Despite claims that no complaints were delivered to the FCC or Fox concerning this matter is false. The Ground Tracking numbers speak for themselves.

July 1st, 2003 - Mailed via Delivery Confirmation

Mr. Michael K. Powell - Chairman
U.S. Post Office Ground Track # 0301 0120 0005 9411 5769
Commissioners:
Kathleen Q. Abernathy - U.S. Post Office Ground Track # 0301 0120 0005 9411 5745
Michael J. Copps - U.S. Post Office Ground Track # 0301 0120 0005 9411 5738
Kevin J. Martin - U.S. Post Office Ground Track # 0301 0120 0005 9411 5721
Jonathan S. Adelstein - U.S. Post Office Ground Track # 0301 0120 0005 9411 5752
Federal Communications Commission
445 12th Street SW
Washington, DC 20554

Dell Mayberry - U.S. Post Office Ground Tracking # 0301 0120 0005 9411 5714
President
Fox Television Network
10201 West Pico Avenue
West Los Angeles, CA. 90035

RE: 1,253 complaints from American viewers - all fifty states
Largest age group 958 complaints, 26-55
American Idol Telephone Voting problems night of May 20th, 2003

Dear Mr. Powell:

The night after the final vote for the American Idol show on May 20th, I was emailed by over 800 people asking if I could place a complaint form on my site, tabulate the results, investigate this matter and submit these complaints as one voice to the FCC and Fox Television Network.

The enclosed CD contains the complaints of 1,253 American viewers that submitted the complaints in letter format through my site. The files are in .txt format. The complaints concern the problem of not being able to vote for their contestants on May 20th, 2003, regarding the Fox television show, American Idol.

These complaints were validated and verified coming from actual American viewers by the checking of name, address and telephone numbers against telephone directories and by direct email contact to them after they submitted the complaint to verify they were the person submitting the complaint. Actual phone calls were made to some people to acquire or correct information needed.

Also enclosed find the following spreadsheet reports that contain the following results from these complaints:

Combined number of times complainants dialed to try and vote: * 513,555 times over 3 hours.
Combined number of times complainants calls actually got through to vote: * 17,401 times
This represents only 3.34% of the time viewers could get thought to vote.
* the above is broken down by land line phone companies and cell phone providers

The reports show percentages of effect according to market shares of the various telephone company providers as well.

A copy of all reports are enclosed with this letter.

The report listing the market share comparisons show the following for land line providers:

USERS OF THESE TELEPHONE COMPANIES THAT HAD THE MOST TROUBLE
GETTING CALLS THROUGH TO VOTE ON LAND LINE PHONES

The percent of users that could not get through to vote is based on actual telephone company markets shares as of March, 2003, acquired from reports filed with the FCC and IDS Telecom.

Out of the 1,253 total complaints filed, 1,223 complaints listed land line phone providers. ( 15 ) stated they only had a cell phone. (15 ) did not list a land line phone provider. 1,223 complaints were used to calculate the percentages.

There are approximately 182 million phone subscribers. Market share percentages are then calculated for approximate number of subscribers and users per (1) AT&T customers are then calculated. AT&T is highlighted in red on the enclosed report to represent (1) person. For example: For every (1 ) AT&T customer that was able to call and get through to vote, (17.1) SW Bell/Bell South customers could not get through to vote. For every (1) AT&T customer that got through to vote, ( 9.0 ) SBC/Pacific Bell/Cingular/SNET land line customers could not get through to vote. Totally, what this means is that for every (1) AT&T customer that was able to get through to vote, there were ( 107 ) other land line phone customers of other phone companies that could not get through to vote. The cell phone analysis shows that ( 23.2 ) cell phone users from other companies could not get through to every (1) AT&T user that was getting through to vote. Here is another example.

Recently, Bell South stated that 3 million phone calls were properly delivered to the telephone network on the night of May 20th. Spokesperson, John McKinney at Bell South has stated,
"We did an analysis of the telephone network and we found no blockage, no busy signals, no blocked calls. All the calls originating on the BellSouth network in North Carolina did go out."

However, in analyzing the data for Bell South customers from these complaints, the following results were found:

In the nine states that Bell South serves, there were 161 complaints filed from Bell South users that tried to place calls to vote.

These complaints represent 182,473 land line dialed attempts with only 1,130 calls getting through. This is an average of only .61% of the calls getting through to American Idol to be registered for their contestant.

