"Amidst the fast-changing broadcast media landscape, the present book examined many “balancing acts” which stake-holders both in government and private sector have to undertake to establish and maintain an effective and credible broadcast regulation mechanism. For example, it requires a balancin
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g act to determine which aspects of broadcasting can be regulated to protect citizens rights but at the same time not to provide an opportunity for “powers that be” to curtail freedom. One needs to strike a balance between the independence of the regulator and the government’s own purpose to pursue public policy objectives; and as determining where the balance lies between the potentially conflicting rights of the broadcaster, society, and the individual. Another important contribution of this book is the discussion on new or emerging issues which may create some confusion in the regulatory system, such as jurisdiction issues for cable and telecommunication as carriers of broadcast programmes, issues on spectrum management; issues on broadcasting-related intellectual property rights and the role of the government in the digital switchover. Of special interest to UNESCO is the discussion on licensing community radio stations. UNESCO has always encouraged for allocating frequencies for community radios which serve the needs of marginalized groups. Policymakers, particularly legislators on the lookout for a model regulatory framework and mechanism will find the appended law outline most useful and adaptable because of its comprehensiveness despite its outline format. Meanwhile, a substantial section provides country experiences in terms of model regulatory objects." (Foreword)
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"In this reader media experts discuss the prospects and problems of program exchange between German and Chinese Broadcasters. They explain that program exchange is not the cockaigne one could assume with regard to the non-rivalry of media content and the huge Chinese TV market (more than 300 million
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TV households and an estimated 180,000 hours of weekly broadcast time across all TV platforms), but that many economic peculiarities of the media that only can be read in the footnotes of economic text books are highly relevant in practice. To trade TV programs with China thus requires a solid knowledge about the TV business in general, but also about the Chinese media order and the Chinese society, and the Chinese way of business." (Back cover)
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"César e Valério, com o rigor acadêmico que os caracteriza, nos brindam aqui com um marco amplo sobre a convergência tecnológica em geral e sobre a televisão digital em particular. Passam em revista o acontecido nos últimos anos na União Europeia, Estados Unidos e Japão; e analisam a fundo
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o caso do Brasil, seu mercado televisivo e as regulações do setor. O foco principal, porém, é aproveitar o momento da regulação da tecnologia digital para redesenhar o conjunto do sistema de comunicação do país em um sentido mais democrático. Este é um livro útil para todos os que batalham cada dia pela democratização das comunicações." (Descrição da editora de livros)
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"There is a great deal at stake for everyone in the future of Arab television. Political and social upheavals in this central but unsettled region are increasingly played out on television screens and in the tussles over programming that take place behind them. Al-Jazeera is of course only one playe
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r among a still-growing throng of satellite channels, which now include private terrestrial stations in some Arab states. It is an industry urgently needing to be made sense of; this book does exactly this in a very readable and authoritative way, through exploring and explaining the evolving structures and content choices in both entertainment and news of contemporary Arab television. It shows how owners, investors, journalists, presenters, production companies, advertisers, regulators and media freedom advocates influence each other in a geolinguistic marketplace that encompasses the Arab region itself and communities abroad." (Publisher description)
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"Esta edición de Perspectivas Progresistas analiza el reciente debate y proceso po-lítico sobre las reformas a la legislación de radio, televisión y telecomunicaciones en México.“Una ley para Televisa: crónica de una regresión política” es el título del análisis que realizó el investi
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gador y especialista en medios Raúl Trejo Delarbre, a través pre-cisamente de una crónica de aquellos aciagos días que desembocaron en la aprobación a toda costa de la llamada Ley Televisa. “La aprobación a las reformas de a la Ley Federal de Radio y Televisión y a la de Telecomunicaciones significa para México uno de los retrocesos más grandes en la construcción de nuestra democracia”, dice Aleida Calleja, de la Asociación Mundial de Radios Comunitarias (AMARC) en sus reflexio-nes sobre el tema. En un texto publicado inicialmente en su columna editorial para la revista Proceso, con el significativo nombre “Paisaje después de la batalla”, la politóloga Denise Dresser recuerda la triste y dura lección sobre la política mexicana contemporá-nea que aprendieron varios de sus estudiantes que fueron testigos de las reuniones de la Comisión de Comunicaciones y Transportes en el Senado de la República en marzo de 2006. A su vez, en sus “Apuntes sobre los contenidos de da la Ley Federal de Radio y Televisión”, Damián Loreti, experto en legislación internacional de los medios elec-trónicos, desarrolla algunos principios básicos e internacionalmente reconocidos para una legislación plural en la materia." (Editorial)
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"Instead of limiting ourselves to an enumeration of the obstacles to pluralism, we tried to push the analysis further, proposing draft solutions to problems raised, in a realistic way. The democratic debate today can not be limited to the political arena only, by turning up one’s nose at the debat
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e on the media, especially at television pluralism, as in a kind of conspiracy of silence by politicians in power or in the opposition. Our inner conviction is that there can be no democracy in this twenty-first century without audiovisual democracy. Unless Africa, persisting in its denial of development or having opted for backwardness, by afro-pessimism, is not yet mature for any kind of pluralism. Which is obviously not the case, because Africa is already embracing television pluralism, something which, to quote a famous retort, is too serious to be left solely in the hands of politicians. The real challenge is and remains that of professionalism and economic viability." (introduction, page 15)
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