Radio: The Noes Have It

Radio got a good talking-to last week from an experienced and earnest man, CBS Chairman William S. Paley. He jabbed his points home hard, but it was like jabbing at marbles; most of the 4,000 broadcasters who had piled into Chicago were more concerned with the unprogrammed hoopla of the National Association of Broadcasters’ first postwar convention. Said Paley:

“I have been reading and hearing … a growing volume of criticism of American broadcasting. … We cannot ignore its scope and its destructive effect. … I believe this rising tide of criticism . . . constitute[s] the most urgent single problem of our industry. … I believe a part of the criticism is justified. . . .

“The most persistently repeated charge against broadcasters is that we permit advertising excesses. Are we guilty or not? It is my opinion that we are. . . . This type of operation is bad radio. More than that, it is bad advertising. Certainly it is not the advertiser’s fault, but the broadcaster’s. . . .

“Too long now we have tolerated . . . the cynical and irresponsible ones among us. We have allowed them to escape in the crowd for lack of a spotlight to single them out. … All this spells out a strong case to me for a strengthened and better-enforced Code of Standards. … I would like to see a Code which would serve to enhance all stations subscribing to it, and raise serious questions about stations which offend against it. … As I see it now, there is only one acceptable way to enforce it—and that is, the spotlight of publicity.”

Cruel & Unusual. Next day the broadcasters were jabbed again, and in similar fashion, by FCCommissioner Charles R. Denny, who made the crack of the convention: “I take this occasion to deny that the commission is planning to punish large numbers of wayward broadcasters by forcing them to listen to their own stations two hours every day. This would be clearly unconstitutional, under the Eighth Amendment, as cruel and unusual punishment.”

Then the broadcasters hit back. Blared NBC President Niles Trammell: “Advertising [is] the vital spark in our way of life.” Mutual President Ed Kobak snorted that Bill Paley should have expressed his views in private because such statements were bad public relations for the industry.

“Hell,” said one broadcaster, “what’s eating this Paley? Nobody’s kicking out my way. Biggest year I ever had—advertisers practically climbing in the windows.” There was no doubt that these were the views of almost all broadcasters.

But the critics had made at least a few gains. Said one Paley convert: “It’s a funny game where the jackasses pin the tail on the people, but that’s radio until the people realize it.” Said a shrewd radio editor, veteran of many an N.A.B. convention: “At least they had it thrown in their faces by one of their own kind. They had to face it. And they’re going to have to face it from now on. FCC has licensed more than 400 new stations in the last year and there’s more coming. That means competition for the boys. And the stations with good programming are going to get the listeners. Radio will just have to learn that good radio is good business.”