Broadcasting: A Candid Appraisal

National Educational Television presents from Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, an exclusive television report from the continuing conference on communications and the public interest. Broadcasting, a candid appraisal. This report is being submitted for evaluation to you, the public, and to Mr. Charles Tower, vice president of the National Association of Broadcasters, Commissioner Frederick R. Ford, outgoing chairman of the Federal Communications Commission, and to Miss Maria Manis, television and drama critic of the reporter magazine. The report is presented by Dr. Dallas Smite, research professor and communications at the University of Illinois, Mr. Percy H. Tenenbaum, director of the Mass Communications Research Center at the University of Wisconsin, and by your chairman, Mr. Gilbert Selditz, Dean of the Annanburg School of Communications at the University of Pennsylvania. What is known as polite society about technology? Well, let me proceed with what we are here for. The conference, which is now reporting, is just over.

We have come from the conference through lunch here to report. And well, my friends in the academic world are on my left, representatives of the broadcasting through broadcasters, through the government, and through critics are on my right. I'd like to say we are not on opposite sides of the table, we are not on opposite sides of questions. We are not trying to trick one another, but we're trying to do is really to confirm the fact that we have the same general interest. I have to explain this conference only because this title is so very long, and hereafter we will refer to it merely as the conference. It's full title is the continuing conference on communications and the public interest. It's a group of teachers of communications who are also students of communications.

And we meet and observe, we meet twice a year, and observe the present status of all the industries and communications. This year, we have specialized very much on the electronic media on broadcasting, and almost entirely this time on commercial broadcasting. At our next meeting, we expect to develop considerable time to educational broadcasting, and because we want to do it then and do not want to do it hastily now, it is secondary in our discussions today. The one thing what I'm going to do is to report what we did in the last two days, and ask you for your criticism, and particularly also ask you, what do we fail to do, and what do you think we can do in the future? The one thing that I would like to start off with is something which I will read because it is written down as precise. This conference has established a role of honor to signalize actions in the field of communications, which are praiseworthy actions, which are actions related to the basic functions of the media in a democratic society. Now I'm going to read the full list of the five citations, and then ask you indeed for a comment on them and what they imply.

The conference is opposed to any attempt on the part of a government agency to influence the handling of news by broadcasters. And it places on its role of honor, Mr. Edward R. Murrow, for exposing on the air the effort of the State Department to guide the networks in regard to the visit of Premier Truschev. The conference believes that broadcasters have obligations toward the public which they can fulfill best on their own, and it places on its role of honor, Dr. Frank Stanton of the Columbia Broadcasting System, for eliminating sponsorship from the all network presentation of the great debates. The conference believes that issues of grave public concern may probably be discussed under commercial sponsorship, but without commercial control. And it lists on its role of honor, the Gulf Oil Company, for underwriting a series of such discussions, leading to the discretion of NBC, the selection of topics, and the production of programs. The conference is opposed to professional blacklisting, and lists on the role of honor those who have fought this practice in the past, and in particular David Susskind, pronouncing that he would no longer submit the names of actors and actresses for clearance.

The conference is deeply concerned with the problem of presenting strong, rhetorical opinion, and carefully researched facts on matters of national and international significance, however controversial. And it lists on its role of honor, the National Broadcasting Company, and in particular Irving Gitlin and its associates, for the production of the white paper dealing with the U2 incident. That is the list of five. There's one note. This list is not, of course, internally exclusive. It refers only to broadcasting, and additions to the list and future will come from other fields of communications. Well, two of the five citations I've just given are connected with specific programs. The conference is concerned with the action taken, and as in the other three instances, with the principles involved. As we three worked on this, and I think we all three agree on these, as did the other members of the conference.

I put it to you to ask you what you think of the choices we've made, what we've left out, and the principles involved. And you're on my right, Ms. Manners. Well, it's very hard, Mr. Sellett, is to quarrel really with any of these conclusions. I would, you know, heartless say, I, I sort of feel though that something is missing, and I don't know whether I can define it. It's a pretty big thing. Let's say there are two things that I sort of find missing. One is, I gather in writing these, and in thinking these through, the assumption has been that broadcasting, that commercial broadcasting, as it is now, the status quo is maintained. You are not thinking ahead or away from it. You are taking it as it is, as a more or less permanent fact. I know this is a big thing, but then I would like to go into something a little smaller and more specific. I don't notice here any concern as to the relation of the commercial to the program, and as to whether the government or any regulatory agency thereof, should in this area have control as to length frequency kind of commercial,

which, for my money, my feeling is of vast importance in dealing with programming as programming. You're speaking of the commercial message itself, not of the fact that it's that a program is sponsored. Now I'm speaking of the commercial message itself. This is a small, tiny breakdown of the major thing I mentioned before, and that is an acceptance of the system of commercial broadcasting, that is of sponsorship. I'm not talking now of advertising, but of sponsorship, as it now is. What I miss, in other words, is a look ahead. I will now rest.

Well, as I look at your list of those on the honor roll, it seems to me that these are the very little quarrel can be had with it. I think they seem to group themselves into some principle of self-regulation, and then this question of commercial against sustaining time. As you know, I've taken the position that any program that's good enough to be broadcast is good enough to be sponsored and paid for by some advertisers. But this isn't the whole question. The origin of the sustaining time was to permit a flexibility to meet emergency things, not emergency exactly, but matters of utmost public importance in local areas, so that there would be time available uncommitted by contracts. But it seems to me that that can certainly be taken care of in contracts, so the time of that can be cancelled to make way for the public interest program that is timely.

But Ms. Manus raises a different issue, and that issue deals with the number of minutes of commercial continuity and program interruption by commercials versus the program material. Now, this is a matter that is an extremely troublesome one to deal with. However, I can state very positively that we are struggling with it. We struggled with it all day yesterday, and it's a matter of grave concern to the commission. Now, in order to point out immediately that the matter of commercial advertising has been determined by the Supreme Court not to be a matter of censorship. The Valentine, Christensen against Valentine, was the case decided by the Supreme Court in New York, well involved, factual situation in New York City. So that we're not troubled with the constitutional and censorship problems with respect to advertising itself.

This question of, well, I know not long ago, an application was before the commission, and it appeared from the application that 25% of the minutes on the air had been devoted to commercial continuity. And this question of program interruption, we think that we've been working hard to find a formula whereby this can be measured and yet not at the same time stifled the station to such an extent that it just can't keep its logs properly. And therefore, we're thinking in terms of maybe a minute commercial that this being the critical one, and the program interuptions and of the total time and things of that sort. So that I can understand Ms. Manis is concerned about it, and she's not alone. I think we were concerned, but we probably didn't think of anyone who illustrated any general principle that we felt was important enough.

Maybe nothing has occurred in the way of commercial, some very brilliant ones don't doubt have occurred. Broadcasters opinion, are you speaking for yourself or for your association or both? I suppose we all speak principally for ourselves here, but we can't completely divorce ourselves from our official context as it were. Mr. Selly, first let me say that I think what you're trying to do here is very useful for broadcasting, particularly useful today, because as you know, radio and television commercial broadcasting gets many more than its share of brick bats, most unusual to find serious minded, intelligent, knowledgeable people sitting down and trying to find out what has been interesting and creative and good in what we have done. And thus, I'm sure all commercial broadcasters applaud this type of thing. We know you, gentlemen, can be critical too, and we want you to be critical.

I would say this beyond that brief preface in regard to Ms. Manus' thought. I think she's talking about two things. I'm not quite sure just which one she's putting the emphasis on. When you're talking about commercial content, you have the problem which is sometimes referred to as the magazine concept problem, as to whether or not particular programs should be sponsored or whether the network and stations should retain complete control over the programming and the advertiser should be involved only in commercial inserts in program. This is one problem. This is entirely different from the problem of the amount of commercial content in a broadcast day, for example. This should be clear as to just which one we're talking about here. Well, you're quite right that there are two different subjects, and I think when I threw them out, I realized and even mentioned that they were merely talking about them because they were two separate aspects which I didn't find discussed here or thought about.

But you're absolutely right that they are different and must be handled from different approaches. And I should say that we are critical of broadcasting, and I should also say that each one of these individuals, one corporation that we praise, in a sense reflects our dispraise of people who have taken opposite actions. I think that all of us felt that we didn't want to establish a role of dishonor because, in a sense, we were all committed to being positive thinkers. But I'm sorry. I suppose it is. From your side, Hawkes back to the theory of childhood discipline, which suggests that rewards have better than punishment is an order as a philosophy. I would say this that when we signal out in the specific case of Dr. Stanton, that we felt that the effort which had been going on to demand sponsorship for these great debates, we disapprove of that, and we therefore approve of a person who stands against it.

This is true in connection with blacklisting and so forth. But we acceptional act, in other words, that merits an award. It seems to me there's another answer that needs to be given to Ms. Monis' question, though. It may be, since we are presenting a role of things which are rather distinctive, which have been done, that the fact that we didn't cite anybody for accomplishments in addressing themselves to future policy on broadcast, might mean that there wasn't anything worthy of being honored in that way. And the same way with respect to the problem of advertising. Now, if Mr. Ford's commission had come out with documents that he'd been rustling with, I mean, we'd have had something.

