Clear Channel Communications, the radio and concert conglomerate so many people love to hate, has a new batch of disgruntled critics to deal with. But this time it's not the musicians who claim that the entertainment giant plays hardball and locks acts off the airwaves, or the broadcast rivals who allege the company leverages its unmatched size to drive competitors out of business, or even the former employees who insist the company's rampant cost-cutting style has gutted American radio. Nope -- now the heat is coming from other media company executives and Beltway lobbyists. They are dismayed that Clear Channel is doing what many might have thought impossible. In an era when Republicans control the government and big business generally gets what it wants, Clear Channel is making deregulation look bad.
Man, the sad thing is that I don't know whether to call this a good thing or a bad thing. It's good that the other media industries are still being regulated from owning too large of a percentage of the market. However, is sucks that throughout America there is hardly any good radio left. You can certainly tell the Clear Channel stations, though, since they all have the same playlist. It doesn't seem to have changed in the past 4 years... Clear Channel's big, stinking deregulation mess |