With the growing interlocking concentration of media power, where the agenda is set by fewer and fewer corporations, you have the issue of political worth and net worth intruding into the whole question of who gets heard.
--Bill Moyers
When Congress passed the Telecommunications Act of 1996, the voices of dissention were drowned out by the whining meat grinder of corporate media. What was at stake were two important principles of democracy: free speech and the power to use it.
The act created the environment where it was okay for media monopolies to gobble up the competition, which was a tremendous win for free speech as long as you were Clear Channel. It also gave away the public airwaves to 21 broadcast companies, who will undoubtably gain more than even the estimated high value then of 70 billion dollars. The American citizens of this country who owned these airwaves got nothing.
What was the reason for this giveaway? We want our HDTV. The act was supposed to expedite the process, getting high definition to the American people quicker and remaining affordable to all. The irony? The top reasons for not getting HD today are price and a lack of HD content.
Now some geniuses have decided the Smithsonian is for sale. Last month, the Smithsonian signed a secret deal with Showtime that gives them exclusive rights to steward some of the Smithsonian's archives. The deal includes Showtime's right to refuse any persons requests to use that material. Think Progress reports that yesterday a letter signed by 215 people, including Ken Burns, Michael Moore, and Alex Gibney was sent to the Secretary of the Smithsonian concerning this betrayal of the public trust.
This is a true outrage. The Smithsonian Institute is an American treasure, one of the few things we have left that is free and open to the public. It is still to this day amazing to me that we can walk up to the steps of the Museum of Natural History and see a life size model of a blue whale and it doesn't cost a dime.
There is a difference between an accomplished filmmaker like Burns, who can create an incredible series about jazz or the Civil War and make it available to everyone on a public television station, and one subscription-based movie channel that has a dizzying lack of programming except for a few exclusive content shows. To think that the reason for selling history is to compete with the Sopranos is truly horrendous. Americans get shafted again.
Note: Today, at 12:30, Ken Burns will be speaking about this issue at the Center for American Progress in Washington D.C. It's free, of course, but an RSVP is required.
Update: The media is slowly picking this story up, but generally, lazily, and predictably, they only report on the letter to Lawrence Small, and don't do any news gathering themselves. Think Progress is slow to post on their own event, so I hope they keep this issue front and center, as I think it shows that mainstream America doesn't want corporate America messing with the things that are valuable to us.
J
Jacqueline Trescott at the Washington Post thankfully does have coverage of the American Progress event. I'll comment about it, but it's so short and well written you should read it yourself.
Ken Burns was smart enough to both praise and criticize the Smithsonian in his speech, immediately showing that he supports what they do, but takes issue with this latest deal. Although I'm sure transcripts of Burns' and hopefully Malamud's speeches will be available soon, Trescott hones in on an interesting anecdote by Burns at the end of the article:
But it wasn't always that way, he told the group yesterday. In 1979 he was working on his first film, about the Brooklyn Bridge. At the Smithsonian was a huge model that depicted the making of the main cables. He got permission to photograph it. He paid $75 overtime for an electrician.
But he needed $30,000 to finish the project. He went to several banks in New York and landed in a manager's office at Citibank. "The person who made the decision was Lawrence Small," then a bank executive, recounted Burns. The documentary went on to earn an Oscar nomination.
Now Burns is appealing to Small once again. "We hope now he doesn't become an impediment," he said. "We want him to reconsider the deal."
Brilliant. He's giving Small credit for once having artistic credibility, then he's asking where is it now? That's pressure right where we need it.
Thanks to Magorn for sending people my way.