You might have been cited rather than been on the panel. Well, we didn't cite any critic, because we knew Ms. Monis was going to be on the panel, and we couldn't cite any other critic except you. Could you bring up something about this paragraph on self-regulation, the approving in principle of self-regulation as against government interference? There's a philosophical thing I'd like to ask you, gentlemen. No, partner, did we do that? The one in connection with push-off and... Oh, I'm sure that you've got something here with a word self-regulation in it, haven't you? No, no, no. In fact, I can promise you. With self-regulation, I supplied that from a categorizing some of the awards they had made. Well, then when you admit, at least Mr. Soldiers, that the philosophy is for self-regulation as against government regulation wherever possible. Is this correct?

It would represent my personal feeling. I don't know whether it represents what I would like for the group. No, no. I think if I'll make a guess, I think the dollar's smith has a much later trust. He's probably more willing to accept certain, carefully guarded forms of regulation outside than I am. But I'm an anarchist in these matters. Well, it's the second paragraph I think that I had in mind, wherein you say that the conference is opposed to any attempt on the part of a government agency to influence the handling on moves by a broker actually placed on the role of honor and so on. It made a repress specifically to this one incident. Well, but out of that, I got a philosophical context. Yes. Well, this is what I suppose is the same philosophical content that I got out of it. But what interests me is that you admitted yourself with your anarchist. Yes. Whenever people like you, and I say this with respect, talk about government. The associative word is censorship.

You always view the government as some outside monster with long tentacles that is closing in on the body of whatever medium you're talking about. Since the government in a democracy is presumably of and by the people, I don't know where this fear, which I think is excessive in this country, where this fear stems from. It is an easy thing to say government stay away. On the other hand, as we grow bigger and bigger and more and more complex, it has been found absolutely necessary in many areas of human life to have some kind of federal supervision. Now, this has in many instances had nothing to do with censorship or interference in content. Any civilized society, I would think, needed a certain kind of direction on planning. And I know what a lot of people, you know, planning is a dirty word here. And the next word again is socialism.

And I don't mean that. I think we can remain as we are and yet have a little more direction from established government agencies. Self-regulation, I will stop shortly, excuse this long thing. The television has been functioning, let's say, on a national overall basis for how many years, since when did it really come in its stride? Well, or I'd just say 11 years. And it is only in the last year that the American public has been able to see public affairs program to concern them deeply in prime viewing time. Now, this is due to the bravery and the persistence of a few people in broadcasting. But can we rely on this to give people what they should know? Well, this is a point that came up in our discussion in this meeting. I'm glad you gave me an excuse to tell you about it. We've been concerned over the question of how much presentation of points of view, alternative points of view, on controversial public issues, there is on the air.

We've been concerned about the amount of total time devoted to public issues programs on the air. And so, as a kind of pilot study, the conference encouraged several of us and several locations to do actual monitoring studies on this question. And one was done at Boston, by people at Boston University. Another was done at Champaign, Urbana, Illinois. And I might just cite the couple of the highlights of this study to give context for your remark, because while there have been some remarkably good things such as the program we cited on the U2 incident, for example, in the aggregate, they don't bulk very large. Thus, we monitored for four weeks from November 15 to December 11, CBS outlet on TV, an NBC outlet on TV, and the educational TV station in Champaign Urbana.

And in that four week period, less than 2% of all of the time on the air was devoted to any kind of program on public issues. Now, let me define what we meant by public issues. We excluded hard news programs. We included commentary on news. We included forum-type programs. Anything that was presenting information on a current issue, as we put it, dealing with the events or issues of our time. So that less than 2% of all of the time on the air for a month of the two network TV stations was devoted to public issues. The educational station devoted 6% of its time to public issues. On radio, the pattern is even lower. The one radio station commercial station that we monitored was the CBS outlet. Half of 1% of its time was on public issues. And 2.3% of the time of the educational radio station was on public issues.

If one then asks the question, as we did, what proportion of the time was devoted to programs on public issues where there was a genuine confrontation of divergent points of view, you get a much smaller figure than that, of course. And for example, the one TV station, one of the commercial ones in our community devoted 3% of its time in the four-week period on programs that had an international reference, which had divergent points of view confronting each other. And so on. The pattern is pretty small. We expect to go ahead and to do this study again this spring on a nationwide basis through our member institutions. And I think this is one of the things that's bound up in the UHF VHF problem. And this is one of the key things to settle it. Now, I have asked the educators to submit and make a demand for a block of frequencies for a nationwide educational television system.

