Broadcasting Telecasting (Jul-Sep 1963)

EDITORIALS Henry's unhidden persuader FCC Chairman E. William Henry last week performed the miraculous feat of reviving a very dead horse which he then set to kicking the bejeepers out of radio and television broadcasters. Mr. Henry breathed new life and form into the attempt to impose federal limitations on the amount of advertising that stations can carry. Until Mr. Henry addressed the International Radio and Television Society in New York last Tuesday, the FCC's proposed rulemaking on commercials had all but expired. Important members of the Congress, including Oren Harris, chairman Of the House Commerce Committee which oversees legislation in the broadcast field, had as much as ordered the FCC to stay out of commercial regulation. It looked as though the FCC, which had voted for the rulemaking in the first place only by a bare majority, would receive the comments that are due today (Sept. 30), would perfunctorily examine them and then let the matter drop. Mr. Henry changed all that, and drastically. Although he may never succeed in his announced aim of getting a rule or a policy statement, he has succeeded in creating a condition that is bound to elevate the question of commercial practices to the status of a public issue. He has called for a public hearing on the subject. It is doubtful that his colleagues will deny him that. Such a forum is tailor-made for all those who have grievances against radio and television advertising. It is a forum that rival advertising media will delight in reporting in detail. The new turn of events that Mr. Henry has arranged presents broadcasters with the need to devise a new defensive position. Up to last week, the National Association of Broadcasters— presumably representing general sentiment in radio and TV— had elected to oppose the FCC's rulemaking on the legal grounds that the agency lacks authority to set arbitrary limits on broadcast advertising. That defense may still be good enough to head off the writing of a rule. It is not good enough to answer the criticisms of contemporary broadcast advertising practices that will inevitably be exposed in a public hearing. What was a legal problem is now a legal and a public relations problem. In the public hearing broadcasters must be prepared with convincing arguments to defend things as they stand, or they must be in a position to talk of specific improvements they have in mind. The natural inclination at this point will be to strengthen the radio and television codes, in their content and enforcement, as an antidote to the threat of government action and an answer to critics of commercial excess. No doubt talk of that kind will come up this week at the scheduled meetings of the radio and television code boards. What the code boards ought to do is face up to the fact that the commercial time standards in both codes are meaningless. The majority of stations to which FCC members and other influential persons tune are now adhering to the codes. When an E. William Henry objects to advertising that "begins to interfere unduly with the programs, to restrict the content put into them or to frustrate by interruption the enjoyment and understanding the public gets out of them,'^ he is talking about what he has seen on network television affiliates that scrupulously abide by the time limitations in the television code. Right now broadcasters ought to scrap their own advertising time standards in the frank acknowledgement that they are meaningless as guides to self-discipline and would be equally meaningless as government rules. The new approach ought to be that time is perhaps the poorest meas94 urement of commercial tolerance. In determining public acceptance (and advertising effectiveness), the content and placement of the commercial are more important than the time it occupies. If the NAB and its influential members want to make progress, they would be well advised to start looking into those problems while they also keep up the pressure for legislative restraints on the FCC. Who wins? I T'S no wonder that the three television networks are conI cerned about pay television's future. A Broadcasting survey reported in this issue shows that network sports this season will soak up over 1,000 of the 12,000 hours of network programing with an even larger total indicated next year. It was only a half-dozen years ago that sports programs totaled about one-tenth that figure. Every experiment in pay TV has looked to coverage of sports events as one of its most important ingredients. The avid sports fan will go to almost any length to see his idols in action. This enthusiasm is regarded as money in the bank by pay TV entrepreneurs. The most important pay TV project announced to date, Subscription Television Inc., formed by Reuben H. Donnelley Corp. and Lear Siegler, has as its ace in the hole a contract to show games of the heretofore little televised West Coast big leaguers, the Dodgers and Giants. Ball club executives and other sports promoters will watch developments with interest. Will sports fans pay from $1 to $2 for a pav TV baseball game? What if the team offered is in tenth place? American League teams are crying the blues this year because the runaway Yankees made the race no contest for half the season. Games have been played with fewer than 500 fans in the ball park. If pay TV prospers, who will get the important sports events? The World Series, the football playoffs, the big golf matches? The highest bidder, of course. And if the public in large numbers embraces pay TV, the networks won't be able to match the pay TV bids. The question is: Shall sports be free or fee? If pay TV gets off the ground, the question will be answered by the public. Drawn for BROADCASTING by Sid Hix "He's a TV announcer . . . and that's what they call the soft sell!" BROADCASTING, September 30, 1963