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The Journalism Ratings Board: An Incentive-Based Approach To Cable News Accountability, Andrew Selbst Feb 2011

The Journalism Ratings Board: An Incentive-Based Approach To Cable News Accountability, Andrew Selbst

University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform

The American establishment media is in crisis. With newsmakers primarily driven by profit, sensationalism and partisanship shape news coverage at the expense of information necessary for effective self-government. Focused on cable news in particular this Note proposes a Journalism Ratings Board to periodically rate news programs based on principles of good journalism. The Board will publish periodic reports and display the news programs' ratings during the programs themselves, similar to parental guidelines for entertainment programs. In a political and legal climate hostile to command-and-control regulation, such an incentive-based approach will help cable news fulfill the democratic function of the press.


Expanding The Scarcity Rationale: The Constitutionality Of Public Access Requirements In Cable Franchise Agreements, Debora L. Osgood Oct 1986

Expanding The Scarcity Rationale: The Constitutionality Of Public Access Requirements In Cable Franchise Agreements, Debora L. Osgood

University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform

This Note argues that public access requirements should be upheld because they are constitutional and because they further the goals of the first amendment. As background for the debate over public access, Part I provides a brief description of cable television's history and regulation and discusses the case law concerning public access requirements. Part II examines the nature of the first amendment interests at stake in public access requirements. Before resolving the question of which interests should be protected, Part III argues that an expanded scarcity rationale should be used to justify cable regulation under the first amendment. Part IV …