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Reporters covering the media business love to quote from former FCC chairmen (there’s never been a woman running that agency!). They are seen as expert sources with great “inside the FCC” expertise. But they have conflicts that require disclosure to readers/users, at the very least. Because of the `golden’ revolving door, former agency officials generally end up immediately working for the very media and telecommunications sector which only minutes before they oversaw (allegedly to protect the public interest).

Take, for example, today’s New York Times story quoting Michael Powell about the proposed Sirius and XM satellite radio merger. Powell said that the deal “could get through,” although acknowledged it would be difficult. But Powell should have been identified as a “senior advisor” to the media and telecom buy-out firm Providence Equity Partners. Through his work at Providence, Powell is engaged in helping make media buy-out deals happen. Incredibly, Providence’s deal-making has included an attempted buy-out of the radio conglomerate Clear Channel and Tribune—companies that were under the regulatory purview of Mr. Powell only a short while ago. Last fall, Providence acquired Univision, another company where Powell played a key role at the FCC.

The revolving door of former FCC “experts” is bipartisan. The last Clinton era FCC chair William Kennard is “Managing Director” for “U.S. Buy-out-Telecom and Media” for the Carlyle Group. Kennard is also a director of the New York Times Company.

The very same New York Times writer, who covered the satellite deal, had another story in today’s paper. Providence Equity Partners, Mr. Powell’s firm, has “raised $12 billion for what would be the largest specialized fund in the world…” Powell’s role for Providence wasn’t mentioned in that story either. The frenzy of takeovers that will likely ensure should give Mr. Powell and other former officials working for the industry many more opportunities to be used as an unbiased source.

It’s time Congress did something to address what is ultimately a very corrupt environment at the FCC. Chairs, commissioners, and senior staff should, at the least, be required to pledge they will not seek industry related work for a minimum of five years. The majority of commissioners should not come from industry (sorry K Street!). They should be independent academics, consumer advocates and community media officials. How about an FCC that actually puts real people–not public-and-private deals to be brokered–first!
Sources: “Policy Shift May Benefit Radio Deal.” Andrew Ross Sorkin. New York Times. Feb. 21, 2007
“Equity Firm Said to Raise Big New Fund,” Andrew Ross Sorkin. New York Times. Feb. 21, 2007

One of the pressing issues for the broadband transformation is whether women and persons of color will end up owning sizeable parts of the digital content universe. The cable industry has long cut deals with a few strategic individuals and groups to help advance its monopolistic interests (the telephone giants are doing the same). Deals are made which appear to offer some diversity—but are really about control and the status quo. We think Bob Johnson and BET is a good example of how deals were cut and the promise and potential of our electronic media system to be more diverse was lost. Will this largely repeat itself as the media system is reconfigured to serve the `triple’ play platforms? Will groups and individuals organize so that there will be serious programming, locally and nationally? Here’s a history lesson to help with reflection..

When media titian John Malone backed cable lobbyist Bob Johnson to start BET (Black Entertainment Network), he knew he had found someone who would play ball with the cable and mainstream status quo. As Stephen Keating writes in Cut Throat, his book about the cable industry, Malone said that “Bob seemed like the kind of guy you could invest some money with and he wouldn’t embarrass you…When we thought about starting this, there was always the concern that this kind of channel could become radical and you wouldn’t want your name associated with it.”

In Malone’s “oral history” at the Cable Center, he notes: “Bob Johnson, from Black Entertainment Television, who was on the staff at NCTA, came up to me after an NCTA meeting and said, “Do you think there would be any hope for a black channel aimed at the black demographic.” And I was very enthusiastic about it because we were trying to build in some markets of heavy black neighborhoods and we didn’t have anything to talk to them about. And so we put up what we could afford, a small amount of seed capital…Bob was very successful and he retained majority ownership all the way through, which was quite a testimony to his doggedness, his willingness to keep his budget down and grow the business.”

Indeed, Malone’s TCI used BET to help it win control of very lucrative deals (franchises) from cities with a large diverse population. BET would be, despite Johnson’s stake, a creature of Malone-controlled TCI (Telecommunications, Inc.).

Here’s what Johnson himself said about the cable industry in his oral history (slightly edited): “I would say in the cable industry I was sort of in an industry where it was so few African-Americans that you basically went unnoticed and therefore it was sort of you were just a regular person in the cable industry. There was no reason to talk about black issues unless it was talked about in the context of more employment opportunities that would properly address minority… sort of committee for minority employment…there was never much discussion. There was also a committee to deal with minority ownership, but again, it was politically correct… Sort of a little bit lip service to giving minorities ownership in cable, but nothing was personal in terms of minority issues or racial issues because there were just so few of us. The advantage I had is that I was a known commodity to everybody, so if you go to a cable convention and if you’re black and you happen to be about 5’8″, you were Bob Johnson, no matter who you were… The only thing in the course of my relations with the cable industry… it was all very friendly, very cordial – I don’t think I ever faced directly any kind of race discrimination. Now, I always felt that the cable industry shortchanged us on rate carriage because we were a minority service, and I think they somewhat shortchanged us on giving us more distribution because we were a minority service, as opposed to giving some other channel broader distribution against their demographic.”

