Senate Poised To Tighten Broadcast Ownership Rules - Via American Civil Liberties Union:
Washington, DC – Today, the Senate Commerce Committee is expected to approve a bipartisan resolution, sponsored by Sen. Byron Dorgan (D-ND), which would restore a media ownership rule recently rescinded by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC). The old rule generally restricted a company from owning both a newspaper and a television station in the same city, unless the FCC granted a waiver.
Caroline Fredrickson, Director of the ACLU’s Washington Legislative Office said, “Senator Dorgan’s resolution aims to protect the airing of a multiplicity of voices, which fuels our democracy. Democracy is not served well by a media oligarchy where five or six corporations decide what Americans see in the news. We urge the Commerce Committee to also take up S. 2332, Senator Dorgan’s bill to reverse the media ownership rules to ensure the FCC does not go down this road again.” read more... »
FCC to look into firms' use of customer data - Via Privacy : Tech news from CNET :
Staff at the Federal Communications Commission are expected to recommend that it review rules on how phone and cable companies can use customer information as they try to take business from each other, an FCC official said Friday.
The FCC enforcement bureau will recommend that the commission reject a complaint by cable operators charging that Verizon Communications violated the agency's customer privacy rules by using customer information to prevent them from switching their phone service to cable, an agency official said on condition of anonymity.
Beyond that, the enforcement bureau is expected to recommend that the FCC address more broadly the issue of "customer retention activities" by both phone companies and cable operators to make sure the rules apply equally to both, the official said. read more... »
One phat hi-tech home theatre, gaming system - Via Computerworld Blogs:
If you attend Storage Networking World and walk the exposition floor, you're sure to see more spinning disk subsystems, robotic tape libraries, blinking Fibre Channel switches and screens displaying management software than you can shake a stick at, but the one thing you don't expect to see is one of the nicest home theatre systems money can buy streaming downloaded movies, games and photos through wired and wirelsss links from a consumer-grade server to a state-of-the-art Pioneer 50" plasma 1080p TV. Everyone stopped by this vendor's booth. read more... »
The FCC and media consolidation - Via Salon News : Dec. 3, 2007 | Michael Copps doesn't want to be called a crusader. But as one of the two Democrats on the five-member Federal Communications Commission, he's not shy about sounding biblical. He says he's "blowing a loud trumpet" for a "call to battle" to stop the FCC from giving big media a generous Christmas present.
Copps is trying to defeat FCC chairman Kevin J. Martin's last-minute proposal to loosen media ownership rules, which will be voted on by Dec. 18. As it stands now, a company can't own both a daily newspaper and a broadcast outlet -- a radio or TV station -- in the same market without a waiver. In an Op-Ed piece in the New York Times on Nov. 13, Martin wrote that media companies in the 20 largest markets should be allowed to own both in the same market to bolster journalism. "If we don't act to improve the health of the ... industry," he wrote, "we will see newspapers wither and die ... and have fewer outlets for the expression of independent thinking and diversity of viewpoints." read more... »
DTV Answers : What you need to know about the February 17, 2009 switch to DTV. :
DTVAnswers.com is the official Web site of the National Association of Broadcasters' digital television (DTV) transition campaign. Launched in January 2007, the DTV campaign’s mission is to ensure that no consumer is left unprepared, due to lack of information, for the February 17, 2009 federally mandated transition from analog to digital broadcasting.
Internet Video Copyright Laws Recap: In light of the recent TVLinks shut-down in the UK, I thought we should take a look at the many other cases of lawsuits and shut-downs pertaining to copyright violations on video sites that we have covered here on WebTVWire.
Many sites which link to pirated and copyrighted material on the web have been threatened, and in most cases successfully stopped from the copyright violations they were involved in.
Here are a few discussions on the subject:- read more... »
The Wonderful World of TV Viewed Through HDTV | New Technology Guides: High-definition television or HDTV sets were launched and introduced to the ever insatiable market in 1998. On its launch, HDTV spurred excitement among tech aficionados, sports fans and movie addicts. You must be wondering why. Well, there is a pretty good reason for TV buffs to get excited about the advent of TV through HDTV.
HDTV started the rise of a television paradise because they boasted and impressed consumers with resolutions that are of superior and top quality. HDTV’s superior resolution of course, comes in pair and is complemented by equally superior digital surround sound. read more... »
NBC Universal Fight For Network Filters To Stop Copyright Infringement: "Last month, NBC Universal filed comments in the FCC’s
proceeding on ‘Broadband Industry Practices.’
NBC asked that the FCC require that ISPs institute ‘bandwidth
management tools’, code for network filters, to try to stop the
Internet infringing copyrights. read more... »
Beginner's Guide to HDTV - HDTV Guide, Comparison & Reviews | YouReviewElectronics.com: "One of the biggest and fastest growing trends in electronics is High-Definition (HD) Television. Since the advent of color TV, there haven't been many revolutionary advances when it comes to televisions. TV's are one of the most popular and commonly used electronic devices in most households but we've been subjected to low quality TV signals for years now. Poor quality signals and old tube TV's are slowly dying and HDTV is the hot new trend. But if you've ever been shopping for a new TV or HD service you'll know there are many confusing high tech terms and features. Before you go shopping and possibly spend thousands of dollars on a new high-tech TV, learn some of the basics of HDTV so you know what you're shopping for. read more... »
July 2, 1928: America's First TV Station Goes on the Air: "The picture is grainy and the technology won't last, but TV programming is here to stay.
[...]
1928: W3XK, the first American TV station, begins broadcasting from suburban Washington, D.C.
The station was an outgrowth of the work done by Charles Francis Jenkins in devising a way to transmit pictures over the airwaves, a process he called "radiovision." read more... »