Look at the North Carolina complaints. 50 complaints in North Carolina were from Bell South users representing 32,984 attempted calls with 504 calls/votes actually only getting through. This is a 1.52% percentage of calls getting through. However, Mississippi had 800 attempted land line dialed Bell South calls with 46 calls getting through. This is 5.75% of calls getting through to vote. This is still a low response of getting through to vote, but a wide variance between the two states.

If one is to believe Bell South's claim they "delivered" 3 million calls to the telephone "network", but you see this much of a difference in actual calls getting through, then something else was going on to prevent more call/votes from getting through. What happened to the calls when they got there is what the next question isn't it?

The next question is, were Bell South's 3 million calls actually tabulated for the contestants? I don't believe they were, or at least a majority of them. Why? 3 million of 24 million votes cast as reported by the producers of this show is 12.5% of the 24 million votes if they had been tabulated. Too high of a percentage from Bell South since AT&T has the largest market share of subscribers versus the high percentage of complainants using Bell South.

The data shows that for every (1) AT&T user that got through to cast their vote for their contestant, (16 ) land line users of SBC/Pacific Bell/Cingular subscribers could not. Verizon customers were (5) users that could not get through to every (1) AT&T customer that got through. Please refer to the report for the other phone companies.

For cell phone users, 704 stated they used their cell phone to try and vote. This is 56.14% of the total complainants. The following percentages are based on 704 complaints of cell phone users.

Percent of users that could not get through to vote is based on actual telephone company markets shares as of March, 2003, gathered from reports filed with FCC and IDS Telecom.

There are approximately 140 million cell phone subscribers. This has grown from only 16 million in 1993 to 140 million in 2003. Market share percentages are then calculated for approximate number of subscribers and users per (1) AT&T customer. AT&T is highlighted in red on the report to represent (1) person. For example: SAGE customers, for every one AT&T customer that was able to call and get through to vote, ( 5.6 ) SAGE customers could not get through to vote. For SBC/Cingular/Southwest Bell it was 1.6 customers were having problems getting through to vote to every (1) AT&T customer that got through to vote. ( 3.9 ) MCI/T-Mobile cell phone customers could not get through to vote to every (1) AT&T customer that got through to vote, ( 2) Verizon customers could not when (1) AT&T did get through to vote.

The overall average for all cell phone users from various companies represents that for every (1) AT&T customer that got through to vote, there were ( 23.2 ) other cell phone customers of other companies that were not able to get through to vote. This represents an overall average of 2.6 other phone company users that could not get through to (1) AT&T user that was getting through to vote.

In addition, the data from these complaints represents that for every 1,253 viewers that were trying to vote, 665, or 53.07% of every 1,253 viewers, ( + or - 3.0% ), of them could not get their calls through to cast their votes. This represents 259,350 lost votes per 1,253 viewers based on the average caller voting 390 times from the complaint results.

I want to point out that the data from these 1,253 complaints is not a reflection of what the actual voting outcome would have been for all contestants. However, the sample size is large enough to show that there was something more going on that just local telephone problems, network telephone problems or people mis-dialing telephone numbers. It provides the data to show further investigation is warranted.

I base this on the data and the millions of other viewers that could not get through to vote and other information concerning the following:

According to technical specialists I have consulted with concerning the system that was used to tabulate the voting results in real time by iTouch, the firm that handled the voting tabulations, I have learned the following. A tech could turn one of the ports off though a software configuration (either on purpose or through incompetence), erase or edit the logs, and the tampering incident is also gone. The proof is also erased. " There is also what is called, FLUX OF SERVICE. This means that those monitoring and controlling the FLUX of calls can actually literally shut ports off and the lines become busy or in some cases are mis-directed to other phone numbers if the person is not careful in what they are doing.

In addition, I spoke with Senior Vice President, Joe Early at Fox Television in Los Angeles. I asked Mr. Early if both Ruben and Clay had been provided the same number of incoming trunk lines for incoming voting calls. His reply, "Fox will not divulge that information because we do not explain our voting methods or technology."

The above question is a very important question to the fairness of this contest. If both contestants did not have the same and equal number of incoming trunk lines and these trunk lines were being control by "FLUX" and by technicians of ITouch, then the producers of this show and the Fox Television Network falsely misrepresented to the American viewers on how the winner of American Idol would be chosen. It was announced many times by host Ryan Secrest, "And it is you, the American viewer who will pick our next American Idol".

