Generally speaking, arcane and largely unenforced FCC rules are not the province of late-night talk shows. However, FCC Commissioner Brendan Carr intends to change this; Jimmy Kimmel was briefly taken off the air shortly after the outcry, but it appears his vague threats were enough to convince CBS to ask Stephen Colbert not to air an interview. Which, of course, became a whole other thing.
But This episode of The Vergecast (which we recorded and published the day before due to the news and Nilay having to go on vacation), David and Nilay opened the show with an extra long installment of Brendan Carr Is a Dummy. We talk back and forth through the Colbert/CBS timeline, trying to explain once again How the Equal Time Rule Really WorksAnd wonder how far Carr’s chilling influence will be allowed to go.
If you want to learn more about everything discussed in this episode, here are some links to get you started, first to the FCC news:
And in the era of electricity:
