Broadcasting (July - Dec 1941)

360 N.MICHIGAN AVE,CHICAGO WFMJ Youngstown's Favorite Station A HooperHolmes survey shows that WFMJ has more listeners than any other station heard in the Youngstown district. POWER--'""'*"" USTENERS«."-;f „||„t LOW COST! IIIEDR CET THE FACTS FROM IMv Si ■■ 1 1 GET THE FACTS FROM I PONTIAC • MICH. r THE fOUMAM CO., NAriONJIl UPS. CHICAGO > NEW YORK (U.P.) THE MARK OF ACCURACY, SPEED AND INDEPENDENCE IN WORLD WIDE NEWS COVERAGE UNITED PRESS Bennett (Continued from page 29) criminally by the Department of Justice. "In the civil case, the consent decree was entered. In the criminal case, fines were assessed totaling some $35,000. For several weeks the trade papers have been full of ASCAP's proposed suit. ASCAP is reported to claim treble damage because they assert they are being kept off the air through boycott. Yet have they approached stations and attempted to sell their product on a competitive business basis? "You will recall the efforts made by you in behalf of NIB to discuss with and obtain from ASCAP a license which would require payment for the material used. You did this both before the expiration of licenses last year and again when Gene Buck made his plea over the air in the first ASCAP on Parade program. Your effort merely resulted in disclosing a lack of sincerity on ASCAP's part to discuss anything but a continuation of the old blanket license with its destructive payment of a per cent on gross business. Treble Damages "The truth about 'treble damages' is that every music user whose continued existence depended upon the obtaining of a license from ASCAP prior to December, 1940, has a valid and enforcable suit for treble damages against ASCAP and all its members. The shoe really is on the other foot. "ASCAP and each of its members is liable threefold for all sums wrongfully extracted. ASCAP no longer can deny the facts stated in the unanimous opinion of the U. S. Supreme Court. The opinion states that ASCAP 'is a combination which controls the performance rights of a major part of the available supply of copyrighted popular music' and that 'ASCAP comes squarely within the definition of the combinations prohibited by Section 1 of the 1937 Act'. This section of the Florida statute is no more extensive than the Federal Sherman Anti-Trust Act under which treble damages are awarded. Yet ASCAP threatens treble suits against broadcasters. "For years this combination by mutual agreement pooled in ASCAP 'a major part of the available supply of copyrighted popular music,' thereby creating in ASCAP 'the power of life and death over every business * * •■■ dependent upon copyrighted musical compositions for existence' (Mr. Justice Black). It actually wielded this power by enforcing its demands for a per cent of broadcasters' gross income, by discriminating contracts such as the newspaper formula and in other less obvious ways. Are broadcasters again to acquiesce and pay on gross income? Open Competition "Clear thinking at this point is doubly essential. In looking for the immediate dollar saving, we f or CODE CLASSES FOR DEFENSE are taught by KDKA, Pittsburgh, anchei-e are two of the instructors during a recent classroom session. The\ are (1 to r) T. C. Kenney, studio supervisor, and Jim Rock, KDKA gen eral manager. Dwight Myer, chief engineer, is director of the classe; j but was away on a vacation at the time this photo was taken. Hole in One ON THE FIRST DAY of his vacation Kolin Hager, manager of WGY, Schenectady, scored a hole in one on the 185-yard second hole at the Mohawk Country Club, Schenectady. Hager, who is a portsider, used a brassie against a stiff wind to ace a tricky par-three hole. Ed Letson, announcer of KDYL, Salt Lake City, recently accomplished a similar feat on a local course. get that the only protection against future exhorbitant demands lies in open competition and that this open competition can be established only by maintaining the 'dollar' incentive. Blanket licenses with payment of a per cent of gross income entered into with a combination controlling a dominating portion of the available material, destroys the 'dollar' incentive. It then becomes economically desirable to restrict the material used to the product of the dominating combination. "The door to protective competition is closed against those who are not members of the combination just as effectively as though they did not exist. No one wants a repetition of December, 1940, but if it is to be avoided, a competitive market must be maintained. The door to competition must be kept open to new and unknown composers and authors, to new music publishers, to AMP, to SESAC, to BMI and others. Unless these nonASCAP creators are able to market the product of their labor in a free market, their chance of earning a livelihood vanishes and their incentive to produce is destroyed. "It is my firm conviction, based on seven years of intensive work with the copyright problem, that if broadcasters again pay ASCAP a per cent of their gross income for blanket licenses, the time will come when the gains of today are hopelessly lost. Unless we help ourselves now, we soon will be past helping. In Florida, Nebraska, Washington and Alaska, ASCAP is barred from doing business as a combination. In several other States, including Kansas and Nor+l Dakota, they must comply witl laws placing restrictions on mo nopolistic operations. If there mus be 48 different laws in order to cur( permanently monopolistic domina tion in the copyright licensing field then let us have 48 laws. But aiearnest effort should be made tt keep those laws uniform. '"Instead of a Munich pact broadcasters and other users o copyrighted music should asser their legal rights and maintaii them. They must not be influencec by fear and self-serving propa ganda. They must not let inerti again destroy their freedom to buj in a competitive market." Building in Clarksville, Tenn. BOB THOMPSON, former assistan chief engineer of AVGOV, Valdosta Ga.. is now chief engineer of the ne\i WJZM. Clarksville, Tenn., nov under construction with RCA equiii ment and a Wiuc-harger 175-ft. towei He is the only member of the stat' thus far engaged, though the statioi expects to be on the air early August. Operating with 250 watts oi 1400 kc. the station was authorizei by the FCC last Februar.v and i owned by William D. Hudson, mayo of Clarksville, and his wife. Mr. Hud son is also a member of the Tennes see Railroad & Public Utilities Com mission. PHIL BAKER, off the air nearly tw years, has l)een auditioned by XBC with his old comedy cast in a ne^' show. BroKustone House. 50,000 WAHS CBS 42 5,683 Listening Families* nmii SHREVEPORT LOUISIANA Dominant Coverage in the Central Southwest Branham Co. Representatives! *CBS Audit of Nighttime Coverage : Page 46 • July 21, 1941 BROADCASTING • Broadcast Advertising^