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ACT
to
HELP THE HAND THAT FEEDS YOU
You can help the hand that feeds you — and needs you. The Broadcasting industry and the people are, after all, a partnership. The partnership has been a dynamic and fruitful one. From the one-horse era of the old crystal set to the sparkling portable receivers of the modern television age, the people have shown a willingness to stake the industry on its future and bankroll its growth. In turn, the industry has been good to the people and good for the people.
But now this great partnership finds itself in danger. "Pay-TV", a concept of broadcasting, masking itself in the guise of progress, has made sharp and astounding inroads because the people have been kept in the dark. Their confidence in this great industry has been shaken. Recent polls notwithstanding, unless the people and the industry ACT and ACT quickly, Pay-TV can become an American reality, more by default than by inclination.
Both the industry and the people must never allow this to happen. Aside from the corruption of a relationship which has been literally a foundation-stone of modern progress, Pay-TV represents a concept that is both ethically wrong and economically detrimental to the people of the United States and to the industry as it is now constituted.
Two bed-rock facts form a fundamental people's argument on this issue :
I. The Radio-TV Spectrum is a natural resource which belongs to the people. Any granting of channels for Pay-TV without a vote by the direct representa
tives of the people is contrary to the Public Interest.
2. The American people purchased 40,000,000 television sets with the distinct, although unwritten, guarantee that they would not have to pay for viewing television programs, other than for electricity and servicing of the set.
The American Citizens Television Committee (ACT) has been organized to give the people a much-needed voice on this issue, to educate them on the dangers of "Pay-TV" and to work for the promotion and improvement of free television. It is enlisting the aid of national organizations, business groups and individuals to support its efforts to tell the story of free television and the people's role in its growth and future. The committee believes that by acquainting the people with the real facts, Pay-TV will be rejected.
But the people need the industry in this fight, just as much as the industry needs the people. For those who are a part of the industry, ACT offers an opportunity to stand up and be counted in the battle for free TV. ACT wants the support, morally and economically, of the Broadcasting industry to help tell the true story to the American people.
For both the people and the industry, there can be only one choice — to ACT or to preside at the funeral of the time-honored institution of free broadcasting. Such a catastrophe will offer the American people bitter recompense indeed, for their investment and their faith. If you are against Pay-TV, put the weight of your conviction behind ACT.
A C T
TODAY
ACT Committee
1010 Vermont Avenue, N. W.
Washington 5, D. C.
Dear Sirs:
Here is my check for $ to help support the activities
of the American Citizens Television Committee (ACT).
Name:
Address.
Broadcasting
December 9, 1957 • Page 81