Free market status of airwaves - should they be privatised / free-marketised ?

aneeshm

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In a recent discussion about a channel showing a documentary , the question of the legal status of airwaves arose . I hold the stance that a frequency range ( the amouunt required for a channel ) should be bought and sold on the open market , and not leased , like it is now . The country can be divided into regions , and the rights to a frequency in a region can be bought and sold freely on the open market .

What this will do is that it will finally allow smaller , regional players to enter a market dominated by large corporations , whose monopoly is coercively maintained by the government and it's archaic norms . Not only that , but this nonsense of "equal time/equal representation" can be dispensed with . Why , in the name of anything sensible , should you be forced to give equal time to something you personally despise ?




Any defenders of the status quo , please state your reasons .
 
Actually, it would empower the already large companies to buy more airwaves than they are currently allowed.
 
Digital radio would kill that market.

The reason why is because there are an unlimited (more-or-less) amount of frequencies available.

Even in the biggest countries, there wouldn't be any reason for hundreds of radio stations to battle for listeners. If there are too many radio stations, then some of them won't get sponsorship/advertisement because they have too few listeners.

If digital radio wasn't going to happen, then I still don't think that it would work. There are numerous radio stations on practically the same frequencies.
 
Then you go from censorship in the government to censorship in the home. Because I'm not going to let my kids watch any show that is on the air. Now, of course, we have to pay attention to what's on. But I know they're not going to be watching adult swim at 10:00 saturday morning on nickeoldeon. With what you plan, they could very well be. And there's a reason it's called 'Adult Swim'.

I already do enough policing of what my kids watch. I don't need to do more.
 
Turner_727 said:
Then you go from censorship in the government to censorship in the home. Because I'm not going to let my kids watch any show that is on the air. Now, of course, we have to pay attention to what's on. But I know they're not going to be watching adult swim at 10:00 saturday morning on nickeoldeon. With what you plan, they could very well be. And there's a reason it's called 'Adult Swim'.

I already do enough policing of what my kids watch. I don't need to do more.

You know, your kids are going to watch "Adult Swim" in the Internet, or at the house of some friend with ultra-liberal parents. There is no escaping.

I support aneeshm idea.
 
I'd prefer it if every facet of my existence wasn't controlled by companies, but by policy I could vote to change. Besides, government can raise money by relicensing the frequencies every 5 years or something.
Digital radio will change the landscape completely however.
 
aneeshm said:
I hold the stance that a frequency range ( the amouunt required for a channel ) should be bought and sold on the open market , and not leased , like it is now .

What difference does it make? If frequency ranges are bought, the first buy would be from the govt., right? So the govt. would get a big lump sum instead of a steady flow of payments. Sounds like just the kind of one-time budget gimmick that the current generation of politicians would love to grab. Then they could unbalance the budget even more while pretending not to.

Now, changing the rules for broadcasters, like the "equal time" rule, is a separate issue. And a more important one.
 
Since none of the broadcasting companies pay taxes for filling public airwaves with their signals, aren't they essentially private as it is?
 
luiz said:
You know, your kids are going to watch "Adult Swim" in the Internet, or at the house of some friend with ultra-liberal parents. There is no escaping.

I support aneeshm idea.

Actually, they're not. We control their internet access as well. As for going over to friends houses', well that doesn't happen very often. Mostly the kids come over here to play.
 
What makes you think that selling the frequencies would lead to more small radiostations to emerge. As in where do they get the money to outbid the big companies to get their business started?
The air freely being sold in the open market. :hmm: :D
 
Turner, I must say, I'm really glad I'm not your kid. I know I have no right to tell you how to rear children, but from your description you seem especially draconian.

In either case, if selling rather than leasing air waves would end the current reign of FCC censorship, which I find rather absurd and antiquated, then I'm all for it. I don't particularly care much for the issue, but it does pop up to annoy me occasionally. For instance, when Al Sharpton hosted Saturnday Night Live, some NBC affiliates in early primary states refused to air it, for fear that another candidate could use the FCC regulation to demand that he be given equal time hosting the show.
 
Turner_727 said:
Actually, they're not. We control their internet access as well. As for going over to friends houses', well that doesn't happen very often. Mostly the kids come over here to play.

