mauro's blog

Apparently Charter's TV 3 is running on two channels this evening overriding the educational access channel 11 and on it's own channel 3. We noticed this occuring from about 6PM, or possibly earlier, to this moment at about 10:50PM Charter's TV 3 seems to be airing on the WPS channel 11 commercials and all. It seems to be a connection problem. We received complaints from west side viewers. So we are not certain the problem is visible everywhere.

It reminds me, about a year and a half ago, after hundreds of petitioners asked the City Manager to negotiate for WCCA to be seen county wide, Charter's reps at a Public Service and Transportation hearing said it couldn't be done. Well it can, as we always knew, and tonight everyone can see it. The connection seems to be there. Recently there was some controversy surrounding public access show produced in Northbridge. The Producer of that show also apparently purchases time on Charter's TV 3. Her show was scheduled to cable cast at 2:30 AM on Saturday. Hopefully it will be rectified before the controversial Dudular TV airs on the Worcester's educational channel. Most likely someone else is paying attention to this apparent SNAFU.

Read the article which is embedded with links for the full effect.

Worceser Lust

• Having trouble reading my usually long rants?
• Maybe War and Peace seems like to much of a chore?
• Are we becoming a society that barely has the patience to read bulleted information?
• Is Google making us stupid? Click here to find out.

Bunnie speaks up righteously for PEG

Scroll her blog and look for " YES, I Mean You "

My comment:
I am sure there are some who are very sincere about media reform, and perhaps we in the Public Access community need to be more proactive in asserting our voice in this movement. However, if the "Media Reform Movement" does not take a much stronger stance in support of Public Access, and to recognize it as a corner stone of electronic democratic media then they will continue to look hypocritical and self serving. In this electronic media age, after radio, PEG has evolved to be one of the first democratic, participatory, community media ,"reform" movements in the country.

Enabling your childhood dream and helping others do it also.

Carnegie Mellon Professor Randy Pausch, who is dying from pancreatic cancer, gave his last lecture at the university Sept. 18, 2007, before a packed McConomy Auditorium. In his moving talk, "Really Achieving Your Childhood Dreams," Pausch talked about his lessons learned and gave advice to students on how to achieve their own career and personal goals.

What would we be without a dream?

Thanks to John S. for sharing this.

( NOTE: Elected public officials, and municipal and state administrators have a responsibility to know about this. MD)
Barbara Popovic , Chicago Public Access ( WCCA's counterpart in the windy city) writes :
Preliminary findings from the survey on the Harm to Public, Educational and Government (PEG) Access from State Video Franchising Laws were presented at a meeting with FCC Commissioners Copps and Adelstein at the National Conference for Media Reform (NCRM) in Minneapolis on Friday, June 6. The survey was circulated and results compiled by Michael Eisenmenger on behalf of the ACM's Public Policy Work Group. That report will be expanded and presented soon to the ACM membership and will be available for visits to legislators.

PEG folks who attended the meeting at NCRM shared experiences with the Commissioners regarding what has happened since the advent of statewide franchises. California, Georgia, Florida, North Carolina, Ohio, Michigan, Wisconsin, and Illinois were among the states that reported. PEG reps from Vermont, New York, Minnesota and the DC area also reported on issues of concern. The testimonials were powerful and gave the Commissioners a snapshot of issues occuring around the country.

There are reports of loss of funding, loss of channels, facility closures, channel slamming, franchise fees, reduced quality and functionality of PEG channels compared to commercial channels, PEG fees being redirected to local gov, and in the case of Illinois where PEG language is the strongest, lack of compliance by AT&T on PEG carriage.

We discussed with the Commissioners ways that the FCC can address the problems that are multiplying. Commissioner Copps reinforced the importance of continuing to collect the data and said that the preliminary report was very helpful. Commissioner Adelstein said that PEG Access is fundamental to our democracy, especially when commercial media is moving away from local coverage and should not be sacrificed in the name of competition. He wants to see regulations get back to what Congrss intended with PEG available in basic service tier at the lowest reasonable rate.

On Saturday at Future of Media Policy panel the day after the PEG meeting, both Commissioners referenced concerns about the attacks on PEG. Commissioner Adelstein said in regards to PEG, "the one media that is trying to be local is being decimated and its just not right." Commissioner Copps mentioned PEG access as one of the remedies for getting more noncommercial media on the air - content the markets won't produce but society requires. (Thanks Lauren-Glenn for those notes.)

