13 FOX affiliates were fined today $7000 each because they aired an episode of FOX’s Married by America, in 2003, that contained 10.5 seconds pixilated boobies and ass! Yes, pixilated indecency, a new one courtesy of the ever watchful FCC! And it only took them 5 years to reach a decision, but they had to, the statue of limitations on indecency is 5 years!
According to the FCC merely pixilating the special areas of the female body was not sufficient to keep them from being patently offensive as measured by contemporary community standards. Operative words being “community standards” which are used in the more raunchy pornography cases and which differ from place to place (hence why such cases are tried in conservative areas to have a bigger chance of scoring a conviction).
Originally the FCC fined 169 FOX stations but then wound up watering down their punishment to just a handful of tv stations that were the only ones to receive complaints from viewers. WTVT in Tampa, Florida
SunbeamTV, owners of WSVN, paid the fine but since they received no complaints are now asking for a refund:
Respondents raise multiple arguments, each of which is discussed below. Generally, they
assert that the subject episode of “Married By America†is not actionably indecent under the
Commission’s prevailing indecency standard.
One respondent, Sunbeam Television Corporation, licensee of Station WSVN(TV), Miami, Florida, paid its
forfeiture in full, subject to the outcome of the Commission’s final action with respect to the FOX/Affiliates
Consolidated Response
In response to the NAL, Sunbeam, licensee of Station WSVN(TV), Miami, Florida, tendered
a check made payable to the Commission in the amount of $7,000, subject to final agency action with
respect to the FOX/Affiliates Consolidated Response. Having determined that the NAL should be
canceled as to all licensees against which no specific complaint was filed, including Sunbeam, Sunbeam
may file appropriate documents requesting a refund of the amount it tendered
Meanwhile, in a state far far away outraged “family” organizations heard the news and had a collective orgasm.
FCC Forfeiture Order /PDF/
WSJ.com -
FCC Rejects Appeal by Fox on Reality-TV Indecency Complaint
Reuters-
Thirteen Fox stations fined over 2003 reality show
BroadcastingCable.com -
FCC Fines 13 Fox Stations for 2003 Episode of Married by America – 2/22/2008
Tampa Bay Business Journal -
‘Married By America’ broadcast lands fine on WTVT
Power Outage Online Coverage
CBS4.com – frequent updates, on the front page, and video from on-air reports.
No live streaming that i can see– here’s live video linkNBC6.net – WTVJ is streaming their live coverage , you can watch it here
WSVN.com – 7News is streaming live at the usual address /must have Windows Media player or equivalent/ though it can be a bit slow due to the massive amount of people watching
Local10.com – WPLG is also streaming their live coverage on the web /under Related To story content/ – video
wsvn.com -
Grid problems cause Fla. power outages, shut down nuclear plant
local10.com -
FPL: Power Back On In South Florida
cbs4.com -
Fast Facts: Power Outage
nbc6.net -
Grid Problems Cause Fla. Power Outages, Shut Down Nuclear Plant
Overall if you were lucky to have power and internet at work, or got suck with only your mobile device in the middle of I-95, you would’ve gotten plenty of details regarding the power outage from the local news sites, the tv ones in this case.
CBS4.com as usual had pretty extensive coverage, and lots of information on their front page, updated frequently with text and lots of video. CNN.com gave them a nice visible link in the breaking news report. NBC6.net didn’t have much fanfare on the front page besides a link to an extended story and live video from the on-air coverage.
WSVN.com didn’t fare too well today. If the tipster was correct, their site crashed really hard from the sudden influx of visitors, probably everyone trying to watch the live stream. When I tried to hit them up around 3:15pm the page wouldn’t load at all, few minutes later only some parts of it did. And they probably couldn’t even update the site because when it came online it had nothing regarding the outage besides the flash player on the left with a screen shot of Mayor Alvarez presser but even that would show as not available when I pressed play.
Local10.com offered live streaming of their on-air coverage too, along with frequent updates on the site itself, and they too got a nice juicy link from CNN.com’s report.