From the Tennessean’s Mike Organ :
Titans fans frustrated by a lengthy new delay during game broadcasts on radio can blame Janet Jackson.
The pop star’s “wardrobe malfunction” during the halftime show of Super Bowl XXXVIII in 2004, which resulted in one of her breasts being exposed, led to in stricter rules from the Federal Communications Commission.
Those rules are the reason fans were subjected to a 12-second delay in the Titans-Saints preseason game broadcast last Saturday, Citadel Broadcasting Market Manager Dave Kelly said. (Citadel owns WKDF-FM 103.3, the flagship station for the Titans.)
The delay was particularly troublesome for the fans tuning in at LP Field.
Kelly said he has been inundated with e-mails and phone calls from upset listeners.
“The FCC’s big thing that they’re on right now is indecency with federally licensed broadcast facilities,” Kelly said.
“If someone in the stands screams something out and it gets picked up on a crowd mike and it goes out over the network, there is a zero-tolerance policy with the FCC for about a $325,000 fine per incident.
I’m curious if anyone else had the experience recently of bringing a radio to the game and being unable to understand what was going on — other than those listening to John Sterling and Suzyn Waldman, of course. The last time I brought a radio to Shea Stadium, WFAN had employed no such 12 second delay. Though given who was behind the microphone that afternoon, a 12 hour delay wouldn’t have been enough.
It’s bad enough that Super Bowl XXXVIII, arguably the greatest Super Bowl game ever played, is remembered not for Tom Brady, Jake Delhomme, or Adam Vinatieri’s winning field goal, but for Janet Jackson’s stupid wardrobe malfunction.
But now the Jackson incident is threatening the way that rabid NFL fans like myself can enjoy the action. I’m a Viking fan, but hearing 60,000 cheeseheaded Packer fans deride my team at Lambeau Field adds to the immediacy and suspense of the action. That’s one of many things that makes watching NFL football a great experience.
May the Cleveland Browns’ end zone fans pelt our government with thousands of dog bones over this one. (A Raider fan motorcycle convoy on Washington wouldn’t hurt, either!)