I want to extend my thanks to those able to attend this meeting and my apologies if you were at the conference and didn't get word about this. I'm sure there will be future opportunities as we need to continue to shine the light on these critical issues for PEG and our local communities that depend on it.

Barbara Popovic
Executive Director
Chicago Access Network Television (CAN TV)
322 S. Green St.
Chicago, Illinois 60607

June 8, 2008

*For Immediate Release*

Contact:
Jen Howard, Free Press, (703) 517-6273 (in Minneapolis)
Craig Aaron, Free Press, (202) 441-9983 (in Minneapolis)

*Dan Rather Slams Corporate News at National Conference for Media Reform*

MINNEAPOLIS -- On Saturday, former CBS News anchor *Dan Rather* gave a
blistering critique of corporate news at the National Conference for Media
Reform hosted by Free Press -- the national, nonpartisan media reform group.

The following are Dan Rather's prepared remarks:

I am grateful to be here and I am, most of all, gratified by the energy I have
seen tonight and at this conference. It will take this kind of energy -- and
more -- to sustain what is good in our news media ... to improve what is
deficient ... and to push back against the forces and the trends that imperil
journalism and that -- by immediate extension -- imperil democracy itself.

The Framers of our Constitution enshrined freedom of the press in the very first
Amendment, up at the top of the Bill of Rights, not because they were great fans
of journalists -- like many politicians, then and now, they were not -- but
rather because they knew, as Thomas Jefferson put it, that, "If a nation expects
to be ignorant and free... it expects what never was and never will be."

And it is because of this Constitutionally protected role that I still prefer to
use the word "press" over the word "media." If nothing else, it serves as a
subtle reminder that -- along with newspapers -- radio, television, and, now,
the Internet, carry the same Constitutional rights, mandates, and
responsibilities that the founders guaranteed for those who plied their trade
solely in print.

So when you hear me talk about the press, please know that I am talking about
all the ways that news can be transmitted. And when you hear me criticize and
critique the press, please know that I do not exempt myself from these criticisms.

In our efforts to take back the American press for the American people, we are
blessed this weekend with the gift of good timing. For anyone who may have been
inclined to ask if there really is a problem with the news media, or wonder if
the task of media reform is, indeed, an urgent one... recent days have brought
an inescapable answer, from a most unlikely source.

A source who decided to tell everyone, quote, "what happened."

I know I can't be the first person this weekend to reference the recent book by
former White House Press Secretary Scott McClellan, but, having interviewed him
this past week, I think there are some very important points to be made from the
things he says in his book, and the questions his statements raise.

I'm sure all of you took special notice of what he had to say about the role of
the press corps, in the run-up to the war in Iraq. In the government's selling
of the war, he said they were -- or, I should say, we were "complicit enablers"
and "overly deferential."

These are interesting statements, especially considering their source. As one
tries to wrap one's mind around them, the phrase "cognitive dissonance" comes to
mind.

The first reaction, a visceral one, is: Whatever his motives for saying these
things, he's right -- and we didn't need Scott McClellan to tell us so.

But the second reaction is: Wait a minute... I do remember at least some
reporters, and some news organizations, asking tough questions -- asking them of
the president, of those in his administration, of White House Press Secretary
Ari Fleischer and -- oh yes -- of Scott McClellan himself, once he took over for
Mr. Fleischer a few months after the invasion.

So how do we reconcile these competing reactions? Well, we need to pull back for
what we in television call the wide shot.

If we look at the wide shot, we can see, in one corner of our screen, the White
House briefing room filled with the White House press corps... and, filling the
rest of the screen, the finite but disproportionately powerful universe that has
become known as "mainstream media" -- the newspapers and news programs, real and
alleged, that employ these White House correspondents -- the news organizations
that are, in turn, owned by a shockingly few, much larger corporations, for
which news is but a minuscule part of their overall business interests.

In the wake of 9/11 and in the run-up to Iraq, these news organizations made a
decision -- consciously or unconsciously, but unquestionably in a climate of
fear -- to accept the overall narrative frame given them by the White House, a
narrative that went like this: Saddam Hussein, brutal dictator, harbored weapons
of mass destruction and, because of his supposed links to al Qaeda, this could
not be tolerated in a post-9/11 world.

