FCC on the Information Needs of Communities

The FCC Working group on the Information Needs of Communities has just released its eighteen-months-in-the-making Future of Media report—now called “The Information Needs of Communities: The Changing Media Landscape in a Broadband Age.” The 365-page report thoroughly assesses the current news media landscape, including policy and regulation, and provides recommendations, some directed at the FCC, others to the broader community of policymakers, philanthropists, and citizens.

From the Report's Overview:

Thomas Jefferson, who loathed many specific newspapers, nonetheless considered a free press so vital that he declared, “Were it left to me to decide whether we should have a government without newspapers or newspapers without a government, I should not hesitate a moment to prefer the latter.” If he were alive today, Jefferson would likely clarify that his dedication was not to “newspapers” per se but to their function: providing citizens the information they need to both pursue happiness and hold accountable government as well as other powerful institutions.

That sense of the vital link between informed citizens and a healthy democracy is why civic and media leaders grew alarmed a few years ago when the digital revolution began undercutting traditional media business models, leading to massive layoffs of journalists at newspapers, newsmagazines, and TV stations. Since then, experts in the media and information technology spheres have been debating whether the media is fulfilling the crucial role envisioned for it by the Founders. In 2008 and 2009, a group that was both bipartisan (Republicans and Democrats) and bi-generational (“new media” and “old media”) studied this issue at the behest of the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation. The group, the Knight Commission on Information Needs of Communities in a Democracy, concluded: “America is at a critical juncture in the history of communications. Information technology is changing our lives in ways that we cannot easily foresee...The digital age is creating an information and communications renaissance. But it is not serving all Americans and their local communities equally. It is not yet serving democracy fully. How we react, individually and collectively, to this democratic shortfall will affect the quality of our lives and the very nature of our communities.”

The Knight Commission’s findings, as well as those of other blue-ribbon reports, posed a bipartisan challenge to the FCC, whose policies often affect the information health of communities. The chairman responded in December 2009 by initiating an effort at the FCC to answer two questions: 1) are citizens and communities getting the news, information, and reporting they want and need? and 2) is public policy in sync with the nature of modern media markets, especially when it comes to encouraging innovation and advancing local public interest goals?

A working group consisting of journalists, entrepreneurs, scholars, and government officials conducted an exploration of these questions. The group interviewed hundreds of people, reviewed scores of studies and reports, held hearings, initiated a process for public comment, and made site visits. We looked not only at the news media but, more broadly, at how citizens get local information in an age when the Internet has enabled consumers to access information without intermediaries.

This report is intended both to inform the broad public debate and help FCC Commissioners assess current rules.

BBC Archive: The Gay Rights Movement in the UK

From BBC press release:

The BBC Archive has today released a new collection of material charting the emergence of the gay rights movement in the UK.

This collection, released through the BBC Archive website, brings together TV and radio programmes from news bulletins, documentaries and current affairs programmes, which chart the political and social change in attitudes to homosexuality over the past 50 years. The programmes in the collection feature noted gay rights campaigners including Sir Ian McKellen, Angela Mason of equality charity Stonewall, Peter Tatchell, founder of Outrage! and MEP and former EastEnders actor, Michael Cashman.

The launch of the collection coincides with the release of BBC research findings into the portrayal of lesbian, gay and bisexual people across the BBC's services.

Programmes include a press conference from 1957 about the Wolfenden Report, which first recommended the decriminalisation of homosexuality, and a Today interview on Radio 4 with MP Leo Abse, whose 1967 bill led to the decriminalisation of homosexuality in England and Wales. Two editions from the ground-breaking documentary series Man Alive look at the lives of gay men and women in the late Sixties, while experts debate the pros and cons of the programmes in a follow-up panel discussion, Late Night Line Up.

Other programmes in the collection cover the struggle of coming out, the age of consent, civil partnerships and the protests against Section 28 – the controversial government bill that banned councils from being able to "promote homosexuality" through schools.

Also, see this very detailed report in one of these forms:

Portrayal of Lesbian, Gay and Bisexual People on the BBC Complete Report (226 pages; PDF)

Summary Report: (37 pages; PDF)

Consultation Report (63 pages; PDF)

NPR Transcripts

As part of National Public Radio's site relaunch in July came a new free-text policy for transcripts. More than 80,000 transcripts are now available going back to May 2005 (they used to charge for them). Observes Susanne Bjorner, writing in The CyberSkeptics Guide to Internet Research (October 2009), "NPR says that transcripts are 'largely accurate' but acknowledges that there may be some spelling or grammatical errors and that, in some cases the text may not align perfectly with the audio" Some random testing on her part "indicates that available transcripts are indexed by every word, making the backfile a major new free source for research in news, business, and culture."

NPR transcripts are also available at LexisNexis (see previous post) but you may want to go straight to the horse's mouth from now on.

Transcripts for NPR and WHYY's Fresh Air

From LexisNexis Wiki several months back:

In the past, one would use the Burrelle's Transcripts source in LexisNexis Academic to find transcripts of Fresh Air. You may still use this source to find the archived episodes before October, 2008. However, after October 1, 2008, Fresh Air is now contained inside of the "National Public Radio (NPR)" source. To read transcripts of Fresh Air or transcripts of other NPR shows that were broadcast on or after October 1, 2008, use the "National Public Radio (NPR)" source to narrow your search.

Speaking of NPR, it started a new blog (it has many) in November of last year called As a Matter of Fact.

In its own words:

As A Matter of Fact is a blog by and for the audio-loving, fact-finding, truth-seeking, pop-culture-fiending, news-addicted librarians of the world. Of course, you don't need to be a librarian to read it. But we're pretty sure you may secretly want to be one after you do.