CHICAGO MEDIA ACTION NEWSLETTER: November 8, 2004 http://www.chicagomediaaction.org In this month's newsletter: * CAN TV funding ordinance delayed once again, needs support * CMA acts against WTTW and against CBS (on International Media Democracy Day) * CMA holds a Town Hall event, and a television call-in show * Debating for Ratings, cross-ownership, and a possible threat to the Internet (1) ANNOUNCEMENTS * CAN TV's funding ordinance has unfortunately been delayed one more time (this time because of efforts by the cable company Comcast), until Wednesday, December 1. Your support is needed one more time to encourage the City Council to approve Alderman Stone's and Mayor Daley's ordinance to fund CAN TV. (More details follow below in "What's New in Media Politics?".) Chicago residents are encouraged to contact Mayor Daley and City Council representatives to pass this ordinance. Learn how here: http://www.cantv.org/alder1.htm http://www.cantv.org/mayor2.htm If you are a Comcast subscriber, call Comcast at 1-866-594-1234 and encourage Comcast to support the Stone/Daley funding ordinance for CAN TV. * CMA will be participating in a conference entitled "The Future of Public Television" at the Museum of Contemporary Art on December 2-3, 2004. Learn more: http://www.chicagomediaaction.org/pdffiles/CPC_poster_screenproof_1.pdf http://www.chicagomediaaction.org/news.php?id=250 * The next CMA meeting is scheduled for Tuesday, November 9, at 6:30pm, at 3411 W. Diversey, in Chicago (at the intersection of Milwaukee, Diversey, and Kimball, near the Logan Square blue line stop). If you're interested in organizing on media issues in Chicago, this is the place to be. (2) WHAT'S NEW WITH CMA? It's been a busy month for CMA. * CMA organized two protests against the Chicago CBS offices in downtown Chicago, including one on International Media Democracy Day (Monday, October 18). CMA even challenged CBS for their public file. Read more here: http://www.chicagomediaaction.org/news.php?id=242 * CMA has published a magazine article about its 2004 study of WTTW's show "Chicago Tonight", in the October 2004 issue of the magazine "Extra" published by the media group FAIR. You can read the article here: http://www.chicagomediaaction.org/pdffiles/fair_ct_article.pdf * WTTW Channel 11's elite board had a meeting on October 27. It was portrayed as a public meeting, and three members of CMA went. Our little excursion was good and bad. Good - we learned a lot about the station's progress in commercializing WTTW and PBS. Bad - as the public we were treated discourteously, perhaps illegally. Read more: http://www.chicagomediaaction.org/news.php?id=253 * About 180 people attended a special Town Hall organized by CMA at the Chicago Temple on Sunday, October 24, featuring the film "Hijacking Catastrophe", and including a panel with John Nichols (The Nation magazine), Salim Muwakkil (In These Times magazine) and Cliff Kelley (WVON-AM radio). The event was then aired on CAN TV. Read more about the event here: http://www.chicagomediaaction.org/index.php?link=2004-10-24_townhall * CMA also hosted a call-in studio presentation on CAN TV channel 19 on October 31. The presentation featured the film "Hijacking Catastrophe" with filmmaker Sut Jhally participating via telephone. (3) WHAT'S NEW IN MEDIA POLITICS? * The CAN TV funding ordinance faced some challenges. First, the ordinance (after some changes) won Mayor Daley's support, and became known as the Stone/Daley ordinance. Then the ordinance won approval in the Chicago Finance Committee on November 1. But Comcast entered the fray, and Comcast asked for (and got) a 30-day delay of the ordinance from the City Council. But Comcast has not delivered a better proposal, and the impact on Comcast subscribers is negligible. We encourage you to contact the Mayor and the City Council, and ask them to pass this ordinance at the next City Council meeting on December 1. Read more: http://www.cantv.org/update.htm * Legal Actions galore: The Adbusters Media Foundation has filed a lawsuit against four of Canada's largest TV broadcasters for their systematic rejection of Adbusters' social marketing spots on topics including the environment and consumer consumption. Meanwhile, Sinclair Broadcasting (which bent to public pressure and wound up not airing the controversial film "Stolen Honor") is facing a license renewal challenge from Free Press, which is asking for license denial for six Sinclair TV stations. Read more about these efforts: http://adbusters.org/metas/psycho/mediacarta/ http://www.freepress.net/news/5241 (4) FACT OF THE MONTH Todd Schaefer, a political science professor at Central Washington University, report of a study conducted of newspaper editorials on the issue of cross-ownership (where a company could own a newspaper and a TV station in the same city or regional area). In editorials appearing in papers without an ownership stake in broadcasting, 73 percent favored free airtime. But of those editorials in papers with broadcast holdings, only 30 percent favored free airtime. (5) QUOTE OF THE MONTH As Schaefer reported in that study: "Interestingly, none of the papers owning broadcast interests informed their readers of that fact in their editorials." http://www.freepress.net/news/4813 (6) RECOMMENDED WEBSITE http://www.debatingforratings.com Free Press created this short film about how Big Media impacts our political process and elections, and what you can do to help improve things. (7) MORE ANNOUNCEMENTS The Center for Digital Democracy is warning us of a proposal to extend Baby Bell Monopolies to brodband, and thereby threaten the Internet's openness. Learn more, and how you can act, here: http://www.democraticmedia.org/news/washingtonwatch/bellsouth.html *** *** *** *** *** *** *** This is an email from Chicago Media Action, a Chicago activist group devoted to media issues. Chicago Media Action, P.O. 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