And they have met this challenge and I understand they're going to submit it shortly. Now, as you know, we've eliminated a lot of the alternatives in solving the UHF VHF problem. And we think that we're fast approaching the point where we hope to resolve it. For instance, one of the keys to this situation is the all-channel receiver. And that has been introduced in the Congress and is being sponsored by the Commission, which means merely that of the 82 channels, of the 80 channels, 82 channels, that are authorized for television. You only get 12 of them are on your receiver. But now, if the receiver is being sold to the public, you've got all 82 channels. And if a block of those channels were an educational television, a nationwide system designed to reach the school children of this country. And then the upper channels, which are presently devoted to transliter stations in remote areas. And then you get some idea, it seems to me, that this will work. And then when you take this into consideration along with the possibilities of the public service programming, the educational programming,

educational television stations can be used for, perhaps the 492 megacircles of space, which is almost half of the most valuable spectrum space available to radio and television, is being devoted now to education with the hit or miss public service methods that we have. I think you can see that there is a possibility that with such an educational system, that the commercial broadcasters would be relieved to some extent of their obligation at the habit of present time. The question is to fortune. It's a question of whether they should. Now, in order to get to this, there is an additional program, which is going on. And we issued a report in that last June, as to the method whereby a station determines what the public interest convenience and necessity is that he is obligated to serve.

Now, what the commission has concluded is that the individual licensee has been delegated responsibility of programming his station. Self-regulation is built into this to that extent. And he is committed through the commission to the Congress to use these facilities in the public interest. But now, what is he done to find out what the public interest is that he is proposing to serve? Now, our policy at the present time, and we're presently working on the forms that I referred to a while ago, is to make a determination to the extent to which he is undertaken to find out. And then, if he finds out, then the evaluation of it and the way in which he intends to meet that. Now, for somebody in Washington to sit back and say, well, you got a program this, you got a program. That, it isn't long until free country dissolves. So, I'm totally against that. Self-regulation is what I am for. But I'm also, for the commission, creating the climate to require the broadcaster to find out what that public interest is and then to propose how he is going to meet. Actually, Chairman Ford, the next thing that we had done in addition to the role of honor was that, here again, I will read it because it's brief and it refers precisely to what you are doing, we're doing a parallel study.

The conference has accepted proposal made by the Annabelle School of Communications for a preliminary survey, leading to an eventual study of the public interest as it occurs in the law governing broadcasting. This survey will bring together many separate studies, which have been or are being made, which I trust will include yours. And the purpose of it is to find out what is known about the legal and social aspects of this one phrase, the public interest. On the basis of this survey, the conference hopes to erect a full-scale study, which should result in providing the government through the FCC, the broadcasting industry and the public, with a clear concept of the public interest and the public participation in deciding what the public interest is. You are a member of the government and are in favor of as much self-regulation as we can stand without disrupting either the economy or our social system.

And so I will do the public. Ms. Manis, I think would like very much to have the government's power to not dictate the individual programs, but to alter some way the whole atmosphere of broadcasting. I would say to set up a series of standards, not to impose, but to present a series of standards of what is the public interest. And in one sense, I would think straight regulation and that is proportion of public affairs to entertainment. Do you want it by percentage? Well, I am trying to grasp something, and it seems to me that the American public, in a time of crisis, if it got 80% entertainment as against 20% information public affairs, would not be too badly off nor too throttled. I mean, I don't see what is so evil about attempting a solution of that kind.

Well, I was asked a question a minute ago that deal somewhat with this, that I didn't quite answer, and that is, should the broadcaster be relieved if an educational system is in its progress? And why? Well, now the background I was giving you and the broadcaster determining what the public interest is. If it's not being served by the educational interest stations network, for example, then he certainly has the obligation to meet the whole public interest in his area. You see, for instance, there would be specialized stations of one kind or another. And this he would have to have to show and evaluate in framing his programming as to what he is required to do to meet the public interest. And that also would have to take into account what other people were doing. Now as to the second thing, the Hatfield Amendment in 1934 was offered, which would require the commercial broadcasters to devote 25% of their time to educational programs, which is the precedent for the idea that you're really talking about.