In the news and on the news, one could, to be sure, find persons and views that
did not agree with all or parts of this official narrative. Hans Blix, the
former U.N. chief weapons inspector, comes to mind as an example. But the burden
of proof, implicitly or explicitly, was put on these dissenting views and
persons... the burden of proof was not put on an administration that was
demonstrably moving towards a large-scale military action that would represent a
break with American precedent and stated policy of how, when, and under what
circumstances this nation goes to war.

So with this in mind, we look back to the corner of our screen where the White
House Press Corps is asking their questions. I have been a White House
correspondent myself, and I have worked with some of the best in the business.
You have an incentive, when you are in that briefing room, to ask the good,
tough questions: If nothing else, that is how you get in the paper, or on the
air. There is more to it than that, and things have changed since I was a White
House correspondent -- something I want to talk about in a minute. But the
correspondents -- the really good ones -- these correspondents ask their tough
questions.

And these questions are met with what is now called, euphemistically and much
too kindly, what is now called "message discipline."

Well, we used to have a better and more accurate term for "message discipline."
We called it "stonewalling."

Now, cut back to your evening news, or your daily newspaper... where that White
House Correspondent dutifully repeats the question he asked of the president or
his press secretary, and dutifully relates the answer he was given -- the same
non-answer we've already heard dozens of times, which amounts to a pitch for the
administration's point of view, whether or not the answer had anything to do
with the actual question that was asked.

And then: "Thank you Jack. In other news today... "

And we're off on a whole new story.

In our news media, in our press, those who wield power were, in the lead-up to
Iraq, given the opportunity to present their views as a coherent whole, to
connect the dots, as they saw the dots and the connections... no matter how much
these views may have flown in the face of precedent, established practice -- or,
indeed, the facts (as we are reminded, yet again, by the just-released Senate
report on the administration's use of pre-war intelligence). The powerful are
given this opportunity still, in ways big and small, despite what you may hear
about the "post-Katrina" press.

But when a tough question is asked and not answered, when reputable people come
before the public and say, "wait a minute, something's not right here," the
press has treated them like voices crying in the wilderness. These views, though
they might be given air time, become lone dots -- dots that journalists don't
dare connect, even if the connections are obvious, even if people on the
Internet and in the independent press are making these very same connections.
The mainstream press doesn't connect these dots because someone might then
accuse them of editorializing, or of being the, quote, "liberal media."

But connecting these dots -- making disparate facts make sense -- is a big part
of the real work of journalism.

So how does this happen? Why does this happen?

Let me say, by way of answering, that quality news of integrity starts with an
owner who has guts.

In a news organization with an owner who has guts, there is an incentive to ask
the tough questions, and there is an incentive to pull together the facts -- to
connect the dots -- in a way that makes coherent sense to the news audience.

I mentioned a moment ago that things have changed since I was a White House
correspondent. Yes, presidential administrations have become more adept at
holding "access" over the heads of reporters -- ask too tough a question, or too
many of them, so the implicit threat goes, and you're not going to get any more
interviews with high-ranking members of the administration, let alone the
president.

But I was covering Presidents Johnson and Nixon -- men not exactly known as
pushovers. No, what has changed, even more than the nature of the presidency, is
the character of news ownership. I only found out years after the fact, for
example, about the pressure that the Nixon White House put on my then-bosses,
during Watergate -- pressure to cut down my pieces, to call me off the story,
and so on... because, back then, my bosses took the heat, so I didn't have to.
They did this so the story could get told, and so the public could be informed.

But it is rare, now, to find a major news organization owned by an individual,
someone who can say, in effect, "The buck stops here." The more likely motto now
is: "The news stops... with making bucks."

America's biggest, most important news organizations have, over the past 25
years, fallen prey to merger after merger, acquisition after acquisition... to
the point where they are, now, tiny parts of immeasurably larger corporate
entities -- entities whose primary business often has nothing to do with news.
Entities that may, at any given time, have literally hundreds of regulatory
issues before multiple arms of the government concerning a vast array of
business interests.

These are entities that, as publicly held and traded corporations, have as their
overall, reigning mandate: Provide a return on shareholder value. Increase
profits. And not over time, not over the long haul, but quarterly.

