Seen in the Los Angeles Times:
A federal court handed the broadcast TV networks a major victory today, ruling that the Federal Communications Commission’s crackdown on indecency was “arbitrary and capricious.”
The 2-1 decision by a panel of judges from the U.S. 2nd Circuit Court of Appeals in New York found that the FCC’s decisions last year that isolated uses of expletives had violated broadcast indecency standards “represents a significant departure” from previous commission rulings.[...]
“For decades broadcasters relied on the FCC’s restrained approach to indecency regulation and its consistent rejection of arguments that isolated expletives were indecent,” the court ruled. “While the FCC is free to change its previously settled view on this issue, it must provide a reasoned basis for that change.”
I derive too much pleasure from seeing a court slap a government agency for randomly changing the rules of the game.
The networks tried to plead freedom of speech issues, but the court was able to make a ruling without addressing that point. Considering the concept of broadcasters using the spectrum in trust for the public, I wouldn’t be surprised if they would have had limited success on that point.