As much as I respect your position, I insist that it's a very difficult goal to achieve.
You can't watch over your kids 24/7. Maybe some of their friends will bring some porn magazines to school. When I was young I went to this hardcore catholic school, but that didn't keep anyone from taking porn magazines.

Honestly, I don't know of a single 6 year old who had no contact with that kind of stuff. Granted, Brazil is waaaay more liberal then the US, but I tend to think that people are the same.
 
Hehe... just by the sound of the conversation, I know T is an adult, and would venture a guess that SeleucusNicator and luiz are probably teens...
Don't listen to them T... There are so few 'draconian' parents left ;)
 
SeleucusNicator said:
Turner, I must say, I'm really glad I'm not your kid. I know I have no right to tell you how to rear children, but from your description you seem especially draconian.
I had a nice little response to it, but really it's not worth it.

Draconian indeed! :lol:

SeleucusNicator said:
In either case, if selling rather than leasing air waves would end the current reign of FCC censorship, which I find rather absurd and antiquated, then I'm all for it. I don't particularly care much for the issue, but it does pop up to annoy me occasionally. For instance, when Al Sharpton hosted Saturnday Night Live, some NBC affiliates in early primary states refused to air it, for fear that another candidate could use the FCC regulation to demand that he be given equal time hosting the show.

Believe it or not, I wish that american laws were looser. In certain time slots. I hate watching a movie on cable - cable of all things! - and have things bleeped out. Or nudity not shown. Granted, TNT and TBS are going to be family oriented. But I don't want to have to rely on premium channels to get my movie fix. Before I got rid of them, I had 30 odd premium channels, and nothing on. I watched as many movies on HBO and Showtime as I did on SpikeTV, Comedy Central, TNT and TBS. Sad, really.

luiz said:
As much as I respect your position, I insist that it's a very difficult goal to achieve.
You can't watch over your kids 24/7. Maybe some of their friends will bring some porn magazines to school. When I was young I went to this hardcore catholic school, but that didn't keep anyone from taking porn magazines.

Honestly, I don't know of a single 6 year old who had no contact with that kind of stuff. Granted, Brazil is waaaay more liberal then the US, but I tend to think that people are the same.

You're right. It's very difficult. However, I trust my kids. Oh, I know they're going to get into porn in high school, and watch shows I'd rather them not see. But I teach them morals. I teach them right and wrong. And I trust that my trust in them will be rewarded. It's already happened in other areas. They may look at Playboys or watch the Spice channel at another kids house, but they're going to know why I disapprove of it, and why they should wait. Certainly they'll be exposed to it. And I'm sure that they'll make a good choice.

And if they do, better this than drugs. Better this than stealing a car for a joy ride. Better this than a lot of things.

I too went to Catholic school. First to Eight grades. We were much more informed about these things than our public school peers!

Paradigne said:
Hehe... just by the sound of the conversation, I know T is an adult, and would venture a guess that SeleucusNicator and luiz are probably teens...
Don't listen to them T... There are so few 'draconian' parents left.

Better a draconian parent who takes interest in their kids lives than a non-draconian one who doesn't, eh? ;)

For the record, my kids rather like how my wife and I parent. We let them watch R rated movies, let them listen to the music they want to. Generally, when we tell them no to something, be it a book, movie, or music, they know why we said no, and why we feel that way. They actually have quite a lot of freedom for kids their age. Do they get their way every time? Of course not. But they get a lot more than other kids their age.
 
I still don't understand how an "airwave" can be bought or leased in the first place.

I will address this before I even attempt the question at hand.
 
There needs to be control with who sends on what frequensy, or else the signals would eliminate each other.

Most things like this is controlled by the government, so letting them make the rules for who sends on what airwave seems good to me.

As for leasing or selling, I think it would be best if the government was leasing it to the companies. I just don't like the idea of one corporation suddenly owning ALL frequensies in a certain area...
 
cgannon64 said:
I know very little about radio, so may I ask: What happens if two people try to broadcast on the same frequency?

They will interfere with each other, resulting in either totally garbled messages (can't understand anything), or result in some pretty hilarious conversations.

"Sosa steps up to the plate.."
"Do you have debt problems? Then visit us at"
"Wrigley field"
 
cgannon64 said:
I know very little about radio, so may I ask: What happens if two people try to broadcast on the same frequency?

What Bamspeedy said, but only if they both are within the same range.
 
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