freedom of press

FCC Auctioning a Filtered "Free" Internet

charlesuchu — Tue, 27 May 2008 21:30:00 -0700

Reading this article concerned me heavily.

FCC boss mulls free* wireless for all
* - includes ads and content filters

documentary film on decline of television

Mark Tollefson — Fri, 23 May 2008 11:47:00 -0700

I am producing a documentary film about the current state and future evolution of television. It is a critical examination of how the broadcasting industry has been steadily corrupted by the influence of media consolidation, greed and mismanagement.

Join Us In Minneapolis

headzup — Mon, 12 May 2008 14:32:00 -0700

As many of you already know, Headzup's satirical cartoons have been known to traverse the globe within minutes of publication by being passed from cell phone to cell phone as forwarded picture messages. By carefully crafting our daily cartoons to "fly under the radar" of monopolistic mobile network operators, we are working to establish an early beachhead from which other progressive voices can be heard.

Pentagon Pundits Jeopardize America's Free Press

jsilver — Wed, 23 Apr 2008 11:35:00 -0700

Yesterday, the New York Times exposed a secret Pentagon campaign to infiltrate the media with pro-war propaganda.

The scheme reaches all the way to the Bush White House, where top officials recruited dozens of "military analysts" to spread favorable views of the war via every major news channel -- without revealing they were working from Pentagon scripts and often lobbying for major military contractors.

Spreading "covert propaganda" is illegal under federal law. Congress must investigate these military pundits and their ties to the Bush administration, defense contractors and our national news media.

ColorOfChange.org Speaks Out on Net Neutrality

Josh Stearns — Thu, 17 Apr 2008 17:05:00 -0700

Can the FCC fix the internet?

Seeta Peña Gangadharan — Mon, 14 Apr 2008 15:15:00 -0700

The Federal Communications Commission comes to Stanford this Thursday
to hear from two panels of experts and members of the public on issues
related to broadband network management practices.

Background

Some more suppressed news from Joe's Union Review

Sun, 06 Apr 2008 23:22:00 -0700

Most people aren't even aware that 35,000 workers are laid off because of the American Axle Strike, theres a lot more stuff you may not know, my job is bringing it to the public with some semblance of journalistic integrity

American Axle Strike

A True 21st Century Education Looks Like This

tompoe — Thu, 20 Mar 2008 21:40:00 -0700

"He sees interactive tablet PCs replacing textbooks and notebooks in schools. Students will call up everything they need on their tablet PCs and write everything directly on the screen to be stored there. His daughter’s school, he said, is already using this technology."
<a href="http://www.freepress.net/news/31335">Free Press News</a>

More suppresed news you may have missed, 46 stories from Feb. at Joe's Union Review

Tue, 26 Feb 2008 18:25:00 -0800

I got myself 46 stories in 26 days of Feb, quite a few are in the suppressed news catagory. Some articles cover the gamut of ideals seen here at freepress. Most of them go back to the idea that there is a war on the middle class worker here in the US and around the entire globe. Take a look, let me know what you think.

Democracy Now! Saves $1,000 a month with bittorrent

deanjansen — Fri, 22 Feb 2008 22:04:00 -0800

In preparing for Monday's public FCC hearing, I decided to do a bit of research into how much money an organization can save by using bittorrent. It turns out that the savings are pretty amazing!

As you will see, Democracy Now! has a fixed cost of roughly $200 per month (the service is donated) for distributing their news program at full resolution. Compare that to a bill for serving direct HTTP downloads using Amazon's S3 service, which would currently sit at roughly $1200 per month and would increase with viewership.

The First Advocacy Corporation, or Anti-Corporation type of business

AdvocacyCorporation — Sun, 10 Feb 2008 13:48:00 -0800

It is my belief that the role of the advocate, the people who believe in things, do things and passionately stand for things, is not structurally protected in this system. The consequences of this is the death of democracy itself and all you need to do is look at the project censored - 25 most censored stories of the year to see this is happening right now. This is a bigger problem than just media consolidation.

