Regulation

 Go to our Media Factsheet archive on the Media Shared drive and open Factsheet 128: Contemporary Media Regulation. Our Media Factsheet archive can be found at M:\Resources\A Level\Media Factsheets. You can find it online here - you'll need to log in using your Greenford Google login. 

Read the Factsheet and complete the following questions/tasks:

1) What is regulation and why do media industries need to be regulated?

Regulation is when the media is monitored and content and products are checked to avoid harmful or inappropriate material

2) What is OFCOM responsible for

OFCOM is responsible for regulating television, radio, telephone services and some aspects of the internet,

3) Look at the section on the OFCOM broadcasting code. Which do you think are the three most important sections of the broadcasting code and why?S

Section 7: Fairness

Section 3: Crime

Section 5: Impartiality and Undue Prominence of Views and Opinions

4) Do you agree with OFCOM that Channel 4 was wrong to broadcast 'Wolverine' at 6.55pm on a Sunday evening? Why?

I disagree, wolverine isn't that violent, and also just because younger kids see some violence on TV won't mean they'll copy.

5) List five of the sections in the old Press Complaints Commission's Code of Practice. 

Section 7: Children in Sex Cases*
Section 4: Harassment*
Section 1: Accuracy

Section 5: Impartiality and undue prominence of views and opinions

Section 11: Victims of Sexual Assault

6) Why was the Press Complaints Commission criticised?

Newspapers were free to sign up to the code or not. If any rules are broken, the paper

could be asked to issue an apology but the PCC had no power to force a newspaper to do so. Newspapers are not licenced – anybody can set one up and start publishing if they wish – so revoking a newspaper’s licence was not an option for the PCC.

7) What was the Leveson enquiry and why was it set up?
An inquiry into the “culture, practice and ethics of the press” was held, mainly as a result of the so-called phone hacking scandal.Clive Goodman (the royal reporter of the News of the World newspaer) and Glenn Mulcaire (a private investigator, employed by Goodman) were imprisoned for illegally intercepting phone calls connected to the royal family.

8) What was the PCC replaced with in 2014?

the PCC was replaced by the Independent Press Standards Organisation (IPSO).

9) What is your opinion on press regulation? Is a free press an important part of living in a democracy or should newspapers face statutory regulation like TV and radio?
Free press is slightly important however most things are now online so it doesn't really matter anymore 

10) Why is the internet so difficult to regulate?

The internet is so big that its hard to control whats being uploaded. Some things are objective, some may find thing offensive where as others wont.