#90: Media Ownership

Tech Policy Podcast

TechFreedom

Technology

4.8 • 45 Ratings

🗓️ 31 May 2016

⏱️ 26 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

The media and advertising markets are more competitive than ever, and it’s been awhile since radio, TV stations, and newspapers were the only games in town. As competition from the Internet is ever increasing, traditional media must adapt. Joint sales agreements (JSAs) allow two broadcast stations to have the same advertising sales force, which can increase efficiency and cuts costs. But the FCC’s media ownership rules have long restricted JSAs and other business practices like having radio and TV stations buy newspapers. Recently, a court threw out the FCC’s JSA rules over the agency’s failure to review its media ownership policies as mandated by Congress. Matthew Berry, chief of staff to FCC Commissioner Ajit Pai, joins the show to discuss the case. Where did the FCC go wrong?

Transcript

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0:00.0	Welcome to the Tech Policy Podcast. I'm Evan Schwarger. On today's show, media ownership. If you want to buy a newspaper, is it simple as that, right? Not so fast. The FCC has a lot of rules restricting
0:21.7	how people own media, how their ad departments work, and recently the Third Circuit
0:26.7	Court of Appeals throughout FCC rules restricting joint sales agreements. What are joint sales
0:31.9	agreements? This actually does affect you. Joining me to discuss this is Matthew Berry,
0:36.8	Chief of Staff to FCC Commissioner Ajit Pye. Matthew, thank you for joining me. Thank you. Joining me to discuss this is Matthew Berry, Chief of Staff to FCC Commissioner
0:38.3	Ajit Pye. Matthew, thank you for joining me. Thank you for having me. And unsuspected and uninvited
0:43.0	is President of Tech Freedom, Baron Soka. Baron, thank you for joining and telling me about 30
0:47.9	minutes before we were about to record that you were joining. You're welcome, as always.
0:51.8	You know, I was getting ready for a different type of podcast, and then I
0:54.7	found out you were coming, so it's just a completely different mindset. So thanks for throwing me off.
0:59.7	Great. Anytime. So, Matthew, before we jump into this topic, let's kind of set the stage of why
1:05.9	media ownership is even a tech policy issue in the first place. What is a joint sales agreement?
1:11.4	Why does this matter?
1:13.0	Well, a joint sales agreement in the television context
1:16.3	is two television stations agreeing to have a joint sales force
1:20.8	to sell advertising on both stations.
1:24.1	And the reason why many stations have entered into JSAs or joint sales agreements is because particularly in smaller or medium-sized markets, the economics of the television industry have changed tremendously over the last 20 to 25 years.
1:44.0	And if stations are going to stay in
1:46.2	business, they have to find efficiencies, they have to find ways to save costs. And one of them is to
1:51.8	share a advertising sales force. So in many smaller medium-sized markets, you've seen JSA's come
1:58.9	into being, and it's had a tremendously positive effect
2:02.5	in terms of allowing television stations not only to stay in business, but to invest in local
	...

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