very commercial radio stations and, in fact, are home to the 18^th largest radio market in the country, what do they offer in the way of public interest, convenience and necessity? Nothing. Without one single radio news reporter on the Island today, our local radio stations are indistinguishable and local only in location, not content. The middle-of-the-night or wee-hour of the morning public affairs programming leans heavily toward the advertorial. Uninspired marketing, at best. Insipid talk, at worst.

Newsday, which had been the source for Island media to follow, has marched from a daily with acclaimed international and national reporting (and flawed local news) and blossomed into a local shopper filled with AP Wire and syndicated reports (and even less, but still flawed local news). The product tells the tale: The foreign bureaus have all closed, the Washington, D.C. and Albany staffs have been cut, and the local news desks continue to bleed. As Newsday’s localism diminishes, a trickle down effect is taking place at other local news outlets that relied on Newsday to pave the way.

What’s intriguing is how the FCC has patted itself on the back this year for being so responsive and holding multiple public hearings. But, with the public typically given about five days notice before a public hearing and thus having little time to prepare and present, these forums have become an expected exercise in futility. That’s why it speaks volumes about public dissatisfaction with today’s media when a public hearing attracts so many with so much to say that the meeting continues well into the night, as we’ve seen happen this year. It’s also noteworthy that the FCC seldom sees how its decisions play out on the street: The information they review is so whitewashed and limited they can’t understand what the fuss is all about.

This is what it’s all about: It’s about having what appears to be hundreds of channels and choices, but what is really nothing but repackaged content and syndicated generalizations of interest to no one and of great consequence to everyone.

Perhaps Martin thought his last-minute, push-through vote would escape public attention, what with everybody busy with the holidays and all. But not so fast. Yesterday the House introduced the “Media Ownership Act of 2007,” which promises to overturn this new ruling. (The Fair Media Council continuously files comments with the FCC, politicians and supports like-minded organizations on issues such as these, but we encourage you to let your individual voice be heard, too. Tell us what you think.)

One of the great ironies is this: Regulation is at odds with a free press. So maybe the public would be better served if the FCC quit trying to rewrite already-broken rules (as the need for those 42 waivers would attest), and instead demand the media explain why they deserve the right to rent the public airwaves in exchange for half a trillion dollars a year?

Or, by looking at the makeup of their designated media markets which, like technology and population patterns, have grown up over the years and redefine those that don’t make sense? For example, Long Island and other outlying areas around the country that have unusual and highly demanding needs in times of emergencies? Perhaps, too, if we were to look at media from an economic standpoint, which the FCC does: come up with a formula that allows companies of all sizes an equal chance at owning a company that happens to distribute news and information? How intriguing that the Free Enterprise system relies on the success of small, medium and large businesses in order to prosper, yet Free Enterprise and American media have nothing to do with one another. If, too, we are to buy the argument that so much has changed since the ‘70s that the current rules don’t work, then maybe it is time for cable to be regulated, and the playing field finally leveled for broadcasters. After all, Gen Y and even latter-born Gen Xers don’t know there’s a difference between cable and broadcast, so why hold on to more boundaries that don’t work?

Perhaps, if the FCC looked closely enough, they’d find their laissez-faire attitude has done great things for big media, but nothing for the people in need of localized news that can help them live better lives. Much in the same way mass-produced movies, books and cups of coffee have robbed us of untold cultural experiences.

Explainer: Why You Need Net Neutrality

Net neutrality took quite a hit this week, and that's a huge problem to anyone using the Internet.
You probably haven't read much about it because, like most media-centric issues, net neutrality's just not on the radar screen of the mainstream media. And that's a shame, because keeping the Internet neutral is something that affects you and your ability to access information.
In fact, it's probably one of the those things you take most for granted: You want to find out about something, so you start up the laptop and log on to a search engine, like Google. You put in a keyword or two, and soon you get a mind boggling assortment of direct hits, as well as some odds and ends.
Now, what if I told you that, soon, this may change. If we lose net neutrality, what will happen when you try to perform the same kind of search is this: the information that comes up will be dictated by advertisers, or the information will be prioritized by what your broadband provider wants you to know.
Let me guess: Right now, you're wondering if, one, you just read what you read (you did, but feel free to read it again, if you want) and two, if you're still in America (yes or, at least, what's left of the Land of the Free).
Now that you know how the issue of net neutrality affects you, here's where the issue stands. This past week, the U.S. Justice Department told the FCC in a filing that net neutrality could get in the way of Internet development or, at least, slow it down. In effect, it was a vote for anti-net neutrality, as the DOJ laid out the welcome mat for business to trample over the rights of the consumer. (The "Communications Opportunity, Promotion and Enhancement Act of 2006,” or COPE Act, was introduced to the Senate as an update to the Telecommunications Act of 1996. Included in the COPE Act (S. 2628) is broadband consumer rights, but the bill, which was introduced in 2006, remains stalled in the Senate.)
But, that's not all.
What's incredibly troubling about all of this is that the Internet falls into the hands of a handful of major companies: AT&T, Comcast, Verizon and Time Warner, leaving the Internet even more consolidated than radio broadcasting, which has left us without news but with plenty of predictable playlists.
Actually, a handful of companies not only control radio, but television, too. With the FCC's attempts to throw out the ban on the old cross-ownership rules, these same handful of companies have been at work buying up our newspapers, too. Now, without net neutrality to protect you and me, we stand to lose the last frontier of freedom, where everyone and anyone who logged on could tell their story, share their thoughts and, in the process, be equal to one another.

