Broadcasting (Jan - Mar 1950)

kMA GROUP PLAN FCC Declines Participation \ HANDS-OFF POLICY was Adopted by FCC last week with •espect to Radio Mfrs. Assn.'s )roposal to form a new, industryvide "National Television Systems I!ommittee" to work on color TV ;tandards [Telecasting, Nov. 21, Dec. 19, 1949]. Unlike the Commission of 1940, vhich shared in the formation of .he original NTSC and accepted nost of its recommendations for )lack-and-white standards, today's ?CC "feels that it should not take my position on the question." If )ne is formed, however, FCC said t will "welcome" its participation n the color TV hearing. The RMA Television Committee meanwhile scheduled a meeting for fan. 17 at the Hotel Roosevelt in ^ew York to map its future ;ourse. The committee is under the chairmanship of Max F. Bal:om of Sylvania Electric Prodicts, a former RMA president, j FCC disclosed its position in a etter from Chairman Wayne Coy |;o Dr. W. R. G. Baker of General Electric Co., who has been named Dy RMA to head a new NTSC and |ivho conferred with the Commiseioners individually on that point a few weeks ago. Mr. Coy's letter, released Tuesday: This is with reference to our recent conversation in my office concerning your suggestion that a national color television systems committee be established under the auspices of the Radio Mfrs. Assn. for the purpose of arriving at standards for color television that might be generally acceptable to the Commission and to the industry. As I indicated at our meeting, I have asked the other members of the Commission if they felt it should arrange a meeting at which you might appear before the Commission and present your ideas on this subject. In connection with the discussion which followed my request, it became quite clear that the Commission does not believe that the formation of a national television systems committee should be dependent upon the Commission's approval. As a matter of fact the Commission feels that it should not take any position on the question of the proposed committee, but that the matter should be entirely in the hands of the industry inasmuch as the committee, as proposed, is designed to serve the industry and to aid the industry in organizing itself for the presentation of all available material to the Commission in connection with the current television proceedings. The Commission's position is dictated by its desire to avoid any implication that a national television systems committee, such as you propose, is to he regarded as an advisory com mittee named by the Commission. . . In the event that such a committee should be formed, and it is prepared to present testimony at the forthcoming television hearing on behalf of the interests it represents, the Commission will welcome its participation in that hearing. Under RMA's proposal, the committee would not be limited to RMA members, but would include representatives of the Institute of Radio Engineers, networks, engineering schools, and others. The committee not only would work on color standards but also would collect and present data with respect to UHF allocations and the lifting of the VHF freeze. Proposal that such a group be formed was advanced by RMA witnesses early in FCC's color proceedings last fall. The hearing currently is in recess but resumes Feb. 20. GOOD OR BAD? cousins, Capp Debate TV I DuMont Raps ' (Continued from Tejecasting 7) jjroposal compared with the same dollars spent in magazines and pther media convince us that this project will be welcomed by adi vertisers and agencies. Your ac{ ceptance of this order will give you j a pai't in an experiment which can make 1950 a profitable year for television if it succeeds and its natural implications are crystallized . . ." I DuMont Network Director Morttimer W. Loewi replied that, with Istations limited and cable faciliities "inadequate," the NBC offer Ito pay full half-hour rate for five Istraight half-hours, "regardless of whether or not any segment has Ibeen sold, constitutes in our opin'ion, an attempt to monopolize the jiexisting facilities for television |! broadcasting and is a manifest attempt to freeze out any competiItor having legitimate business." DuMont Policy He said it has not been and is not now DuMont's policy to "permit any competitor to take unfair and unlawful advantage of its financial position. It is our intention to take full advantage of all facilities at our command, governmental and otherwise, to see to it that this .attempt on the part of the NBC to secure a monopolistic position in the television broadcasting field on Saturday nights is thwarted before it starts." DuMont's complaint was filed by W. A. Roberts of the Washington law firm of Roberts & Mclnnis. Page% • BRb AE^C ASTING AL CAPP, comic-strip artist creator of "Lil Abner" and, in the past, outspoken critic of radio, took up the cudgels in defense of television last Tuesday night on the ABC Town Hall Meeting of the Air program. Mr. Capp, in a discussion of "Television 1950 — is it Good or Bad?", took to task Norman Cousins, editor of The Saturady Review of Literature, for his "vague generalities, his overall damning" of the medium. Mr. Cousins, who referred to television as the potential victim of "a case of impending murder," decried video's practice of "talking down" to its viewers. "You know the theory," Mr. Cousins said. "It's the idea that the average American has the mentality of a 12-year-old child, and you've got to spoon-feed him with entertainment that makes no demands on his supposedly limited intellectual equipment." Decries Theory Labelling the theory as "idiot's fable" and a "billion-dollar blunder," he charged it had already come close to putting the skids under Hollywood, had devitalized and disfigured much of radio, and wrecked some of the largest pulp magazines in America. He warned that television was repeating the blunder and that he feared the same results. Mr. Cousins charged video with compounding a mobilized attack on intelligence and a massed invasion against good ta^e. "There are millions of dollars for perfecting television mechanically," he declared, "but only pennies, comparatively, for programs. Expensive research and equipment will make color on television possible within a year or two, but a Grade C program in technicolor is still a Grade C p' oeram," he went on. "What television needs right now ... is better programnning, more respect for the intelligeri'ce of the average American, more imagination, more originality, more of the pioneering spirit that was behind much of TV only two years ago," Mr. Cousins emphasized. Pointing out that TV doesn't lack for people qualified to make television an "art of its own and not the visual extension of radio" he called for front-office backing of such people. He urged that viewers write to such programs as Kukla, Fran & Ollie, The Nature of Things, You Are an Artist — which he singled out as exemplifying the promise of television — and tell them of their approval. Stressing that he was not arguing for highbrowism or a video extension of the classroom, but for entertainment, Mr. Cousins concluded that he expected the medium to live up to its billings as the supreme triumph of invention, "not an endless procession of murder gang wars, terror and horror acts, sub-standard variety shows and wrestling matches." Capp's Rebuttal As the debate's champion of television, Mr. Capp countered that Mr. Cousin's "beef" was substandard and mediocre. "I've done research," he said. "I've gone into this thing fully. It took me three seconds. I clipped out tonight's television programs. It proves that anyone who takes the trouble to get up off" his canvas backed chair and turn a knob can get from television tonight and any night, the most fabulous, imaginative, varied entertainment, delight and culture ever offered by man to man." Mr. Capp then outlined Tuesday night's program schedule, which encompassed three kiddies shows for "good little kids who have finished reading Lil Abner," a scientific film, news, comedy and "the most beloved funny-man of our time, Milton Berle — and with him, the opera star, Patrice Mvmsel" — debates, music, drama and sports. "What do you want, Mr. Cousins?" he asked, "an egg in your beer?" "The record shows us," Mr. Capp concluded, "that television will give you whatever you want. If you want delight, and entertainment and information, television will give it to you. If you just want to gripe about it, you can, by carefully manipulating your dials so that you bypass all the wonderful gifts of television — you find murder and horror and ugliness." 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