It’s All in the Game: Media Coverage of the 2008 Presidential Primary Campaigns

Jim Carlson — Wed, 30 Jan 2008 06:11:00 -0800

The news media in a democracy should facilitate and nurture a “marketplace of ideas” where the best policies and the best political candidates emerge from competition between ideas that arise from free and transparent public discourse.

S-1959- "Homegrown Terrorism Bill" Bad choice of wording or are we all "terrorists"?

Sat, 12 Jan 2008 16:21:00 -0800

Allegedly this bill, if what the video implies were to be true, could be used by this and many other Netroot sites that concern themselves with governmental acts and corporate misdeeds, be lumped into a new catagory of criminal known as "Homegrown Terrorist".

Net Neutrality, Get It While You Can

jbm125 — Sat, 12 Jan 2008 04:55:00 -0800

Net Neutrality refers to free access to the Internet without discrimination based upon how often a user accesses the Internet or how much broadband capacity they utilize. Advocates for Net Neutrality believe that users are entitled to unlimited access in order to preserve current freedoms as well as to prevent broadband providers from abusing their power to block applications they do not favor or to discriminate between content providers. Critics of Net Neutrality and associated legislative proposals believe that Net Neutrality rules would reduce incentives to upgrade networks and launch next generation network services and, in turn, inhibit the most efficient access to the broadband network.

Academic Leaders Respond to FCC Vote

Josh Stearns — Fri, 04 Jan 2008 12:29:00 -0800

NCMR: Got suggestions?

yolandafp — Mon, 17 Dec 2007 10:08:00 -0800

We need your brainpower and creativity as we plan the program for the next National Conference for Media Reform.

Please contribute your suggestions for conference session topics, presenters, and workshop proposals through our online system: http://www.freepress.net/conference/CFS.

A User-Backlash Against New Advertising Practices by Social Networks

Kathryn Montgomery — Wed, 21 Nov 2007 07:02:00 -0800

As the controversy over new online marketing plans by social networks continues, there is evidence of growing user backlash. Both Facebook and MySpace have recently announced the launch of new interactive marketing schemes on their platforms, even after the Federal Trade Commission and consumer groups had expressed concerns about the privacy threats posed by behavioral profiling on social network sites.

Want to see what BIG MEDIA take over is like??

cATSENd — Wed, 14 Nov 2007 15:40:00 -0800

I hope people will read this a take a view of the future

if these LARGE GREEDY MEDIA people take over.

I don't know how many people have either watched or

heard about the TV Show Max Headroom ,but if you want to

see what is to come try to get hold of these shows.

The WGA Strike and Media Consolidation

Josh Stearns — Tue, 13 Nov 2007 12:13:00 -0800

The Writers Guild of America (WGA) East and West have been longstanding supporters of media reform work. They see first hand the impact that consolidation has on jobs and communities. Recently, WGA has been on strike because corporate media owners refuse to bargain in good faith about new and emerging forms of media. However, as we know from our work in media reform, one of the hardest things about fighting big media is that they control the airwaves (our airwaves).

In the blog entry below, one of the writers on strike writes about the dismal coverage their issue if getting in mainstream media. The post is from the WGA blog that leaders of the strike set up to chronicle their effort for a fair contract. Go check it out for some great videos and lots of great writing: http://unitedhollywood.blogspot.com.

Journalists Must Join the Fight for Better Media

jtorres — Thu, 08 Nov 2007 09:06:00 -0800

UNITY: Journalists of Color, which represents more than 10,000 journalists, recently sent a letter to FCC Chairman Kevin Martin calling for the creation of an independent minority ownership task force.

UNITY is a coalition of the Asian American Journalists Association,
Native American Journalists Association, National Association of Black
Journalists and National Association of Hispanic Journalists. They
should be commended for taking such a principled stand.

But the simple truth is that too few journalists are speaking out
against the harmful affects of media consolidation on their newsrooms
and on news coverage.