May 03, 2005
Bleep You
Posted by Doug Allen @ 1:56 pm in
* General
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It’s coming up on my one-year anniversary of acquiring a satellite radio unit. Once installed in my vehicle, I’ve rarely looked back on FM and AM, and many others are increasingly feeling the same way. I love satellite radio. The seemingly endless variety of music genres and talk/comedy stations, most without commercials and only limited DJ banter, puts terrestrial radio to shame. With so much bandwidth, XM and Sirius can take chances with new and relatively unheard artists and comedians. Off-center musicians that never saw light on radio can now breathe on this medium. Everything from bluegrass to new age to salsa to punk. Not only that, but the bleeps and pauses that may cover the naughty bits are absent. Satellite radio, like cable stations HBO and Cinemax, are beyond FCC regulations. For now.
But politicians like Senator Ted Stevens (disappointingly from Alaska, one of the most limited-government states in the union) wouldn’t mind extending the heavy hand of the FCC into cable television and satellite radio (Imagine Tony Soprano shouting “gosh darn you!”). And it appears that it doesn’t really matter what side of the proverbial aisle they are on. Stevens is Republican, and the retired John Breaux, a Democrat, pushed for an amendment to expand the FCC’s authority.
The pro-FCC side has always favored such decency standards for over-the-air broadcast radio. Even if one disagreed with even this amount of regulation, one could possibly see some sense in the other side’s argument.
But going after a paid service is downright scary. If this succeeds (which, fortunately, many predict it won’t), every single shred of home entertainment will have to be at a child’s level. The FCC will have completed its role as Ultra-Nanny. I mean, what’s next? Magazines? Someone might bring a Penthouse home, and God forbid if an unsupervised child finds it. Books? Even widely-known mainstream novels like Michael Crichton’s Timeline have more than a couple obscenities in it.
Seems like Howard Stern was on to something, after all.
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