Newton N. Minow, who as Federal Communications Commission chief in the early 1960s famously proclaimed that network television was a « vast wasteland, » died Saturday.
Newton N. Minow, who as Federal Communications Commission chief in the early 1960s famously proclaimed that network television was a « vast wasteland, » died Saturday. He was 97. Minow, who received a Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2016, died Saturday at home, the AP reports. Though Minow held the FCC post for just two years, he left a permanent stamp on the broadcasting industry through government steps to foster satellite communications, the passage of a law mandating UHF reception on TV sets, and his outspoken advocacy for quality in television. « My faith is in the belief that this country needs and can support many voices of television—and that the more voices we hear, the better, the richer, the freer we shall be, » Minow once said. « After all, the airways belong to the people. »
Minow was appointed by President John F. Kennedy in early 1961. On May 9, Minow laid down his famous challenge to TV executives in a speech to the National Association of Broadcasters, urging them to sit down and watch their station for a full day « without a book, magazine, newspaper, profit-and-loss sheet or rating book to distract you.