There has never been, as I understood it, well, it was defeated in the Senate. That's right, so that it wasn't incorporated in the law. But at the same time, I have never heard anybody argue that it was unconstitutional and that it could not be done. So I think that if it's any consolation to you, there is a legal precedent, and I think the gallery for the proposition which you advance. You still want to ask whether it's desirable? Oh, yes, I'm going to ask it all the way down the line. I think this is just avoiding the main responsibility attached to the granting of a license. To have someone else do it for you. We've had broadcasting now for some 25, 30 years on a commercial basis in radio and then television from last 10 or 15. And this notion of public interest has never been met in terms of any kind of proportionate time, which is less than 2%. And even on educational stations today, which, as you know, are rather poorly manned.

It's an expensive proposition. I don't know if we can support without any kind of federal aid, a national network of ETV. And they're offering only 6% of these kinds of programs. That's different from educational broadcasting. You see, it's not putting on courses on the air. And I see nothing wrong myself because the main criterion to get back to a pointless man is made very early. To me, anyway, I'm speaking just as an individual much for the conference, is the public's criteria. We ask whether it's government or the broadcasters. I'm going to be public to regulate. And the public's agency here has to be the government. Well, but wait a minute. What you've said is that the main responsibility is being shifted to someone else. Now, the Congress has put the responsibility on the broadcast licensee to select his programming and put it on the air. What you're saying is that the Congress's policy in this area is an error. They should remove the censorship provisions. Do I understand that correctly?

And the FCC's responsibility? Well, we have to carry out what the law is. Now, there is Section 326 as no censorship. And then you have the constitutional provisions of free speech. So the question that bothers me is that you say the main responsibility, that is determining what's beyond the air, has been shifted to someone else. It hasn't. It's been shifted to the broadcaster and the Congress put it there. Now, you may say that he shifted it to the network and so on. But basically, the responsibility is the broadcaster for what goes out over the air. What if he doesn't meet that responsible? You are responsible to see that he meets it. That's right. Question. Mr. Tower. I'm going to be on your side for one minute and then I'll ask you if I am on your side. The law says that the broadcaster must operate in the public interest. So we do respect the public interest. It doesn't say that he must give 10 percent or 20 percent or 2 percent. It doesn't say that some of his programs has been. The law says in the law which your commission has to enforce that everything he does must be in the public interest.

You begin on the left hand side, you must put on nothing that's actively against the public interest. And then over this, that everything he does must in some ways serve the public interest. The objection I have to all of these proposals for making a percentage of programs specifically identified as the public interest is that that releases him from his obligation to put on everything in the public interest. He can put on two westerns to say it is in the public interest. I have two westerns. If he puts on 60 westerns, you say it's not in the public interest to do it. But he has to prove that his entire program schedule is in the public interest. Therefore dividing it off between public interest programs, programs that do serve the public. And the rest means that you will have an appalling break between two kinds of programs. I think it would be the most disastrous thing for broadcasting to have them for the country to have. But once the government grows into dictating that you shall have 2 percent of this and 5 percent of this and 10 percent of this in all areas of the country, then you have a stereotype type of broadcasting in which you have 20 stations in one town all broadcasting on exactly the same formula.

I am on your side against the same time. I as a broadcaster have just a word here. I have participated in hundreds of discussions of this problem in our own industry. That is what is the import of the phrase the public interest. I have heard it discussed by people who are knowledgeable and I. I think it is wise at the outset to try to give a bit of background on this phrase. And good chairman on my left will bear me out if I am right and correct me if I am wrong. I think the phrase public interest convenience and necessity came out of the English common law public or utility regulation. Primarily the transportation regulation in England.

It was carried over in federal public utility regulation and it was a handy phrase at the time the communications actors first put together in 1927. I don't think it is particularly useful to spend a lot of time trying to figure out what congress met in 1927 when it put this phrase in the law. That is in terms of what obligation it was imposing on a licensee. I think the public interest phrase has to be interpreted now primarily in a context of what in today's society in the United States. We think the responsibility of government is in terms of the level and diversity of programming on radio and television. In short, the phrase public interest may say to the commission what it can do in this area.

I don't think it says what it must do. I think the question we have to decide is what is the injection, what should be the degree of control. I personally feel that given a reasonable degree of competition, given a reasonable degree of competition, thus a multiplicity of services available, that you rely on a good sense of the licensee and you rely on his natural interest in serving a substantial number of people, with a service which will be attractive and useful to them. May I say just before it gets out of my mind in regard to Mr. Smice survey, I wish it had been made for the preceding four weeks rather than for the particular four weeks involved. My guess is if that survey had incorporated the last four weeks of the presidential campaign, the result would have been different.