One might ask just where the news fits into this model. And if you really need
an answer, you can turn on your television, where you will see the following:

Political analysis reduced to in-studio shouting matches between partisans armed
with little more than the day's talking points.

Precious time and resources wasted on so-called human-interest stories,
celebrity fluff, sensationalist trials, and gossip.

A proliferation of "news you can use" that amounts to thinly disguised press
releases for the latest consumer products.

And, though this doesn't get said enough, local news, which is where most
Americans get their news, that seems not to change no matter what town or what
city you're in... so slavish is its adherence to the "happy talk" formula and
the dictum that, "If it bleeds, it leads."

I could continue for hours, cataloging journalistic sins of which I know you are
all too aware. But, as the time grows late, let me say that almost all of these
failings come down to this: In the current model of corporate news ownership,
the incentive to produce good and valuable news is simply not there.

Good news, quality news of integrity, requires resources and it requires talent.
These things are expensive, these things eat away at the bottom line.

Years ago, in the eighties and the nineties, when the implications of these
cost-trimming measures were becoming impossible to ignore, and the quality of
the news was clearly threatened, I spoke out against this cutting of news
operations to the bone and beyond. Even then, though, I couldn't have imagined
that the cost-cutting imperatives would go as far as they have today -- deep
into the marrow of what was once considered a public trust.

But since the financial resources always seem to be available for entertainment,
promotion, and -- last but not least -- for lobbying... perhaps there is an even
more important reason why the incentive to produce quality news is absent, and
that is: quality news of integrity, by its very nature, is sure to rock the boat
now and then. Good, responsible news worthy of its Constitutional protections
will, in that famous phrase, afflict the powerful and comfort the afflicted.

And that, when one feels the need to deliver shareholder value above all, means
that good news... may not always mean good business -- or so goes the fear, a
fear that filters down into just about every big newsroom in this country.

Now, I have spent my entire life in for-profit news, and I happen to think that
it does not have to be this way. I have worked for news owners who, while they
may have regarded their news divisions as an occasional irritant, chose to turn
that irritant into a pearl of public trust. But today, sadly, it seems that the
conglomerates that have control over some of the biggest pieces of this public
trust would just as soon spit that irritant out.

So what does this mean for us tonight, and what is to be done?

It means that we need to be on the alert for where, when, and how our news media
bows to undue government influence. And you need to let news organizations know,
in no uncertain terms, that you won't stand for it... that you, as news
consumers, are capable of exerting pressure of your own.

It means that we need to continue to let our government know that, when it comes
to media consolidation, enough is enough. Too few voices are dominating,
homogenizing, and marginalizing the news. We need to demand that the American
people get something in exchange for the use of airwaves that belong, after all,
to the people.

It means that we need to ensure that the Internet, where free speech reigns and
where journalism does not have to pass through a corporate filter... remains free.

We need to say, loud and clear, that we don't want big corporations enjoying
preferred access to -- or government acting as the gatekeeper for -- this unique
platform for independent journalism.

And it means that we need to hold the government to its mandate to protect the
freedom of the press, including independent and non-commercial news media.

The stakes could not possibly be higher. Scott McClellan's book serves as a
reminder, and the current election season, not to mention the gathering clouds
of conflict with Iran, will both serve as tests of whether lessons have truly
been learned from past experience. Ensuring that a free press remains free will
require vigilance, and it will require work.

Please, take tonight's energy and inspiration home with you. Take it back to
your desks and your workplaces, to your colleagues and your fellow citizens.
magnify it, multiply it, and spread it. Make it viral. Make it something that
cannot be ignored -- not by the powers in Washington, not by the owners and
executives of media companies.

Write these people. Call them. Send them the message that you know your rights,
you know that you are entitled to news media as diverse and varied as the
American people... and that you deserve a press that provides the raw material
of democracy, the good information that Americans need to be full participants
in our government of, by, and for the people. T

here is energy here, that can be equal to that task, but this energy must be
maintained... if the press -- if democracy -- is to be preserved.

Thank you very much, and good night.

*###*

/Free Press is a national, nonpartisan organization working to reform the media.
Through education, organizing and advocacy, we promote diverse and independent
media ownership, strong public media, and universal access to communications.
Learn more at www.freepress.net

Glad to see Bill is feeling better. In this upcoming InCity Times, Bill shares some insight on Fathers Day.

