Television digest with electronics reports (Jan-Dec 1956)

3 Board (see p. 11) ; the rallying of affiliates to networks' defense in face of Congressional threats to network-affiliate relationships (see below). Both Klntner and Fellows exhorted industry to publicize its contributions. Blasting charges of "hucksterism, " Kintner tossed bouquets at his network competitors by asking: "Are Bill Paley and Frank Stanton 'hucksters' when they have been instrumental in developing some of the most popular programs, some of the best research, some of the best methods of selling in our business? Are Gen. Sarnoff, Frank Folsom and Pat Weaver and Bob Sarnoff 'hucksters' when they are responsible for important electronic developments and for new types of program presentation? Is Tom O'Neil a 'huckster' when he tries to combine the dynamic forces of motion picture film with the TV business?" Answering "myth" that TV-radio is "tasteless." Kintner said: "Whether it is in the field of drama, music, documentaries, news or information, a close study of our business over the past 15 years will prove, without question, that we have equaled, if not exceeded, other media in both presentations of past and contemporary material and in experimental and new art forms." He did concede that news on TV "has barely scratched the surface." Kintner also acknowledged that criticism is justified "in certain minute fringes of the business" and that industry must put our house completely in order to avoid the sins of the few being visited upon the many." As for charges of "monopoly" leveled at networks. Kintner said: "Stations may complain about not getting a network affiliation, but I've never heard a station complain about being forced into network affiliation. .. Sometimes the critics of the so-called network control confuse their inability to produce good programs with the unwillingness of the network and the advertiser to buy them." One charge of monopoly does have "real meaning." Kintner said, referring to "the artificial Govt . -created station scarcity in TV." blaming FCC for slowness and Congress for failure to prod Commission. Fellows cautioned broadcasters not to ignore criticism in hopes it would disappear, because "some of the criticism leveled against us is deserved. "It does not require courage." he said, "nor even much imagination, to accept anything that comes over the transom — merely for the reason that it adds revenue to the station operation. It does take courage and imagination to reject it and find another, more acceptable and more palatable, way of increasing revenue. The same reasoning applies to the character of the program with which you want your station call letters identified. If you can buy it cheap, there is a good possibility that you'll get what you paid for. And more than that, you have to sell it cheap and accept, as a consequence, the classification which will be yours in the community in which you live." Fellows adjured operators to live up to TV & radio codes and, "in the same fashion, with imagination and purpose, we must be more alert to our virtues, displaying them for public examination." ♦ ♦ * * Executives of ABC, CBS & NBC were gratified by the way their TV affiliates rushed to their defense in matter of option time and network-affiliate relationships — reacting to powerful impact on Senate Commerce Committee made by testimony of Richard A. Moore, of KTTV, Los Angeles independent (Vol. 12:13). ABC-TV affiliates passed resolution stating that option time is "vital," then authorized committee to present testimony to that effect to Commerce Committee. Frederick S. Houwink, WMAL-TV, Washington, is acting secy. Representatives of 169 CBS-TV affiliates voted unanimously to testify in support of option time, etc., chairman C. Howard Lane, KOIN-TV, Portland, Ore., appointing coordinating committee comprising: John S. Hayes, WTOP-TV, Washington, chairman; W.D. Rogers, KDUB-TV, Lubbock, Tex. ; August Meyer, WCIA, Champaign, 111. NBC-TV affiliates had no full-membership meeting scheduled for convention, but their 9-man executive committee, headed by Walter J. Damra, WTMJ-TV, Milwaukee,