And we would be the first to admit that that wouldn't be a typical period either. I don't know whether this particular period was or not. I'm not sure Mr. Smite that percentages in this area are particularly useful. Now finally, let me just say if I'm not talking too long here, I think an obvious point here is that the government could perhaps, according to the lights of some people, run better newspapers. The government perhaps either directly or indirectly could run better magazines. And it may be that the government even by stepping into broadcasting in a much heavier way than it has done could make better broadcasting service. But I don't think any of us want this. I think we don't want it because even though the government as Mr. Manus points out is extending its reach in all in many, many areas of American life, and some of these perhaps inevitably, some of them as a matter of choice.

I think we at least I don't want to see the government extend into this area any more than is absolutely necessary. In fact, I'd say that the more the government extends into the areas involving the distribution of goods, for example, whether direct goods are indirect goods. I think perhaps it's more incumbent upon us to be careful that the government does not move into these areas of opinion which are so important in our society in terms of deciding what she'll be done in these other economic areas. I don't think that we, but I assure you that I think Mr. Smith does want precisely. Now I want to state this for myself, you don't mind. The first place I think the significance of the citation to Murrow, which we have made, is a gesture in the direction that you're talking about. We applauded him for rejecting government interference with the content of specific news programs.

It seems to me the significance of this citation is that he alone did this. I don't know that any other broadcaster publicly objected or resented or made known his resentment to the government for this intervention. I don't know that anybody outside of the print media in one newspaper did for that matter either. But it is this element in what you say that I thoroughly agree with. Apart from that, I'd like to suggest that the problem needs to be reformulated. I don't think it's fruitful to go over round, which, as you say, has been hashed over in hundreds of meetings. It becomes like a ritualistic dance where the parties take predetermined positions and go through certain predetermined motions as to what censorship means in relation to the broadcasting industry. It seems to me that pertinent question is what is the responsibility of the broadcaster, not what is the regulatory authority of the government. Because surely we all operate on the assumption that the radio channels are still the property of the public.

And if the broadcaster is using the public property, the prime question is what is the broadcaster's responsibility? Mr. Ford, I'd like in closing just to ask you this question quite directly. I have never heard the commission take the position which I thought I heard you take a few minutes ago. That the responsibility of a commercial broadcaster could be diminished in the public service area by the performance of an educational station in his same community. I thought that this responsibility was the quid pro quo which the commercial broadcaster owed the public for the use of his frequency and I didn't know he could slough it off onto anyone else. I think you're familiar with the fact that we have many news and music stations. We have foreign language stations. We have good music stations. We have stations that are primarily devoted to religious broadcast. These are all for the most part in multiple station markets. Unfortunately in some instances they're not multiple station markets.

But the point is that I don't think you would say that a good music station is not serving the public interest when there is no other source of good music in a community providing. At the same time the public is getting well someone described this as a vertical and horizontal balance. Now what it seems to me you're contending for is vertical balance. Every station having so and so and so. And what I'm talking about is horizontal balance in which the total broadcast product of a community meets every segment of the needs of that community. The difference here is that these specialized stations you're referring to are also commercial stations. That's right. I know it sounds ridiculous but the point I would make is that it is quite possible that you have one station which puts on all these important controversial programs. And if the other station which has seven times as big following doesn't put on enough public service programs. The fact that they exist on another station the fact that the public has a chance to turn this on makes no difference at all.

It's the obligation of the broadcaster of the station owner of the network behind him to see to it that if he is tuned to that station alone for the entertainment he gets that he would also have some content with these other things such as cultural or controversial or whatever it may be. The gamut goes back to my fear that if you have suppose you had a straight educational station, a television station. And you also had a station with the loftiest motives in the world between them they would have one fifth of the of the audience that the other two stations have. And you would be relieving the other two stations of their obligation also to put a certain amount of material which is in the public interest on the one. Let me ask you this. This is the way it worked. He goes out into the community his obligation is to find is to is to report on each of the areas and he has to investigate all of the areas of categories of program which include public service program to educational agriculture and so on. And he goes out and he says to the local university we would like to have an hour a week or more of time from your institution.

And he says so sorry we're busy we've got all we can handle and yet would we penalize this one broadcaster for not having an educational program from the university or from school extended out anyway you please. Not if he couldn't get it. Not if he couldn't get it. Now my point is that if he stirs up the community and he makes a proper investigation is what the needs of the community are then he is not really of his obligation for public service program. To put a few in the simplest form that I know in certain areas in Southern California it is a vital importance to broadcast frost warnings they come suddenly and the citrus props are ruined. The station goes on the air and says we know the three other stations of broadcasting is frost warnings it does not. This case was actually mentioned in the famous blue book where the where the FCC rebuilt the owner of the station. But if you're going to say if these people will do this public service it's quite a part of educational cultural stuff.

