Media Beat: November 22, 2021

By David Farrell

Hearings on Shaw/Rogers deal underway today

The CRTC proceeding will not tackle the merger’s biggest red flag for most consumers: wireless competition and prices. Instead, it will focus only on the broadcasting issue and feature interventions by independent producers such as Blue Ant (which operates specialty channels like Cottage Life) as well as rival TV distributors, including Bell Canada.

Opponents of the transaction warn that combining the two businesses will give Rogers outsized bargaining power when it comes to negotiating the fees that it pays to carry the channels that it offers to customers. – Christine Dobby, The Star

Aussie TV host’s $1M bungled Adele interview

Matt Doran - from Channel 7 - flew from Sydney to London on 4 November to meet Adele for her only Australian interview about her new album, 30.

But after admitting during it that he had not listened to the album, Sony withheld the interview footage.

Doran apologised and said he had missed an email with a preview copy of the songs.

"It was an oversight but not a deliberate snub," he told The Australian newspaper. "This is the most important email I have ever missed." – BBC News

Before it was Rock it was Race: American racial profiling on the radio in the 1950s

In 1950 radio was still the dominant entertainment medium in America - the major stations were all part of one of the several networks around at the time. It tried to be all things to all people - but in the days of segregation it was all things to some people. Black America, with rare exception, was often excluded from participating in the world of mainstream entertainment. There were Black entertainers who crossed the color barrier, but were never on equal footing with their White counterparts. There were no Black heroes, but there were a lot of Black foils.

Nowhere was the color line more evident than in the field of music. Recording sessions had two separate Musicians Union sheets; one that asked if it was a "White Session" or if it was a "Colored Session", for the Producer to fill out.

And if it was a predominately "colored" session, chances were good that it would be issued (if it was a major label) as a subsidiary, or Race Record. – Gordon Skene, Past Daily News Archive

US Government: Bought and paid for

The high art of futility

Here in the US, there are three different online privacy bills pending before Congress. Congress is sure to pass sensible privacy regulations just as soon as Our Blessed Savior returns and buys a Jamba Juice franchise. – Bob Hoffman, The Ad Contrarian