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The Center's 'Well Connected' Telecommunications Project Expands its 'Media Tracker'

The Center for Public Integrity's "Well Connected" Telecommunications Project today relaunched an updated and expanded version of its "Media Tracker" database. The freely accessible Internet database now includes political contributions and lobbying expenditures by nearly 300 companies in the telecommunications, media and technology sector.

The new features of the Media Tracker database detail the scope of the political influence of top communications, entertainment and electronic companies, such as AT&T, Clear Channel, Google, Hewlett-Packard, Microsoft, Sony, Tribune, Walt Disney and hundreds of others. To view the complete list of companies, go to http://www.publicintegrity.org/telecom/search/list.aspx?act=companies.

Media Tracker includes campaign contributions to all candidates for Congress and the presidency from 1998 to 2006, money spent lobbying the federal government since 1998, and privately-funded trips for legislators and their aides since 2000. The complete database is available at http://www.publicintegrity.org/telecom.

All told, the employees and political action committees of the companies in these information industries spent $486 million on campaign contributions from January 1, 1997 to June 30, 2006.

Further, the Media Tracker allows individual users to see a detailed breakdown of company-by-company contributions to all current and former members of Congress, since 1998. Information about the contributions from telecommunications, media and technologies companies are available for about 2,800 candidates and members of Congress, and political party committees.

These aspects of political influence supplement the existing ability to track the ownership of media and telecommunications facilities by ZIP Code and by city and state. The broadcast, cable and newspaper ownership database in Media Tracker was relaunched on October 17, 2006.

"By adding technology and entertainment companies to the matrix of data within Media Tracker, the public can obtain a comprehensive view of the lobbying and influence-seeking activities by the entire sector engaged in digital computing and communications," said Drew Clark, Senior Fellow and Project Manager of Well Connected at the Center for Public Integrity.

The Well Connected Project updated and expanded its list of companies engaged in lobbying by obtaining spending figures from the Senate Office of Public Records as of October 19, 2006. For campaign contributions, the project partnered with the Center for Responsive Politics (http://www.opensecrets.org) to acquire a complete listing of contributions classified in the Communications/Electronics sector.

Well Connected researchers further enhanced the data by researching each organization's history and structure, allowing the Media Tracker to follow the history of corporate contributions over time. For privately-sponsored trips, Well Connected relied upon Power Trips (http://www.publicintegrity.org/powertrips), another project of the Center for Public Integrity, together with American Public Media and Northwestern University's Medill News Service. Detailed information about the methodology employed by Media Tracker is available at http://www.publicintegrity.org/telecom/default.aspx?act=methodology.

The Media Tracker includes more than 5 million records from government sources, corporate documents and original Center research. The Center for Public Integrity also seeks to display information about broadband providers by ZIP code, but the FCC has refused the Center's Freedom of Information Act request for access to its database of broadband providers. When the FCC failed to respond to the Center's August 24 request within the required 20 working days, the Center filed suit in the federal district court in Washington.

In October, Media Tracker also profiled the business strategies and policy priorities of the top 10 companies in these industries: Broadcast Television, Broadcast Radio, Cable Operators, Telephone Companies, Wireless Companies and Broadband Internet Providers. The project also profiled the top two Satellite TV and the top two Satellite Radio companies.

These latest additions to the Well Connected Project make the Media Tracker the only tool of its kind. It tracks the ownership and the political influence of the nation's telecommunications, media and technology companies. Major funding for the Well Connected Project has been provided by the Ford Foundation, a nongovernmental philanthropic organization.

To access the Center's latest updates to its Well Connected Project and Media Tracker visit http://www.publicintegrity.org/telecom/.

The Center for Public Integrity is a nonprofit, nonpartisan Washington, D.C.-based organization that does investigative reporting and research on significant public issues. Since 1990, the Center has released more than 300 investigative reports and 15 books. It has received the prestigious George Polk Award and more than 20 other journalism awards and 16 finalist nominations from national organizations, including PEN USA and Investigative Reporters and Editors. In April 2006, the Society of Professional Journalists recognized the Center with a national award for excellence in online public service journalism for the fifth consecutive year. In October 2006, the Center also was honored with the Online News Association's coveted General Excellence award.

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