And on the station is relieved of it then I think you are you are opening the way to the most dangerous kind. Well this this analogy I think is extending safety of life and property to all types of public service programming. And to the safety of your mind is also important. I think some kind of education of the people not under capital E but under the many ways and that includes drama. It doesn't mean that it's just discussion or just dry stuff. It is giving the people the best in various forms and I think reducing again to the simplest it is the audience of the untouchables that should also be able to get. Let's say two first class minds discussing layers. It isn't to have a little station on the side having all this and to let the untouchable audience which is the biggest see nothing but untouchables which is virtually what's happening now. It is that you have a cross in other words a thorough diet use a horrible word a kind of a broadcasting metrical by which a person viewing a commercial channel can whether he knows it or not get the intellectual emotional creative minerals that he needs to to make a whole man.

What brings me up is this thing nobody's talking about the government running broadcasting none of us have said that none of us have talked about censoring. I think we're united in being against that in any form but I still think that it is the duty of the government at least to lay down minimal standards for this greatest of mass communications. Minimal standards of what the American viewer for his own lactation and education should see during a day's viewing. I cannot see that this is anything but the responsibility a top responsibility of a governing body.

I suppose in this diet that Miss Manis is prescribing that she or someone like her might be the dietitian and determine what the balance of food elements would be and she is a very discriminating lady and obviously would do a good job. But I think the question comes down in our free society whether we want somebody in Washington or elsewhere or seven people in Washington or elsewhere being the dietitian in terms of this type of service for the American people. I don't think that's quite what she said. Isn't the content of the diet that you have meat that you have potatoes whipped or you have potatoes fried or you have potatoes some other way. All she's saying is that everybody ought to have the potatoes they need to build their body and just moving that over to ideas. It isn't as I understood it wasn't a question of saying what the content is very careful to refrain from any censorship or direction as to the content of programming but she's talking about the type of programming.

That is correct. That connection raised a question with Mr. Ford. When the commission issued the blue book it was announcing a policy pretty much like what Miss Manis has just stated. When I listen to you sir telling us your views on the music stations versus the others it sounds as if the commission has changed its policy on this important question from 1946 down to the present time. Well with respect to having any elements of public service which you would want to have showings on. It has left out the percentage factor. In other words the blue book had that an ideal station would normally in the course of events have certain percentages of different types of programs. Now then what the commission in its June 29 report said was that communities vary and what serves one community may not necessarily serve another. For instance take a station that doesn't get outside of the city of Chicago should they be required to have the same percentage of agricultural programming that one has in a rural area of Kansas.

So as you get individual differences in every garden and character and type of people now what the commission is saying is you can't ignore any of these areas you have to investigate them all and find out what the public interest requires you to do in that community so that the community gets the service it's entitled to. Certainly but this can come under broad headings I mean Mr. Sellers talking about warnings of frost in a certain section. Every section of the country obviously for the public interest public safety and health should have either hurricane warnings or flood warnings. This is one area I would think of the public interest which is clearly defined and and definable surely it is possible to find or although more difficult other areas which are could be interpreted regionally which are of importance to the people who live there not only regionally but nationally. It seems to me that people are evading these definitions constantly by saying well it can't be done without censorship I see no reason why it can't.

May I ask what does the commission proposing to do or has it proposed to do with respect to policing whatever policy it may have on this question. Well as a matter of fact one of the first things I did you know is to request Congress to give us the after I became chairman the commission requested Congress to give us the money for complaints and compliance division. Complaints would stack up in the corner and once in a while if somebody kicked while it would be investigating we had no investigators we had no way to go out and check these things. And so we conceived of a program whereby we would have and I think we've got about 25 or 30 people in this division at the moment that we would investigate these complaints that every complaint that came in from the public would receive attention. And in addition to that we would try to audit about maybe as much as 50 stations a year in which we would go into a town unknown to the station. And tape recordies programs compare the actual programming with what he said he broadcast on his logs not for the purpose of determining what balance was or what content was but determining whether or not he was complying with the commission's record keeping rules.

And it also gave us an opportunity to investigate any other charges as to failure to keep the proper kinds of record political law books and all that sort of thing. But more importantly it seems to me that what this does it gives the commission an ability now that on complaint we have somebody if this had been an existence when pay all was there. Undoubtedly it would have been investigated and never have reached the proportions that it did the same thing with respect to quiz shows I think I was fooled but many people weren't. But and wrote letters and if we had had division primarily responsible for getting those things for instance there is a national magazine that came out with an article accusing of fixing 40 some programs. But one of the networks within two days we had a list of the names of those people and we had to investigators on the way to Los Angeles to interview the guy that wrote the article.

