16 abril 2003

VITAMEDIAS
US broadcasters' war stance under scrutiny: Rupert Murdoch's Fox network is among the US media giants accused of tailoring its war coverage to curry favour with Michael Powell, the George Bush-appointed chairman of America's media regulator who is facing mounting pressure to scrap media ownership rules.
Mr Powell, the son of US secretary of state Colin Powell, is under intense lobbying pressure from the US broadcasting industry to abolish safeguards that restrict limits on the number of TV and radio stations a company can own in a market.
[act.:] How war coverage helped put Murdoch on a media roll in Bush's America: This is a very good time to be alive if you happen to be Rupert Murdoch. He has just realised his long-held ambition to break into the US satellite television market, securing the purchase of the market leader, DirecTV, after three years of tortuous negotiations with its owner, General Motors (GM).
His cable news channel, Fox News, meanwhile, has come out of the Iraq war stronger than ever. Having already overtaken CNN with its hot-blooded, rabble-rousing style and deferential approach to the Bush administration's every move, it came out as the top-rated cable station – news or non-news – in 36 of the top 40 time-slots from 31 March to 6 April.
Perhaps more significantly, it may be transforming the way Americans get their news in times of crisis. The three main networks – NBC, ABC and CBS – have been losing about two million viewers a night to cable. It is the first time they have seen audiences shrink during a war. [...]
There are more potential windfalls ahead. Mr Murdoch's long-standing campaign to deregulate the media landscape could soon come to glorious fruition in the US, thanks to the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) and its chairman, Michael Powell.