(via LostRemote)
With all the Sinclair hoopla some stations, particularly WTXL the ABC affiliate in Tallahassee, has been prompted to include in big bold letters on their front pages they’re not affiliated with Sinclair and have no intention of airing anything requested by Sinclair. (WTXL website)
Meanwhile two new sites have sprung up regarding the Sinclair boycott – BoycottSBG and StopSinclair.com which has an online petition with over 40,000 signatures
Oh that one’s going to be messy.
Fox News Bill O’Reilly is suing one of his associated producers, Andrea Mackris, who alleged that while working for the O’Reilly Factor “offensinve statements” had been made to her by Bill O’Reilly himself. Draft of the complaint shown to Fox and News Corp reps had lenghty complaints indicating that O’Reilly might have been taped by Mackris.
Yahoo News
Fox’s O’Reilly Sues Over Alleged Extortion Scheme
The Smocking Gun – letter sent to FOX News
The Smocking Gun – O’Reilly: Female Aide In $60M Extort Bid – complaint filed by Fox News Channel
Exerpts taken from the complaing filed by Andrea Mackris and highlighted by The Smocking gun
O’Reilly on Al Franken and the power of FNC
Sexual advances during dinner at restaurant and Thailand sex shows
Carribean vacations and watching porn
Update: Fox News releases official Press Release regarding the lawsuit (needs Adoby Acrobat)
One of my insiders tells me that Delaine Mathieu has oficially left WSVN and likely moved to WPLG. The new newsplex design is being finalized as is the graphics overhaul which will more than likely not make it for Novermber sweeps. I suspect if everything is a go soon, they might do like their sister station WHDH and debut the set 2-3 weeks into the sweeps, but that remains to be seen. Also no baseball tomorrow, 3rd presidential debate will be aired on 7News, good move!
The Federal Communications Commission said on Tuesday that it would fine 169 Fox television stations $7,000 each, or a total of $1.18 million, for violating indecency rules when it showed a particularly graphic episode of the show “Married by America” last spring.
… more from the NYTimes – 169 Fox Stations Fined in Indecency Case
169 Fox Stations Fined in Indecency Case
By STEPHEN LABATON
Published: October 13, 2004
WASHINGTON, Oct. 12 – The Federal Communications Commission said on Tuesday that it would fine 169 Fox television stations $7,000 each, or a total of $1.18 million, for violating indecency rules when it showed a particularly graphic episode of the show “Married by America” last spring.
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The show, one of the reality’ programs in Fox’s lineup, features a group of single adults who agree to be engaged and marry, even though they had never previously met.
The commission found an April episode of the show violated the indecency rules through a series of sexually suggestive and explicit scenes.
“The material is gratuitous, vulgar and clearly intended to pander to and titillate,” said the commission’s order, which was unanimously approved by the five commissioners.
The order noted that at least one Fox affiliate, WRAZ in the Raleigh- Durham area of North Carolina, had refused to broadcast the show and would not be penalized. That station is owned by the Capitol Broadcasting Company, which has long been critical of the content of various programs and has been one of the few broadcasting companies to oppose the commission’s efforts to deregulate the media ownership rules.
The Fox broadcasting network, which owns 25 of the stations, issued a statement shortly after the commission decision that suggested that it would appeal the action.
“We disagree with the F.C.C. decision and believe the content is not indecent,” said Joe Early, a spokesman for the broadcasting company.
In the aggregate, the fine is the largest indecency penalty ever levied by the commission against a group of television stations, and it caps a series of other indecency fines in recent months.
Three weeks ago the commission proposed a fine of $550,000 against the CBS division of Viacom for an incident during the Super Bowl halftime show when the singer Janet Jackson’s breast was bared.
In that case, the commission did not levy a fine against the affiliates. The commission sought to distinguish the CBS case from the Fox decision by noting that “Married by America,” unlike the Super Bowl, was a taped episode that could have been pre-empted by the affiliates.
Earlier this year, the commission reached a settlement with Clear Channel, the nation’s largest radio station owner, to settle a series of indecency complaints for more than $1.7 million. That settlement was on top of a $755,000 fine imposed on Clear Channel for graphic and sexually explicit material broadcast in Florida on the “Bubba the Love Sponge” program, whose host, Todd Clem, was dismissed.
Oh does it ever end? Now the Parents Television Council gestapo is going after FOX’s sleazy “Married by America” show for showing people licking whip cream off of each other during a “racy” bachelor’s party. All of that happened in 2003. And if the FCC has it’s way FOX is going to get slapped with $1,000,000 fine – $450,000 more than CBS Jannet tit “accident”. If the airwaves were a bathtub, the soap industry would make bank and retire to the Carribean from the PTC and their quest for clean airwaves
CNN/Money
FCC may hit Fox with $1M penalty
