The FCC’s localism report has attracted massive controversy as to whether it was inappropriately scotched by the FCC. By contrast, there has been remarkably little attention on its substance. “Do Local Owners Deliver More Localism?: Some Evidence From Local Broadcast News,” was written in 2004, apparently by FCC staffers Peter Alexander and Keith Brown. Using a 1998 database from the University of Delaware, the authors looked at how the ownership of television stations affects the amount of news they deliver. The headline finding was that stations that are locally-owned have some 5.5 minutes more of local news on their half-hour news programs, and over 3 minutes more of local on-location news. Because of this finding–which points to a possible downside to national chains of TV stations– the FCC allegedly killed the study.
But, as Matthew Laser–an author and former Pacifica Radio reporter–argued today, the report is actually much more complicated than the headlines suggest. He points out that several aspects of this study undercut the advocates of strict ownership limits. The study found that television stations that also own a radio station in the same market provide more news than those without such cross-ownership. It also found that television station/newspaper cross-ownership was not found to be a significant factor in the amount of local news provided.
Perhaps most striking, the report concedes that more local news may not always be a good thing. “For example,” it suggests, “if the local [television] owners also develops real estate locally, they may cover the local zoning board in a way that favors the owners’s real estate interests.”
In fact, the report does not address perhaps the biggest question: do viewers actually want more local content? This issue is addressed only in a footnote of the study, which simply states that “non-local content may be more appealing to viewers than local content.”
In this regard, the study tracks much of the current debate: policymakers determine what content is preferred, with only occasional nods to whether consumers object. Its a topsy-turvy analysis: instead of defining success, consumer preferences are seen as potential obstacles to it. This really is more complicated than it seems.
The Technology Liberation Front is the tech policy blog dedicated to keeping politicians' hands off the 'net and everything else related to technology.
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