Latest On Local News

Media reform is now a hot topic. The controversy over controlling the internet, combined with the recent changes of who's in control in Washington, D.C., has culminated in making media reform the equivalent of the new black for the spring of 2007.

The sudden public interest in what we do all day inspired us to kick off 2007 by introducing you to our Media Savvy Bill of Rights, with 10 rights and responsibilities created specifically with you in mind. The bill of rights serves as the perfect springboard for what else we’ll be introducing this year.

There’s also much talk about media ownership and what the FCC will do to revise the rules that enabled big media to grow bigger. Even the Fairness Doctrine is back on the table. With all these issues suddenly front and center, now’s the time to address where we stand and, with your help, where we’re heading.

To begin with, "reform" is a word with a bad rep.

That’s why we use “advocacy” when we discuss how media needs to change. It gives what we do a connotation that we’re working for you, the public, with a positive outlook that improvement is possible. Reform? Well, that makes it sound like the solution involves giving someone a good smack.

Your garden-variety media reformistas will tell you the problem with our society is that a handful of companies control the media you watch, read and hear. While it’s true the era of media consolidation has dwindled ownership down to about six companies accounting for the majority of your news and information, there’s much more to it than that. So, please, read on.

For the record, the Fair Media Council is anti-consolidation. We always have been. Not because we believe in limiting someone’s business success, but because people need a variety of news and information sources in order to understand the issues at play and how what’s happening will affect their lives. People also need a variety of opinions from a diverse array of people in the news and information they receive.

One of the huge problems with media consolidation is the repackaging of content: same information, just presented differently. Helps to fill time and space, and it’s cost effective, too. But the formula fails when it reaches the public because, despite having 600 channels and plenty of free publications to pick up, the public is suffering from information starvation. There’s lots of white noise out there, but there’s a dearth of reliable, credible information offered up in a manner that provides the perspective of how the information impacts those who work and live real lives.

Aside from content considerations, the current media ownership rules make it impossible for small and even medium-sized media companies to compete, let alone prosper, alongside media conglomerates. Whatever happened to the theory that the success of the free enterprise system was contingent upon the employment of businesses of all sizes? In our market, we’ve watched our 19 commercial radio stations turn from news and information providers into mere marketing tools. Now, not one of those stations employs a news reporter. Local radio used to have a purpose, but anyone younger than a Gen Xer isn’t able to remember that.

With the vast majority of our local media owned by out of towners, here’s something else to think about: Where are your advertising dollars going? There was a time when they stayed here, to strengthen your local economy. Now, they go to corporate, to make shareholders happy.
Like media consolidation, cross ownership creates a similar litany of ills within a marketplace. Tribune Co.’s owning Newsday and CW11 is problematic for many of the reasons stated above.
But the state of media policy is only one part of the equation that affects the quality of your local news, and this is where we differ from other media reform organizations.


We believe there are three, equally important parts to the formula for improving media: media policy, education and accountability.


Educating the public about media is vital to creating a media literate society, one that can readily distinguish between news and opinion, as well as news and advertisements. Most people can’t recognize the difference between a news show and a talk show, or a news story and a column.

The problem, of course, is that we don’t have an education standard in our education system for teaching media literacy, yet we live in a country built on the premise of freedom of the press and freedom of speech. You’re just supposed to know, by osmosis, what that means. If adults have such issues with the media delivered into their households, how will their children fare?

Last, but certainly not least, is media accountability. Holding the media accountable for what it publishes and broadcasts is imperative to improving local news coverage. In order for accountability to happen, the public has to be educated on how media works and what to do when it fails. Inside newsrooms, receiving no complaints translates into everything was just fine with the news. We know that’s not true. That’s why we’re here, to help.

To that end, in 2007 you’ll see us unveil a new local news monitoring project. We’ll be monitoring the news in the market for news you need versus the news that’s being delivered to you. We call it “big-picture monitoring.” It’s vastly different from other news monitoring projects happening around the country, which focus on singular stories or the amount of time or space a story is given.

Also on tap: our expansion into Queens and beyond.

With so much happening already, 2007 is going to be interesting. Join us now. Be an advocate for improving your local news coverage.