If every viewer did not have the same equal availability of voting for their contestants no matter how many times they wanted to, this is a mis-representation and eludes to the unethical and illegal practices of the $64,000 Show fraudulent case years ago.

In addition, there is the matter of how all of these companies are linked together or are owned by one another. The details are:

Bertlelsmann in Germany owns the RTL Group which owns BMG Entertainment which owns the records labels, Arista Records, RCA Records, ( the contestants and winners of American Idol record on Arista and RCA Records their sub record labels. Bertlesmann also owns Zomba Records and BMG Music Publishing.

The RTL Group owns Fremantle Media LLC. Who is Fremantle Media LLC? Murdoch's Fox Television Network and Simon Fuller's 19 Entertainment are partners with Fremantle Media to produce the American Idol show for Fox. RTL also owns book publishers Penquin, Putnam Viking. Fremantle contracts with iTouch for the telephone voting monitoring and tabulation of American Idol. Bauer Publishing which publishes INTOUCH magazine is a media client of iTouch, the firm that does the real time controlling, monitoring and tabulating of the votes.

In addition, The Independent in London newspaper in London, owns 49% of ITouch the firm that does the telephone voting monitoring and tabulation of American Idol. Bauer Publishing mentioned above which publishes INTOUCH magazine is a media client of iTouch. It therefore raises the question of all the marketing hype that INTOUCH magazine has given to this controversy of who the real winner was of American Idol. It has created additional sales of pitting Ruben Studdard and Clay Aiken fans against one another in the market place in regards to the purchasing of CD's and other marketable merchandise. It appears by the marketing hype that having this controversy of who the real winner was/is exploited like this and by having "two" winners so to speak has only has put more dollars into the hands of these corporations at the unknowing expense of the American viewer.

There are also the questions of these events that were reported in the press:

Cinergy Communications Corporation in Indiana took 169,382 misdialed phone calls intended for Aiken and 72,114 for Studdard during the three-hour voting period on the final night. This was supposedly was explained away because people were mis-dialing numbers. Now how could this many people continuously mis-dial these thousands of times. Does this have to do with the control monitoring of the incoming calls controlled by iTouch ? According to specialists I have consulted with, If trunk lines are turned off from a monitoring controlling portal, and the calls are being properly delivered through the network as stated by Bell South executives, what happens, these calls can be thrown back into the network and because of the flux of calls can be re-routed to a different number.

Then there is the problem about the man who owns a telemarketing company with 200 phones. He brags that each night he set all 200 phones dialing in on a re-dial basis for Ruben Studdard and that he cast over 250,000 votes. If this is true, this competition by no means was fair for any contestant and the American viewers that could not get through, even if it was one, was deprived of what was being told them. How many other contestants did this happen to as the show progressed? Which contestant lost because of kind of abusive voting which is allowed by Fox. I actually received an email from this person bragging about this.

I am pointing just these two instances because there are many more that support the fact that there was nothing fair and equitable for the contestants or the viewers pertaining to voting.

That is why the FCC must insure that this sort of abuse and betrayal of the American viewing public's trust never happens again. I do not have to remind you, the responsibility of the FCC is to protect the rights of the American viewing public regarding the airwaves and how they are used in situations like this unethically by corporations.

These 1,253 complaints only represent millions of American viewers that are outrage over this. If you do not believe me, this simply read the millions of posts on hundreds of internet message boards. This has nothing to do with just a few thousand hysterical fans.

The FCC must investigate this matter further, the enclosed data supports the need to and to insure that this sort of thing never happens again to American viewers.

I want to point out one important fact that has been used as an excuse. It was stated the reason for the telephone voting problems was because of clogged telephone centers in the country and local telephone problems. The complaints are from all fifty states. How could people from all fifty states all be having the severe difficulty in voting when east and west coat viewers were able to cast votes. This alone eliminated 50% of any possible switching center problems by the airing of the show two hours later on the west coast by tape. One does not have to be a genius to figure this one out.

The reports included list the following:

Totals sorted by state, showing highest number of complaints by state.
Totals of questions asked on the complaint form which are:

1,089 of land line users or 86.8% live outside a large metropolitan area.
600 of cell phone users or 85.2% live outside a large metropolitan area.
562, or only 44.8% were able to get through to cast even one vote.

