Is Free TV Worth Saving in a 500-Channel World?
The first man on the moon. The assassinations of JFK and John Lennon. Political campaigns and Super Bowl games. Tornado warnings, manhunts, "MASH" and "Joe Millionaire."
Since the 1950s, the free broadcast system has served as the great galvanizer and equalizer, accessible to anyone in the nation owning a rooftop antenna and a TV. Even today, most Americans get their news from TV broadcasters.
Yet some critics say the system is irreparably broken and growing more irrelevant in the face of competition from cable and satellite services, even as the federal government has moved to prop up the broadcast industry.
Monday's vote by the Federal Communications Commission to loosen the rules governing media ownership were, at root, about one thing: "trying to strengthen the foundations of free, over-the-air television," in the words of FCC Chairman Michael K. Powell.
But increasingly, critics are asking some pointed questions: Is broadcast television worth saving, especially when the industry arguably has abandoned the pact struck decades ago -- that is, in exchange for serving the "public interest," TV stations get to use the airwaves for free? Why give broadcasters the ability to become more profitable when many of them no longer air the kind of community-oriented programming that once was their mandate?
Might it make more sense for Uncle Sam to fatten its coffers by taking back the airwaves and selling them to the highest bidder?
Although the notion is radical -- and largely confined right now to a handful of politicians and the think tank crowd -- the numbers are hard to ignore: Selling off the broadcast spectrum to wireless phone companies and other high-tech interests could fetch as much as $400 billion. The proceeds could help fund schools or health care or a public TV system free from commercial influences.
What's more, proponents of the sell-off idea point out that nearly 85% of the nation's households already pay for cable or satellite TV, and their packages typically include the local TV stations and broadcast networks. Given that only 15% of the country relies solely on free, over-the-air TV, many say the spectrum could be put to better uses. (If the spectrum was sold off, the have-nots could be subsidized so they would receive pay television -- what some have dubbed "food stamps for TV.")
