FCC

Radio Alternatives

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Last week Mark Morford hammered a bit on corporate rock radio:

This is the problem with rock radio. It has become the last option, the thing you listen to only when all other options fail, when you’re too tired to pop in a CD or too lazy to reach for the iPod or just a little too buzzed on premium tequila and postcoital nirvana to care about searching your glove box for that old AC/DC tape.

After getting subsequent feedback from his readers he now has some alternatives to recommend presented, of course, in his own unique style, i.e., some of you may be a bit offended. Oh, well:

These are places to go and listen anew and dig deep into the raw bloody gorgeous musical universe and rediscover the joys of radio and realize it really doesn’t, despite the howlings of the rigid neurons and the religious Right and the ass-clenched FCC, have to be all about preprogrammed DJs and bleeped f-words and endless goddamn repeats of Eric Clapton.

Of those on his list, I have listened to KPIG and KEXP and find them both very worthy. Give’m a try.

powell Leaving FCC

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The grass may not be greener on the other side but I am happy to see powell leave this part of the American Taliban. His tenure also brought us such wonderful government intrusions as the V-chip which some folks may want in their equipment and the rest of us will now get to subsidize.
It is the FCC and it is the federal government and the bushies1 will be appointing a replacement so we should not have high expectations of any contribution to freedom, liberty, or our economic well being.
1Yes, I’d say the same thing about the dems.

Government Helping the Needy

This entry was posted in Capitalism Economics FCC Libertarianism Technology Television on by

I know some of you have probably forked over big bucks for that new HDTV set and are enjoying some excellent picture quality. I haven’t and have yet to see one at a size and price point that makes me say, “I have got to have that.” And, I also haven’t seen the value in buying that digital cable package. Basic does just fine for the few hours a week that I watch TV.
Since there are apparently a lot of other folks like me out and about our ever helpful federal government is accelerating its work on behalf of big electronics:

It’s one of the biggest technical changes in television since color TV: the digital transition. And because many Americans remain in the dark about it, federal regulators began an education campaign Monday to enlighten them.
Remind me, please, just why it was congress needed to set a target date for “all digital” and why the FCC needs to be spending tax money to act as the marketing arm for the electronics industry in what seems no more than a wealth transfer exercise.
When the perceived value hits the right point people will buy the stuff in droves.