Court Rejects FCC Ownership Rules

In a victory for media diversity, the U.S. District Court in Philadelphia rejected controversial media concentration rules that the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) adopted last year. Under the leadership of Republican Chairman Michael Powell, the FCC had proposed relaxing cross-ownership (newspaper, TV, radio in a single market) rules. The Court said that the evidence did not support the public interest and characterized the reasoning as "hopelessly flawed."