MEDIA AND GOVERNMENT

CONTENT:

1. Government Regulation of Media2. The Law and Mass Media Messages3. Censorship and Freedom of Speech4. Intellectual Property Issues in the Mass

Media5. Digital Democracy and Its Possible

Effects6. Media Influence on Laws and

Government

GOVERNMENT REGULATION OF MEDIA

MAJOR REGULATORY AGENCIES

Under the auspices of the federal government,

these agencies—1. the FTC, 2. the Federal Radio Commission (FRC),3. the FCChave shaped American media and their interactions with both the government and audiences.

FEDERAL TRADE COMMISSION(FTC)

Founded on September 26, 1914, the FTC

came into being when President Woodrow Wilson

signed the FTC Act into law, creating

an agency designed to

“prevent unfair methods of

competition in commerce.”

FEDERAL RADIO COMMISSION(FRC)

First established with the passage of the

Radio Act of 1927, the FRC was intended to “bring order to the

chaotic situation that developed as a result of the breakdown of earlier wireless acts passed during the

formative years of wireless radio

communication.”

FEDERAL COMMUNICATIONS COMMISSION (FCC)

The FCC has been “charged with

regulating interstate and international

communications by radio, television,

wire, satellite and cable.”

Media Consolidation

THE LAW AND MASS MEDIA MESSAGES

Media law comprises two areas: 1. telecommunications

law, which regulates radio and television broadcasts;

2. print law, which addresses publications such as books, newspapers, and magazines.

Media laws involve FirstAmendment protections. This section explores several areas of media law: privacy, libel and slander,copyright and intellectual property, freedom of information, and equal time and coverage.

THE FAIRNESS DOCTRINE• was enacted in 1949, when

applications for radio broadcast licenses outpaced the number of available frequencies.

• the FCC thus instituted the Fairness Doctrine to “ensure that all coverage of controversial issues by a broadcast station be balanced and fair.”

DMCA• The DMCA does allow

webcasting (the broadcasting of media over the Internet) as long as webcasters pay licensing fees to the companies that own the material.

• while it requires websites to remove copyrighted material, it does not require websites to monitor their content. A 3-year-long court battle between media giant Viacom and the Google-owned website YouTube was recently waged over this factor.

Censorship is defined as suppressing or

removing anything deemed objectionable.

A common, everyday example can be

found on the radio or television, where

Potentially offensive words are “bleeped”

out. More controversial is censorship at a

political or religious level. If you’ve ever

been banned From reading a book in school, or watched a “clean” version

of a movie on an airplane, you’ve

experienced censorship.

CENSORSHIP AND FREEDOM OF SPEECH

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances. This is less of

a concern to some countries, such as China. However, modern communication capabilities can affect free speech in a lot of ways, both enhancing and diminishing, depending on how it is used. No matter how you look at it, freedom of speech will be affected in every country.

ONLINE CREATIVITY AND INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY RIGHTS

Congress passed the Digital Millennium Copyright Act in 1998 to establish a protocol for online copyright matters. Yet the nature of the Internet causes very different copyright and intellectual property issues than older forms of media do. Because of the ease of sharing information online, for example, the DMCA has not worked as Congress expected.

Copying and sharing materials online is relatively simple and,

assuch, piracy and rights infringement run rampant. In fact, many have argued that

despite the DMCA’sattempt to stop piracy,

in practice, it has done nothing.

THE RIAA VERSUS PIRACYWidespread piracy problems arose during the late 1990s

with the popularization of technology allowing peer-to-peer (P2P)

music sharing. Suddenly, software such as Napster, Scour,

Aimster, AudioGalaxy, popped up on computers everywhere,

allowing access to free music around the world—and fueling online

piracy. However, in 2003, the Recording Industry Association of

America (RIAA) put the laws into practice and began a campaign to

stop music piracy. Rather than go after the Software engineers,

“the RIAA investigators targeted ‘uploaders’—individuals Who

were allowing others to copy music files from their ‘shared’

folders.”

DIGITAL DEMOCRACY AND ITS POSSIBLE EFFECTS

E-democracy (a combination of the words electronic and democracy), or internet democracy, incorporates 21st-century information and communications technology to promote democracy. That means a form of government in which all adult citizens are presumed to be eligible to participate equally in the proposal, development, and creation of laws.[1] E-democracy encompasses social, economic and cultural conditions that enable the free and equal practice of political self-determination.

In an era when work, discourse, and play are increasingly experienced via the Internet, it is fitting that politics have surged online as well in a recent phenomenon known as digital democracy. Digital democracy—also known as This new form of democracy began as an effort to include larger numbers of citizens in the democratic process.

Recent evidence seems to confirm a rising popular belief that the Internet is the most effective modern way to engage individuals in politics. “Online political organizations…have attracted millions of members, raised tens of millions of dollars, and become a key force in electoral politics. Even more important, the 2004 and 2008 election cycles show that candidates themselves can use the Internet to great effect.”

3 advantages of digital democracy: 1. Digital democracy improves political

information retrieval and exchange between governments, public administrations, representatives, political and community organizations and individual citizens.

2. Digital democracy supports public debate, deliberation and community formation.

3. Digital democracy enhances participation in political decision-making by citizens.

MEDIA INFLUENCE ON LAWS AND GOVERNMENT

Media have long had a voice and a role in politics. Some of the earliest newspapers and magazines used their pages as a forum for political discourse. When broadcast media emerged during the 20th century, radio briefs and television reports entered the conversation, bringing political stories to the public’s living rooms.

In addition to acting as a watchdog, media provide readers and viewers with news coverage of issues and events, and also offer public forums for debate. Thus, media support—or lack thereof—can have a significant influence on public opinion and governmental action.

Sometimes the media appear willing or unwitting participants in chasing stories the government wants them to chase; other times politicians find themselves chasing issues that the media has enlarged by its coverage. Over the decades, political scientists, journalists, politicians, and political pundits have put forth many arguments about the media’s power in influencing the government and politicians.