555 or 44.2% were NOT able to get through to cast even one vote.

62 or 4.94% of land line phone users said they received a recording saying their votes was counted for wrong contestant.

36 or 5.11% of cell phone users said they received a recording stating their votes were counted for wrong contestant.

268 or 23.86% of land line users said they got a recording stating the phone number they had dialed had been disconnected.

168 or 21.37% of cell phone users said they got a recording stating the phone number they had dialed had been disconnected.

1,235 or 98.48% of land line users said that the voting should be changed to only one vote per person.

693 or 98.44% of cell phone users said that the voting should be changed to only one vote per person.

1,235 or 98.48% of land line users felt that the FCC should investigate this matter.

694 or 98.58% of cell phone users felt that the FCC should investigate this matter.

1,238 or 98.72% of land line users said lines were constantly busy on other dates as well.

696 or 98.96% of cell phone users said lines were constantly busy on other dates as well.

1,172 or 93.46% of land line users said the FCC should look at AT&T phone records for voting abuse 666 or 94.60% of cell phone users said the FCC should look at AT&T phone records for voting abuse.

1,076 of 83.57% of land line users said they would be boycotting Fox.

619 of 87.91% of cell phone users said they would be boycotting Fox.

As I stated earlier, these 1,253 complaints are not a reflection of what the actual voting outcome would have been for all contestants. However, the sample size is large enough to show that there was something more going on that just local telephone problems, network telephone problems or people mis-dialing telephone numbers. It provides the data to show further investigation is warranted and that is what these complainants are asking for and expect from the FCC. And to prevent this type of abuse and betrayal of the trust of American viewing public from ever occurring again.

The FCC and FOX can either respond individually to each of the complainants or you can send your reply to me. Their names and addresses are all listed in the complaint letters on the CD and as well on the spreadsheet. If you send your reply to me, I forward your reply to the complainants and post your reply on my website.

Mr. Powell and each Honorable Commissioner, this matter has nothing to do with WHO should have won the competition. It has to do with fairness and honest representation to the American viewing public. They were made to believe their votes would count and they did not.

If you or any of the commissioners cannot see the importance of this issue and do nothing about this issue, you do not have to explain your actions and decisions to me, but you will have to these 1,253 complainants and to millions other American viewers that are outraged over this. Your inaction in doing nothing will be your reply to American viewers. I hope you make the right decision pertaining to this matter.

My task is completed concerning this matter. I have fulfilled my promise to those that asked me to do this and investigate this matter. I have delivered the complaints and the findings to the FCC. It is now up to you, the FCC Commissioners to decide what is right to do for the people that pay your wages. It is also up to the Fox Network to decide what to do to correct this.

On many of the actual complaint letter submissions that are on the CD, complainants have stated their own comments pertaining to this matter. You may wish to read at least some of them.

A copy of this letter has been placed on my website so that the complainants will know that the complaints have been mailed to Commissioners and the Fox Television Network. The complainants are awaiting responses and actions from each.

On a final note, I would like to file my personal complaint concerning the recent FFC ruling changes to allow corporations to allow large media corporations to buy up more TV stations, newspapers and radio stations.

Our democracy has been with dealt a heavy blow by these recent ruling changes.

Big media corporations will not have to make a commitment to provide better news much less even unbiased news. The same with local news and children's programming. What is so disturbing is the fact that the new rules dramatically worsen opportunities for local news coverage, diversity of different views, and especially competition. Doesn't this remind you of the old robber barons slogan of ages ago, "public be damned?" from the Gilded Age.

These rulings have removed the ban on broadcasting and newspaper cross-ownership. They have raised the national cap on audience reach by station group owners to 45 percent. Corporations will now be able to own two stations in more markets and three in a handful of markets.

The airwaves belong to the American public, not the corporations. Yet, these corporations have laid claim to them. What is worse, the new rules allow new merger possibilities without any public-interest review. This is deplorable and a huge insult to Americans.

Under the FCC's new rules, one company can now own UFH TV stations in 199 of the 210 TV markets. This basically means that one corporation could own 95% of the television stations in this country. This places too much power in the hands of one corporation headed by a Chairman and a few board of directors. This means that a single corporation owning all of these stations could influence the elections for 98 U.S. Senators, 382 members of the House of Representative, 49 governors, 49 state legislators and the list goes on and on of what they could control.

