Has the time for deregulation really come?

I find myself asking this question, because I think there is a fine line between a totally free media market and a regulated one that insures a certain cultural and national content.

“Canadian broadcast regulation was designed for a world of scarcity where broadcast spectrum and consumer choice was limited,” Michael Geist rightly claims in his article Canadian Broadcasting Policy For a World of Abundance. There is no doubt that the regulatory framework for broadcasting services need to be re-considered, the question is with which perception of culture this re-consideration should take place.

Cultural production can either be seen as a commercial enterprise, where the profitability is the most important or as expressions of ideas and images that help a culture to imagine itself and to articulate its priorities. If excluded by the so-called ‘realities’ of the marketplace, certain forms of cultural expression can be marginalized, even silenced. (Lorimer, Gasher, and Skinner - Mass Communication in Canada, page 201-202)

Even though The Long Tail helps preventing this problem of marginalizing cultural expression, I think it is important also to recognize that broadcasters have a responsibility of encouraging cultural content, in this case content made by and for Canadians rather than content made by and for US citizens.

If the broadcasters only look upon cultural production as a commercial enterprise, then there is a need for some sort of regulation. Or else we risk that certain form of cultural expression will be silenced, as Lorimer, Gasher and Skinner predict.