So we can find out whether or not there was anything to this or whether this was just a sensational because the magazine is a sensational magazine. But the point is we do have the people now and we have a program of auditing stations and we can determine whether or not they have made the effort they say they have made. And up to this point we've just merely arrived and we'll pass a rule and of course everybody will base it. And now then we're not quite so trusting. And again your penalty will be not only in addition to this we went to Congress this last year and the Congress gave us authority to find up to $1,000 a day up to $10,000 for violations. We have in addition to that now a cease and desist procedure. We have in addition to that the renewal procedure in which we can take them off the hour of revocation. So we have in our armor of sanctions, a light sanction, a medium sanction, and a very drastic sanction. And that was just given to us this past year.

I give you another question you might be glad to speak to. And that's the question that I have heard that the Commission is contemplating a procedure which would require public notice of renewal applications to be publicized in the community where the station is located. That's in the station. That's true. We also got that last year. Nice. And we got a very definite statement with respect to pay all of it with illustrations. Worked out as to what you could do, what kinds of mentions you could make of commercial products on programs. And there's two or three pages and a congressional report. And this was done in conjunction with the National Association of Broadcasters with the three network representatives, with our people and the committee staffs. It's been working out. The National Association of Broadcasters was not particularly happy about the announcement that you would have people investigating. I saw some dirty words in the trade press. But I didn't really interrupt what you were saying in order to mention this. This is only a bridge to one other thing which we did, which while it's not so instant as righteousness being extremely important. This is very brief indeed.

We are going to this, our conference, I mean, is going to invite a number of scientific bodies to cooperate in working out ways by which the mass media can be most effectively used in making more people aware of the social and political consequences of recent scientific developments, particularly in respect to nuclear physics and intercontinental communications. Really, we mean communications by satellite. I mention this because this is one of those areas where programs of programs which made science known to people might be precisely the victims of the kind of thing we were talking about before. Surely we can get them on any educational station. We can get them on this station. They'd be happy to have them. I think that all of us hoped they would also appear on stations which have large audiences, which attract audiences by anything that isn't actually actively against the public interest. By the most popular things in the world, you want those audiences to have a chance to discover what these terribly important, vitally important things mean to them.

So to go back to the thing which has, I think, disturbed, at least divided us most, any suggestion that because this station here or any educational station will be putting on miraculous programs about science, that that should relieve the commercial broadcasters of an obligation to do something in the same order, I think would be nullifying what we're trying to do. This isn't a question of relieving you. But it's a question of this public service programming being put on one station and duplicated on another. Now you know no entertainment media or mass communication media likes to duplicate precisely what's on something on a competing media or a competing magazine or publication one kind or another. It doesn't relieve him of the obligation of investigating and serving the public interest and putting on public service programs. What it does, it relieves him of that particular area that's been done. Mr. Tonnebaum's been working in the scientific societies and he knows that there are 50 hours per day which we could put on if we could get the make.

Where I dispute the assumption that a broadcaster doesn't like to duplicate otherwise by the way you have so many westerns on. At the same time this is what we get. I've been bothered by your remarks earlier Mr. Tower about competition. The way it's carried on often in broadcasting is fighting fire with fire and often the choice, the availability of choice to the member of the audience is nil it's one western or another. Or even with great programs the great debates were all on all three networks in our town on television at the same time and I'm radio at the same time and the poor guy want to watch a western and couldn't. And I don't think even that is good. I want to have freedom of choice at a given time for the individual. This exclusive television report from the continuing conference on communications and the public interest has been presented by Dr. Dallas Smythe research professor in communications at the University of Illinois. Mr. Percy H. Tannenbaum director of the mass communications research center at the University of Wisconsin and by the conference chairman Mr. Gilbert Sellers dean of the Annanburg School of Communications at the University of Pennsylvania.

This appraisal of broadcasting has been considered by Mr. Charles Tower vice president of the National Association of Broadcasters. Commissioner Fredrick R. Ford outgoing chairman of the Federal Communications Commission and by Miss Maria Manis television and drama critic of the reporter magazine. While today's report has been the concern of representatives of government the press scholars in the area of communications and the broadcast profession. It is of continuing concern also to you the viewing audience the consumers of American broadcast. This special telecast has been produced for the National Educational Television and Radio Center. The program was produced by W-H-Y-Y Philadelphia. This is N-E-T National Educational Television.