This cross ownership of all these news media outlets means that local areas, one corporation could own its leading daily newspaper and many times its only newspaper, along with its top market television station in the area, the local cable company and as an extra five to eight radio stations, all in any American city.

Several years ago, the FCC changed the rules to allow one company to own as many radio stations as it wanted. The results prove what I just stated earlier. The local markets were monopolized with basically THREE national companies owning over 50% of the radio stations in America and in which they basically abandoned local news coverage and emergency services notices.

During the 911 attack and recent major catastrophes in the U.S. such as tornado damage, there are no local radio emergency notices from local radio stations. Why? Because it is all automated at some central data bank that pumps the same music and programming to 100 other radio stations because most of these radio stations do not have local live disc jockeys to report on such local disasters. This is not in the best interest of Americans by any means. For Sale signs are already going up on many of them because the stations owners know one thing, either sell now or lose everything they have worked so hard for in their local areas.

More power in the hands the hands of a few corporations controlling all news media is an attack on our country's free speech. Corporations, because of their business interests in other corporations could use that power to prevent the reporting of important news. That is too great of a risk to take.

Now that three corporations will be able to own 95% of market news media, it means fewer journalists and independent ones will be reporting on many things, including exposing fraud, corruption of politicians and the list goes on and on of what will not be reported. Why, because the executives of these corporations that own these news media corporations are also heavy contributors to politicians. It is the old story, "scratch my back and I'll scratch yours", but the scratching is what the American public will no longer receive in honest news reporting.

An example of this control and power in the hands of a few is Rupert Murdoch's News Corporation. It is a global media and entertainment empire. The company, which is one of the world's largest media conglomerates, publishes scores of newspapers The Times of London and books HarperCollins. The company's 80%-owned Fox Entertainment Group has significant entertainment holdings, including FOX Broadcasting, a TV network with 200 US affiliates in the US. It also owns Twentieth Century Fox films, and the Los Angeles Dodgers. It also owns 35 US TV stations and cable and satellite operations in Asia, Australia, Europe, and Latin America. More than 75% of News Corp.'s sales are from its US businesses.

In the UK, the newspaper arm for The News Corporation, it owns and publishes four national newspapers The Sun, The Times, News of the World and The Sunday Times. And let's not forget the DIRECT TV satellite programming that Murdoch owns.

And last, News Corporation recent purchase of the majority of stock in Hughes Electronics. General Motors is the other majority stockholder of Hughes. Hughes makes all of the electronic parts for GM cars. How can a newspaper, who is suppose to report the facts and truth on all issues, especially consumer matters, be unbiased should a major defect is discovered in the electronic parts of the very cars they are making the electronic parts for?

Your rulings must be reversed to insure that the power of free speech is not destroyed by allowing the power of the free press to be placed in the hands of few. This is not what this country was based upon for free speech and freedom of the press. And, I know that I am not the only one that has written to the FCC and their Congressman regarding these recent decisions. There have been hundreds of thousands.

I will also be writing the various Senators and House of Representatives Committees that oversee the telecommunications industry and the FCC to voice my strong objections to your recent rulings concerning these matters.

William Safire of the New York Times recently stated, "the concentration of power, either political, corporate, media, cultural - should not be ignored by conservatives." And John Roberts of the Chicago Tribune also recently stated that he deplores the "blatantly ingenious, if not dishonest, explanations being given by FCC Chairman Michael Powell and his "supporters" for their actions."

Even John Adams, one of our founding fathers of this country said in a speech, "the government must always protect its' citizens to have free speech and that those that print and publish newspapers do not control all of the reporting of our affairs."

Based on these comments from these leading columnists, I strongly advise each of the FCC Commissioners to review your decisions pertaining to these issues, and reverse your decisions and restore public trust that you are protecting the interest of Americans. Otherwise, you will receive a back lash from the American public that will be so strong that you will need to find a place to hide. I believe it has already begun with the hundreds of thousands already writing their elected officials in Washington and more will follow soon.

Sincerely,

David Lawrence Dewey

DLD/ts

Enclosed:
CD containing all 1,253 letter complaints in 50 .txt files.
Spreadsheet reports for various data results.
Hardcopy of all spreadsheet data reports from complaints.