FREE PRESS: PROTESTS AT FCC AGAINST SELLOUT TO BIG MEDIA

WASHINGTON — More than 150 citizens crowded the sidewalks outside Federal Communications Commission headquarters in a Halloween-morning rally against media consolidation.

The public event, held before the FCC’s Oct. 31 hearing on localism, was joined by elected officials, civil rights and labor leaders, consumer and media reform advocates, activists and even cheerleaders, who all came to urge the federal agency to vote against any rule changes that could result in more consolidation of ownership. FCC Chairman Kevin Martin has proposed an expedited timeline for rule changes that could allow a company to own a newspaper and several radio and television stations in a single city.

“We are gravely concerned that Chairman Martin would try to secretly move on such a critical issue with such a short timetable,” said Josh Silver, executive director of Free Press, which coordinates the StopBigMedia.com Coalition. “The public is being shut out of the process so that Martin can move forward with his Big Media giveaway.”

Multichannel News:FCC DISSES CABLE

Dealing a major blow to Comcast, Time Warner Cable and other cable TV operators, the Federal Communications Commission voted Wednesday to ban operators from cutting exclusive deals with owners of apartment buildings, condominiums and other multiple dwelling units.

I WANT MEDIA.COM–RUPERT: BID FOR WORLD DOMINATION CONTINUES

News Corp to Expand in Former Soviet Union

News Corp. is acquiring television station Imedi in Georgia from billionaire Badri Patarkatsishvili to expand in the former Soviet Union. Patarkatsishvili says he plans fund the country’s growing political opposition, which is working to bring down U.S.-educated president Mikheil Saakashvili.

ON CBS COVERAGE OF IRAN AND IRAQ

NEWSPAPER WEBSITE VISITS RISE

The number of people visiting U.S. newspaper Web sites rose 3.7 percent during the third quarter, according to an industry group, even as their print editions reported lower advertising sales. More than 59 million people, or 37.1 percent of all active Internet users, visited the papers’ Web sites during the quarter, up from 56.9 million a year ago, the Newspaper Association said, citing data supplied by Nielsen/NetRatings. The results, which the association plans to release on Wednesday, also show that Internet users spent an average about 43 minutes per month on newspaper Web sites, up 4 percent over the same period a year ago.

Reuters vi AEJC: Paparazzo offered Diana pictures from crash - court

A photographer rang a British newspaper from the Paris road tunnel where Princess Diana lay dying to offer exclusive pictures for GBP 300,000 (about EUR 430,000), a court was told on Tuesday. Two shots of Diana, showing her slumped on the floor of the car’s mangled wreckage, were sent to the picture desk of The Sun tabloid by Romuald Rat, one of the paparazzi pursuing her. Stephane Darmon, Rat’s motorcyclist on the night Diana was killed, said the photographer had tried to help at the crash scene on Aug. 31, 1997.

But in robust court exchanges, Darmon’s version was contested by Richard Keen, lawyer for chauffeur Henri Paul, who died in the crash along with Diana and her lover Dodi al-Fayed. ‘What Mr Rat was protecting was not the victims of this crash, but the 300,000 pound exclusive that he had just telephoned into the Sun from the tunnel,’ Keen told the London inquest probing the deaths of Diana and Dodi. Keen accused Rat and Darmon of offering versions of the event that were ‘self-serving lies’ designed to protect them from charges of manslaughter and failing to give assistance to people in distress. (Reuters)

WIKI MEDIA GOES TO AFRICA

St. Petersburg, FL - October 31, 2007 - The Wikimedia Foundation, an international nonprofit organization dedicated to the growth, development and distribution of free, multilingual content, announced today that it will host Wikipedia Academy workshops in various locations throughout South Africa on November 10 and 11, 2007.

“Wikipedia versions are currently available for only 250 of the world’s 7,000 languages. Establishing Wikipedias in more African languages will enable speakers of those languages to more actively participate in the global exchange of knowledge. Additionally, it may, in a small way, help to preserve those languages,” said Jimmy Wales, the founder of Wikipedia

TOWARD FREEDOM: I Want My Community TV: Public Access Television Faces Threats