[IP] Fed. Appeals Court reverses significant parts of the FCC's new Media Ownership Rules
Begin forwarded message:
From: eackerma@xxxxxxxxxxx
Date: June 24, 2004 3:01:19 PM EDT
To: dave@xxxxxxxxxx
Subject: Fed. Appeals Court reverses significant parts of the FCC's new
Media Ownership Rules
Greetings Dave,
The 3rd Circuit Court of Appeals has released a 2-1 opinion in response
to legal challenges to the FCC's relaxed media ownership rules.
http://www.ca3.uscourts.gov/staymotion/033388p.pdf
The opinion is a hefty read, addressing challenges from industry groups
as well as consumer organizations, and siding with each at times.
The majority essentially says the FCC failed to justify its decision or
was inconsistent in some portions of the rules, so the court is sending
the order back to the FCC to write clear justifications and fix
inconsistencies.
The practical impact is that in the mean time, the new rules are on
hold - everyone waits again for definitive guidance from Congress or
revised rules from the FCC.
From the opinion's conclusion:
"Though we affirm much of the Commission?s Order, we have identified
several
provisions in which the Commission falls short of its obligation to
justify its decisions to retain, repeal, or modify its media ownership
regulations with reasoned analysis. The Commission?s derivation of new
Cross-Media Limits, and its modification of the numerical limits on
both television and radio station ownership in local markets, all have
the same essential flaw: an unjustified assumption that media outlets
of the same type make an equal contribution to diversity and
competition in local markets. We thus remand for the Commission to
justify or modify its approach to setting numerical limits.
-Ethan Ackerman
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