“The View From the Phlipside” is a media commentary program airing on WRFA-LP, Jamestown NY. It can be heard Monday through Friday around 7:30 AM. The following are scripts which may not exactly match the aired version of the program. Mostly because the host may suddenly choose to add or subtract words at a moment’s notice. WRFA-LP is not responsible for any such silliness or the opinions expressed. You can listen to a live stream of WRFA or find a podcast of this program at wrfalp.com. Copyright 2013-18 by Jay Phillippi. All Rights Reserved. You like what you see and hear? Drop me a line and we can talk.
Programs from the week of March 11, 2018
This Week’s Podcast
My name is Jay Phillippi and I’ve spent my life in and around the media. TV, radio, the movies and more. I love them, and I hate them and I always have an opinion. Call this the View from the Phlipside.
Twitter News
It’s been an interesting year for the micro-blogging site (does anybody still call it that?) Twitter. A year ago people were making all kinds of doom and gloom predictions. There were concerns about the number of users on the service, the price of the stock offering, whether it would ever show a profit. 2017 was going to be a make it or break it year for Twitter, and not a lot of people seemed to be betting on the over.
To make things worse, a lot of the news about Twitter last year seemed to indicate that selling short was going to be the smart move. When user numbers weren’t what the experts wanted, the stock lost ten percent of its value early in the year.
But things have been turning around since then. User numbers aren’t growing the way anyone wants, especially in the U.S. Worldwide numbers remain strong but the American numbers are an issue. A Pew Research Center survey has just noted that there was a small increase in the number of U.S. adults using the service from 2016 to 2017.
Much better news was delivered late last year when, for the first time in its twelve year history, Twitter actually showed a profit. That seemed to put some love into the hearts of investors. Twitter stock prices have grown at an impressive rate since that announcement. For the year to date, the price has improved by a very impressive forty-two percent. Compare that to Facebook’s two point two percent increase in the last twelve months.
The latest good news may actually be coming at the hands of Facebook itself. With the announced changes in the algorithm to emphasize personal news over news organizations, Twitter is becoming a darling of media folks once again. Under recently departed Chief Operating Officer Anthony Noto, Twitter has been decidedly media friendly. They reached out to the media world right after the Facebook announcement. And the real upside is that Twitter has long had a reputation for being a better business partner than Facebook. They have also made big moves toward video and especially live feeds. With some impressive deals being reached with folks like Time, Inc., and Bloomberg’s live news channel TicToc, Twitter looks like it is ready to show some strength in 2018.
That doesn’t mean they are out of the woods. The financial community still has some reservations about stock prices in relation to the actual bottom line numbers, but this is certainly a much better looking start to the year for Twitter than twelve months ago.
What’s Up at the FCC?
The Federal Communication Commission, the FCC, has a simple mandate. To foster competition while protecting the public interest. Traditionally this has meant that the five commissioners keep a politically low profile. They focus on broadcast media and nothing else. Which works to everyone’s benefit if you go by the historic record.
Which makes what’s going on at the FCC right now all the more disturbing. The Commission is made up of five commissioners, only three of which can belong to the same party. They are appointed by the President and confirmed by the Senate. So at the moment, there are three Republican commissioners and two Democrats. None of them are permitted any financial interest in any FCC-related business. That includes radio, television, phone, cable, satellite and to a certain degree, internet.
Given that the stated mission of the FCC is to “make available so far as possible to all the people of the United States…rapid, efficient…communication services…at reasonable charges” (that’s from Section One of the amended Communications Act of 1934, which established the commission) it would be expected that this would be a relatively low profile part of the government. And up until recently it has been just that. Commissioners have avoided overt political events or making partisan political statements.
Yet just weeks ago, the three Republican commissioners showed up at the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) and went on stage where some decidedly partisan comments were made. That’s a problem since doing that is a violation of Federal law under the Hatch Act.
Meanwhile, the chairman of the Commission, Ajit Pai is facing an investigation by the FCC’s Inspector General’s office into charges that he may have been inappropriately involved with a major broadcasting entity with business before the Commission. Pai has championed a variety of rule changes that all favor conservative broadcast empire Sinclair Broadcasting. There are a variety of regulations designed to assure that no one entity controls broadcast programming to the majority of the American audience. Questions have been raised about just what is going on with rule adjustments that could give Sinclair coverage of more than 70% of U.S. households.
The FCC is designed to be a non-partisan watchdog. The intent is to make sure that the airwaves and communication services are freely available to the nation at reasonable costs. As such, the increasingly partisan efforts of some of the commissioners is very worrying. The FCC should serve all the people of our nation. That has been its tradition and one that has served our nation well. It’s time for the commission to return to that tradition. And the sooner the better.
Summer Movies
(In the original radio script, I managed to completely skip over the new Star Wars/Han Solo movie. I’m excited to see it and embarassed to have forgotten it. My apologies)
Time to check the upcoming list of movies! Summer time is a time for the big blockbuster movie season. My bet is that we have already seen the top grossing movie of the year in “Black Panther”. Looking at the list of what’s to come, I just don’t see anything that is likely to top it.
As always, we have lots of sequels and lots of superheroes. Combining both are the latest Avenger’s movie, “Infinity War” plus the humorously titled “Untitled Deadpool Sequel”. Seriously, that seems to be the title they’re going with. In other sequels, we have “Pacific Rim – Uprising” which could be interesting, “Jurassic World – Fallen Kingdom” which looks to be the basic the dinosaurs are loose again storyline, “Mission Impossible – Fallout” which is another race against time after a mission gone wrong. Oh and “Mama Mia – Here We Go Again”. Not that’s not my comment, that’s the title. Which is also my comment.
We have “Ant Man and the Wasp” as a relatively new superhero entry. A couple video game based movies, the re-boot of “Tomb Raider” and the highly anticipated “Ready, Player One”. Both of which debut this month.
I’m not a big horror fan, but “Slenderman” might just entice me into the theater. The current day’s version of the boogeyman has immense potential, I think. Later in the summer, look for former MMA star Rhonda Rousey to try to get an action movie career going with “Mile 22”. The Teen Titans GO franchise will get a movie later in the year as well.
There are a couple of interesting titles that jump out at me. “Ocean’s Eight” picks up the mantle of the franchise with an all-female crew this time, led by Danny Ocean’s daughter. The movie stars Sandra Bullock, Cate Blanchett, Rihanna, and Helena Bonham Carter among others. Then there’s the one I don’t get. Why make a movie about “Chappaquidick”, the event that raised permanent questions about Ted Kennedy? If you’re under 50, that name may mean nothing to you. For those of us who do know it, what’s the allure? Can’t see it, expect a quick move to pay-per-view.
For the kiddies, lots of stuff coming as well. That includes “Sherlock Gnomes” starring Johnny Depp and a cast of thousands, the other sequel, the long awaited “The Incredibles 2”, the animated comedy fantasy “Animal Crackers” and one for parents and kids, “Christopher Robin” where Pooh’s friend returns to the hundred acre wood.
A pretty good list through the warm months, but my bet is they are all vying for second place for the year.
Call that the View From the Phlipside
Copyright Jay Phillippi, 2018
Theme music for “The View From the Phlipside” and “TVFTP – Podcast” is “Hustle”
Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com), Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0
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