Source: Cut Throat: High Stakes and Killer Moves on the Electronic Frontier. Stephen Keating. Johnson Books. 1999.

“A Media Mogul Tries Remote Control.” Ron Stodghill. NYTimes. Feb. 18, 2007.

It’s interesting to think about how both FCC Chair Kevin Martin and his wife, Bush White House aide Catherine J. Martin, view the news media. Kevin–in pursuing his plans for further news media consolidation and his policy for a non-neutral broadband digital system for the U.S.–is ultimately helping undermine a robust (and potentially combative to status quo) news media environment. Much like his predecessor Michael Powell, Kevin Martin isn’t really interested in learning about the facts roiling the news business today–and likely tommorow. Catherine’s role helping the Bush White House spin on the Iraq war–including her testimony about suggesting various leaks and other press manipulations–reveals the Administration’s contempt for the role of the news media. [reg. may be required]. (We know that “spinning” and leaks are non-partisan. But the zeal of this White House to cover-up the truth–and the deadly consequences to so many here and especially abroad–is beyond what can be claimed as politics as usual.) Here is an excerpt from a Los Angeles Times story [Jan. 27, 2007] which discussed Ms. Martin’s testimony in the Scooter Libby trial:

“She described how Cheney was obsessed with Wilson’s criticism, particularly after publication of an op-ed piece in the New York Times and how the vice president ordered a counteroffensive in parts of the press deemed receptive to whatever the administration wanted to dish out concerning the former diplomat. One of the options she recommended to Cheney was an appearance on NBC’s “Meet the Press,” because the program’s host, Tim Russert, would allow the vice president to “control the message.” (Russert, along with a number of reporters whom Libby attempted to make conduits of misinformation, will be testifying later in the trial.)

She also told the court that she suggested that the vice president’s office “leak” information that seemed to undercut Wilson’s credibility to carefully selected reporters at the New York Times and Washington Post, arranged a lunch for Cheney with right-wing commentators and advised him to avoid the New York Times’ Pulitzer Prize-winning columnist Nicholas Kristof because he had “attacked the administration fairly regularly.” Other witnesses this week testified that Libby had been assigned to contact selected reporters deemed receptive to information that might discredit Wilson as a critic and to plant with them anonymously sourced stories.

Martin called the word “leak,” which appeared in her notes as a “term of art” and testified, “If you give it to one reporter, they’re likelier to write the story.”

In the same article quoted above, written by Tim Rutten, media critic at the Los Angeles Times, he aptly writes: “The problem is that Cheney and his former aides aren’t simply contemptuous of the individual reporters or even of the press itself. They’re contemptuous of the principle under which the free press operates ×?’ which is the American people’s right to have a reasonable account of what the government does in their name.”

Both Kevin Martin and the Bush Administration support a communications policy agenda which relies on the fiction that its approach to media ownership and broadband will help strengthen our democracy. It’s a story, I suggest, the public–including the news media–shouldn’t buy.÷š

Just a quick comment. The press focus on the resignation of Cartoon Network’s now ex-president Jim Samples over the viral marketing “terrorist” scare shouldn’t distract from the larger problem. The ad and marketing industries are engaged in a 24/7 branded, viral, word of mouth world. There are even trade associations pushing the dubious cause, such as the “Word of Mouth Marketing Association.” WOMMA has a “who’s who” membership (note that Cartoon Network’s corporate cousin AOL is listed as member.). There is a “Viral & Buzz Marketing Association” as well. VNU’s Nielsen Buzz Metrics company makes money measuring “online buzz.” There are ongoing tie-ins and stunts that confound belief, if not the letter of the law. We will be tracking some here. But folks should be examining the ethics of this emerging and growing field. It’s now a part of the “engagement” process set in place by the marketing/ad industries.

As Google begins working more closely with big brand marketers, expect the `do no harm’ digital behemoth to continue to transform into something less than honorable. Here’s an excerpt from a recent Advertising Age online article [subscription required]:
“In the past three months, Google has visited a couple dozen ad agencies, introducing and demonstrating to chief creative officers and creative directors its suite of products and tools ready to be used in ad campaigns…”I’m not sure Google even knows how to use all of [its tools],” said Rich Silverstein, partner at Goodby, Silverstein & Partners. “They’ve got a lot of tools in their box for ways to connect to their consumers. They’re engineers. They come up with this amazing stuff and then ask, ‘What are we going to do with it?”‘

And that’s the point, Ms. Crow [Google’s director-online branding] said. “We don’t bring the creative ideas. … We show examples of how other people applied these tools.”… She highlights a Saturn campaign born out of one of the first creative meetings with Google’s down-the-road neighbor Goodby, in which a viewer clicks on a city and is flown through the world of Google Earth right through the doors of a local dealership. Google Earth then morphs to Google Video, where the local sales manager greets the viewer and introduces a “test drive,” which is really a 30-second spot.”

Source: “Google to Creatives: Check Out These Toys.” Abbey Klaassen. Jan. 29, 2007

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