Media Council Hawaii

SuperPAC Transparency Bill Hearing in House Today, 2 p.m.

Media Council Hawaii — Thu, 02 Feb 2012 18:30:55 +0000

Today at 2 pm. in Capitol Room 325, the state House Committee on the Judiciary (JUD) will be hearing testimony on important campaign finance bills.

HB 2376 – TRANSPARENCY FOR INDEPENDENT EXPENDITURES - This bill will change campaign reporting requirements by:

Requiring more “persons” to report their campaign spending
Improving the reporting by noncandidate committees (PACs and SuperPACs)
Adding late expenditure reports to shine light on money spent just before an election
Improving the disclosures at the end of campaign advertisements

Please support Media Council Hawaii with a testimony to help PASS this bill. The unlimited corporate spending in campaigns, from independent expenditures and Super PACs is a big issue in this year’s elections. In a post last week, we highlighted how SuperPAC funding will affect broadcast media.

Also on the Agenda:

HB 2700 - Improvements for Publicly Funded Elections - replace the equalizing funds for A pilot program for publicly-funded “clean elections” was successfully launched in Hawaii County Council in 2010.
HB 2174 is a less comprehensive bill than HB 2376 but concerns similar issues as well.
HB 2457 – Gifts to legislators & state employees – This bill allows legislators and state employees to accept charitable event tickets from 501c3 nonprofits, creating new loopholes to our gifts and ethics laws.

Be heard! Submit your testimony online or by email.

Perspective on #Davos Journalism – FelixTV

Bobby Lambrix — Wed, 01 Feb 2012 17:43:56 +0000

The World Economic Forum just closed their annual meeting in Davos, Switzerland for 2012. Just prior to the meeting Thomson Reuters debuted Reuters TV. So, finance blogger Felix Salmon was in the Swiss snow with a camera crew for the conference. This video gives an interesting take on the public relations and journalism game at a major international conference.

*The videos with Henry Blodgett and Arianna Huffington are also worth watching.

Media Scrutiny Theater 2012

Media Council Hawaii — Mon, 30 Jan 2012 21:01:39 +0000

For the upcoming elections, WYNC’s On the Media has brought back Media Scrutiny Theater, a political advertising version of Mystery Science Theater 3000.

Hosts Brooke Gladstone and Bob Garfield provide colorful commentary and a bit of fact-checking to candidate advertising in the 2012 election cycle. These segments are excellent accompaniment to your regular news, Daily Show and Flack Check viewings. Below is their latest addition, featuring an Elizabeth Warren attack Ad.

SuperPAC Spending Will Inundate Citizens, Warns Tim Karr of FreePress

Bobby Lambrix — Fri, 27 Jan 2012 20:11:01 +0000

Tim Karr, Senior Strategy Director at FreePress, published a comprehensive report yesterday on campaign Ad spending entitled Citizens Inundated. In it, Karr features current projections for campaign spending and the over-sized influence this money is having on the Federal Communications Commission and local media outlets, particularly on television. His findings and recommendations are issues that, we at the Media Council feel, are worth sharing and applying here in Hawaii.

From the report,

Broadcast television is our most influential communications medium. According to a Pew Research Center survey, 78 percent of American viewers report getting their news from local TV on a typical day — more than the number that rely on newspapers, radio or the Internet. As such TV has been extremely popular with those seeking to manipulate public opinion.

Projections have estimated close to $3 billion in SuperPac spending for the 2012 election cycle. The Wall Street Journal is tracking the spending here. At the time of this post, it’s already at $40,890,383. According to their breakdown, most of the money is in the Republican camp. Locally, GOP candidate and former Hawaii Gov., Linda Lingle’s campaign for a Senate seat has collected $1.8 million in just three months. It may have voters curious if the candidates are (like garage rockers, JEFF the brotherhood) asking themselves, “just how much money can we spend?” Most of this money is expected to end up in the media.

It’s no exaggeration to say that election money is all about the
media. And the funds are not limited to spending by Super
PACs. Campaigns spend, too. For every dollar contributed to
support Barack Obama’s 2008 presidential run, his campaign
spent nearly 60 cents on media, according to the Center for
Responsive Politics.

Yet for all this money pouring into media outlets, journalism jobs are still being lost by competent reporters, photographers and editors. Where the revenue is ending up, is ultimately an issue of transparency. The designation of the public inspection file has previously held this position to document the political Ad buys for broadcast stations. However as Karr, and Columbia’s Steven Waldman have chronicled, the pen-and-ink log is an antiquated model. A recent push to require this information to uploaded online has sparked a backlash from the National Association of Broadcasters (NAB) – to the confusion of many. Waldman wrote yesterday,

One gets the strong sense that broadcasters are happy to have a “public inspection file” as long as the public is not actually inspecting it. For instance, four TV licensees (in San Diego, Texas, New Mexico, and Illinois) objected to a proposal that the public be notified on air about the existence of the file. “Such announcements may arouse the public’s interest in examining a PIF, but the Licensees do not believe that the Commission should attempt to stimulate such examinations.” Right. We wouldn’t want the public so “aroused” that they would, in their words, play “Sherlock Holmes” rather than engaging station managers in “productive dialogue.”