" Fathers Day : United StatesIn the United States, the first modern Father's Day celebration was held on July 5, 1908, in Fairmont, West Virginia[4][5] or on June, 19th of the same year, in the state of Washington[6].In West Virginia, it was first celebrated as a church service at Williams Memorial Methodist Episcopal Church South, now known as Central United Methodist Church. Grace Golden Clayton, who is believed to have suggested the service to the pastor, is believed to have been inspired to celebrate fathers after the deadly mine explosion in nearby Monongah the prior December. This explosion killed 361 men, many of them fathers and recent immigrants to the United States from Italy. Another possible inspiration for the service was Mothers' Day, which had been celebrated for the first time two months prior in Grafton, West Virginia, a town about 15 miles (24 km) away.Another driving force behind the establishment of the integration of Father's Day was Mrs. Sonora Smart Dodd, born in Creston, Washington. Her father, the Civil War veteran William Jackson Smart, as a single parent reared his six children in Spokane, Washington. She was inspired by Anna Jarvis's efforts to establish Mother's Day. Although she initially suggested June 5, the anniversary of her father's death, she did not provide the organizers with enough time to make arrangements, and the celebration was deferred to the third Sunday of June. The first June Father's Day was celebrated on June 19, 1910, in Spokane, WA.Unofficial support from such figures as William Jennings Bryan was immediate and widespread. President Woodrow Wilson was personally feted by his family in 1916. President Calvin Coolidge recommended it as a national holiday in 1924. In 1966, President Lyndon Johnson made Father's Day a holiday to be celebrated on the third Sunday of June. The holiday was not officially recognized until 1972, during the presidency of Richard Nixon."

Thanks to Bill and also Rose at InCity Times for all they do to help and contribute to build Worcester's neighborhoods.

Don't forget to check out Father's Fest at Institute Park, Saturday afternoon, June 14th. Family fun, and parent resources for all.

The following was copied from the T&G editorial. I thought it was so well written that I felt compelled to share it. Over the past decade, I have gone before the city council, many times, and stated that Public Access, WCCA TV, is about building community through electronic media and empowering individuals with a resource that includes media tools, education, expertise, on a non-discriminatory basis. As I experience the city's consideration to change funding formula to support PEG, which could possibly mean less funding for WCCA, to see the city settle for a five year cable license rather than a ten year, to see a cable license with less benefit for the people than the last ten year contract provided, to see a final cable license that leaves the existing PEG channels pitted against themselves, it seems to me, that perhaps we are experiencing a microcosm of what Mary's editorial letter speaks so well about. Remember WCCA TV is more about building lives, and community through electronic media that it is about making that slick action tabloid news or making huge mega profits.Inclusiveness and Community is the heart of everything we do. Why is WCCA or even public access threatened? Perhaps Mary can shed some light on that.

"Capitalism at the core of society’s ruination

Our society is in profound crisis, for it is suffering from end-stage capitalism. Franklin Delano Roosevelt, America’s greatest president, had the instinctive genius to recognize that unless capitalism was counterbalanced by humanity, it would take the country down with it, for at its core lies sadism.

Absolute capitalism always leads to absolute social sadism, just as power without limits and accountability always turns diabolical.

Unregulated capitalism has turned America into a madhouse of the predators and the preyed upon, the shakers and the shaken down, the shills and their victims, a nation able to build only casinos and prisons because it cannot build lives.

When greed goes nuclear and profit becomes the only remaining social value, a mass psychosis develops. The society starts moving at the speed of greed, becoming increasingly manic, demanding work without rest and war without peace. Art and leisure are sacrificed to a concentration camp-style 24/7 work culture.

The need to punish, brutalize, imprison and extort grows more intense, for rage is a byproduct of end-stage capitalism. The society grows more unresponsive to the needs of the public, more authoritarian and abusive until the impulse toward a police state and the declaration of martial law become irresistible.

The society’s leader starts exhibiting signs of profound mental disturbance, claiming the powers of a sun god, while America’s flag flies for the torture of fellow human beings and imprisonment without trial or charges.

All that remains is the collapse into depression."

MARY JARVIS

Gardner

A good link to a very interesting read about the recession.
LINK