FCC Wheeler Still Pitching Newsroom CIN Survey

Tom Wheeler

During Tuesday's hearing before the House Financial Service Subcommitte, FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler said he hoped someone would pickup the ball concerning the commission's ill-fate CIN study.

Wheeler re-iterated the FCC is under a statutory obligation to survey critical information needs of cumminities.  Such a survey perportedly would be a way to guage the impact of media policies on diversity.

He suggested the underlying goal was laudable and collecting data was important, but that there was a difference between studies by academics and other outside groups—which he supports—and a survey that comes with a government eagle on it.

Wheeler also cited Pai's criticism of the study in the Wall Street Journal as helping turn the study into a cause celeb.

Pai said his position was pretty simple: The government does not belong in newsrooms asking about news philosophy or decisions on what to cover and not to cover. He said there was no relationship to barriers to diversity.

He applauded Wheeler for pulling the plug.