Former NTIA chief Larry Irving tells Broadcasting & Cable that he views what Sam Zell did to Tribune Co. as “horrific.” Still, he said he may support some relaxation of cross-ownership rules, as long as it doesn’t lead to Rupert Murdoch owning “every media property in the country,” the trade paper says. “But I am not sure that it is an awful thing in a Seattle or Toledo or Denver or San Francisco, where we are seeing newspapers go away, that it would be the end of the First Amendment if you were actually able to get some synergies out of newspapers and broadcasting,” he tells the publication.
—Aimee Picchi