Category: media

Details are beginning to emerge of the soon to be released internal report that led to controversial Corporation for Public Broadcasting chairman Kenneth Tomlinson’s ouster from the CPB board on Thursday. Tomlinson, who was already under fire for his unapologetic efforts to force PBS to air conservative opinion programs, is accused in the report of a serious misuse of corporation funds and the invention of phantom employees when it served his purposes. The inquiry crosses over into Tomlinson’s work as a member of the largely unknown but highly influential Broadcasting Board of Governors, and insiders believe that he could face criminal charges before all is said and done. And then, there’s the inevitable Karl Rove connection…

Last week, entertainment behemoth Clear Channel appeared to pull out of the concert promotion business in several U.S. cities, laying off employees and shuttering its offices. “This all coincides with the splintering of Clear Channel, which plans to spin off its concert business into a separate company while keeping its radio and billboard divisions.” But the company says that the layoffs merely mark a shift in corporate philosophy, with Clear Channel intending to run its concert promotions from the home office in San Antonio. At the moment, in cities like Minneapolis, Seattle, and Nashville, it’s difficult to accurately assess whether Clear Channel is really gone, and what it means if they are.

The release of the complete Star Wars series on DVD has revived a “long-standing debate about the right of artists to alter their work. George Lucas, who never made a movie he couldn’t touch up years later, has become a living symbol of this debate since he seems unable to leave his creations alone.”

Former Corporation for Public Broadcasting board chairman Ken Tomlinson has resigned from the board. “The board has been reviewing a CPB Inspector General’s report–called for by a pair of congressmen–on Tomlinson’s relationship with the board stemming from Tomlinson’s attempts to add more conservative programming. The board said in a statement: “[F]ormer chairman Kenneth Y. Tomlinson has resigned from the CPB board. The board does not believe that Mr. Tomlinson acted maliciously or with any intent to harm CPB or public broadcasting, and the board recognizes that Mr. Tomlinson strongly disputes the findings in the soon-to-be-released Inspector General’s report.”

Garrison Keillor’s wildly popular radio variety show, A Prairie Home Companion, is leaving its longtime home at the Fitzgerald Theater in St. Paul, Minnesota at the end of December, and details are extremely sketchy about where the show will find a home, and whether the host wants a home base at all. “PHC is negotiating to broadcast several shows from… the University of Minnesota and from the State and Orpheum theaters in downtown Minneapolis, as well as several locations around the region… The departure of St. Paul’s biggest star also puts a damper on the city’s drive to bring in more entertainment.”

Controversial filmmaker Oliver Stone has begun work on a major film focusing on the 9/11 terrorist attacks on New York. But contrary to his reputation, Stone appears to be going out of his way to insure that the final product doesn’t strike anyone who lived through the tragedy as insensitive or sensationalist…

“The old-school peer-to-peer network iMesh has left the murky world of illegal file swapping behind with the launch of a new service that enables users to share up to 2 million tracks from the four major record labels. The New York-based company is charging its 5 million users an a la carte fee of 99 cents to purchase a track, or $6.95 per month to gain unlimited access to the catalog… The company has built Microsoft Digital Rights Management technology into its software, allowing users to see a complete list of tracks available on the Gnutella network. However, they can only download tracks that they are willing to pay for, or that are not copyright protected.”

“Late last month, members of the UNESCO voted 148 to 2 for an accord that supporters claim will protect local cultures from globalization. The debate was cast as a battle between global conformity and cultural diversity, with delegates from several smaller countries saying they were afraid of being swallowed up by American culture. But the United States and Hollywood’s major movie studios said they see the UNESCO accord as little more than trade protectionism and worry foreign countries will use it as a way to impose quotas or raise other barriers on the importation of American movies, television programs and music.”

“Now dogs, cats, hamsters and parrots can keep the anxiety, the loneliness, the restlessness at bay while their owners are out. It is radio just for them, live 17 hours a day, 4 a.m. to 9 p.m. Pacific time, and podcast for the rest of the 24 hours. Those who listen to DogCatRadio will find that there is generally an animal motif to the playlist, like “Hound Dog”: You ain’t nothin’ but a hound dog cryin’ all the time.”

The BBC is launching a series of updated Shakespeare plays this fall, with the emphasis on updated. “It’s unsurprising that writers and directors in a media- and celebrity-obsessed age find Shakespeare’s texts reflect those obsessions. Because the history of Shakespearean-updating shows the translators stamping their own times or minds on the plays.”