FCC’s VNR Fine: More to Come?

FCC'S VNR FINE: MORE TO COME?
[SOURCE: Broadcasting&Cable, AUTHOR: John Eggerton john.eggerton@reedbusiness.com]
The FCC’s proposed $4,000 fine last week against Comcast for airing an unidentified video news release on one of its local cable news—a hardly noticed item—could be the tip of an iceberg waiting ahead for nearly 100 TV stations and a handful of cable outlets. The fine was being billed by at least one commissioner as the first ever for violating the FCC’s sponsorship identification rules, though Comcast, for one, was still disputing that the FCC had any jurisdiction over the cable news channel’s programming. Comcast was among a handful of cable outlets and TV stations totaling 111 identified by anti-media-consolidation activist Free Press and the Center for Media and Democracy. The two filed two separate complaints against the stations, including one against 77 of them back in April 2007, and a second in November after the center had done a follow-up study that identified even more. Did Craig Aaron, communications director for Free Press, see something materially different in the Comcast VNR usage versus that of the other stations Free Press complained about? “I certainly don't think there is,” he said, pointing out that the same VNR ran on a station in Portland, Ore. “We are eager to see the FCC respond to all of the complaints,” said Aaron.
http://www.broadcastingcable.com/article/CA6485605.html

* Rex Smith: Watch out, FCC is on the march
http://blogs.timesunion.com/editors/?p=720