In the closing of his report, Karr offers four recommendations to readers, of which Media Council Hawaii is taking part:

Make Political Ad Spending Information Fully Available Online
Expose the Money Behind Front Groups in the Body of the Ads
Get Serious about Strategies to Foster Local Political Journalism
Strengthen Limits to Consolidated Broadcast Ownership

We encourage you to join us! The blog will be updated with more events like the Feb. 28th panel with NPR’s Neal Conan, for you to participate in addressing these four areas.

NPR’s Neal Conan To Join Panel on Hawaii Journalistic Ethics, Feb. 28th

Media Council Hawaii — Fri, 27 Jan 2012 04:19:28 +0000

National Public Radio’s Talk of the Nation host, Neal Conan will sit with MCH Board member, and Associate Professor of Journalism at UH Manoa, Gerald Kato for a panel discussion on journalistic ethics, at 7:00 p.m. on Feb. 28th in the UH Manoa School of Architecture auditorium (map link).

Entitled, “Keeping a Clean Shop in the Marketplace of Ideas: A Discussion of Journalistic Ethics,” Civil Beat Editor John Temple and The Star-Advertiser’s Mike Gordon will also participate in the panel moderated by Hawaii Public Radio‘s Executive Talk Show Producer, Beth-Ann Kozlovich.

The discussion will be open to the public. Tickets $10, free to students with ID. Seating is limited. Call 955-8821 for reservations.

Neal Conan has served as NPR’s Bureau Chief in New York and London, executive producer of All Things Considered. He is coming to Hawaii on tour with a multi-media program called “First Person: Seeing America.” For more details go to HPR’s website.

Storified: #HB2288 Committee Hearing

Bobby Lambrix — Fri, 27 Jan 2012 00:06:08 +0000

Hawaii’s 2012 legislative session is motion and the other day I heard someone say, “bills are already moving so fast.” True enough, but not much gets past web natives, especially when you threaten their rights. HB 2588 saw that first thing this morning.

Check out the Storify after the jump

Water Surrounding ClearCom’s Broadband Plan Is a Bit Murky

Bobby Lambrix — Thu, 26 Jan 2012 20:03:08 +0000

HB 2267 “RELATING TO THE ISSUANCE OF SPECIAL PURPOSE REVENUE BONDS TO ASSIST CLEARCOM, INC., IN THE DEVELOPMENT OF BROADBAND INFRASTRUCTURE IN HAWAII,” already has 21 co-sponsors (just shy of half of the representatives in the House) and is currently being heard in committee this morning.

Who is ClearCom, Inc.? And why should the state set give them $100 million to improve the state’s fiber optic network that also allots for the construction of a hydropower plant?

ClearCom is affiliate company of Sandwich Isles Communications, Inc. (SIC), which provides telephone service to Hawaiian Home Lands. According to Brandon Roberts’s 2008 report in the Molokai Dispatch, ClearCom built a telecom network which involved drilling beneath Molokai’s southern fringing reef. However, the project wasn’t just water under the bridge.

After assuring the community that no Molokai water would be used, ClearCom consumed up to 44,000 gallons of Homesteader’s drinking water everyday of drilling to make a special mixture of mud to push the undersea drill.

The bill notes that fiber optic cables can be installed in abandon water mains, which appears logical enough. Yet given the experience by Molokai residence and current issues with the state watershed and waste water systems, is this the best use of funds?

Hawaii Policy Portal Drafts SOPA/PIPA Online Petition

Media Council Hawaii — Thu, 19 Jan 2012 08:06:28 +0000

In addition to national efforts and petitions to block the passage of SOPA and PIPA, The Hawaii Policy Portal is circulating this petition to take action against these bills.

“Once we get this to 100 or more signers,” said portal co-founder, Kory Panye, “we’ll send the list of names and addresses to [Sens. Akaka's and Inouye's] offices.”

The Hawaii Public Policy Portal is a web tool that, according to their site, allows users to “easily create an online form that will allow people to take action on an issue or a bill you are tracking.” With today’s start of the 2012 legislative session, the web site’s mission is “to help allow the sun to shine in on the legislative process, and to make it easier for people to participate.”

Keeping Up With #SOPA & #PIPA Commentary

Bobby Lambrix — Wed, 18 Jan 2012 19:50:38 +0000

Last night at The Greenhouse, a few dozen of us watched the web’s most popular sites blackout in opposition to the legislation which could regulate internet content. Since then, it looks like Twitter has exploded with news, commentary and ways to bother legislators about this issue. Keep an eye on our feed @MediaCouncilHI for good reads and info on SOPA and PIPA. In the meantime here is a short list of good links:

A close look at the Stop Online Piracy Act bill – Jonathan Zittrain, et al., Al-Jazeera
Defend our freedom to share (or why SOPA is a bad idea) - Clay Shirky, Ted Talks (video)
A Political Coming of Age for the Tech Industry – Jenna Wortham, The New York Times
The SOPA Blackout Created a Big Problem – Alexis Madrigal, The Atlantic

Also: keep your eye on @theHI for news on where Hawaii’s elected officials stand on these bills, the FreePress Whiplist for all other states, and read Google’s stance if you haven’t already.

SOPA Talk at the Greenhouse – Tuesday, Jan. 17th 6 p.m.

Media Council Hawaii — Mon, 16 Jan 2012 17:30:17 +0000

We’ll be there. Come join us to talk about this important issue on Intellectual Property and the future of the Internet. Click the image for more information about The Greenhouse.