Social Science Research Council

Carolyn M. Byerly is an associate professor in the Department of Journalism at Howard University, Washington, DC.  She teaches graduate-level seminars in media theory, research methods, media effects, and other subjects.  Her research concerns the media and social movements, with a focus on the gender, race, and sexual orientation.  Much of her scholarship is international in scope.  She is the co-author of Women & Media: A Critical Introduction (Blackwell, 2006), and the co-editor of Women & Media: International Perspectives (Blackwell, 2004), as well as many journal articles and book chapters.  She received her PhD and MA degrees in communications from University of Washington, Seattle.

Peter DiCola is a Ph.D. candidate in economics at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor.  He received his J.D. magna cum laude from the University of Michigan Law School in May 2005, and was awarded the Henry M. Bates Memorial Scholarship.  Currently, he serves as the Research Director of the Future of Music Coalition, a non-profit research and advocacy organization, while he works on his dissertation.  He has research interests in the fields of telecommunications law, intellectual property law, law and economics, labor economics, and industrial organization.  He is the co-author, with Kristin Thomson, of Radio Deregulation: Has It Served Citizens and Musicians?, which was cited by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit in Prometheus Radio Project v. FCC.  He has also written a chapter, “Employment and Wage Effects of Radio Consolidation,” for the scholarly collection Media Diversity and Localism (Lawrence Erlbaum and Associates, 2006).

Dr. Napoli is an Associate Professor of Communications & Media Management in the Fordham University Schools of Business and the director of the Donald McGannon Communication Research Center.  His research focuses on media institutions and media policy.  He is the author of the books Audience Economics: Media Institutions and the Audience Marketplace (Columbia University Press, 2003) and  Foundations of Communications Policy: Principles and Process in the Regulation of Electronic Media (Hampton Press, 2001) and the editor of Media Diversity and Localism: Meaning and Metrics (Erlbaum, 2006).  His work has been published in academic journals such as Telecommunications Policy,Communication Law & Policy, the Journal of Communication, the Policy Studies Journal, and the Harvard International Journal of Press Politics.

Michael Yan is an Assistant Professor of Communication Studies at the University of Michigan. Professor Yan’s research interests concern the economics of the media industries (especially the broadcast and cable television industries) and public policies toward them. More specifically, his research revolves around three main themes: the historical development of various video delivery systems/industries, the competitive/economic relationship between these systems and the role government policy plays in their development. His current projects focus on media ownership rules, local and public affairs programming on television and audience segmentation in network broadcasting.
He has published in the Journal of Broadcasting and Electronic Media and Journal of Media Economics.

Joe Karaganis is a Program Director at the Social Science Research Council, responsible for the 'Necessary Knowledge for a Democratic Public Sphere' Program.

Benton Foundation president and former FCC Commissioner Gloria Tristani oversees the foundation's work educating policymakers, funders, and activists about communications policy debates and advocating for tangible public interest benefits from the transition to digital broadcasting. Before joining Benton, she was managing director of the Office of Communication of the United Church of Christ (OC, Inc.), where she advocated for the public interest in the media, including a diversity of ownership and viewpoints, meaningful public interest obligations, and enhanced children's educational programming. At the FCC, Tristani was a supporter of the FCC's Equal Employment Opportunity rules, minority ownership of media properties, broadcasters' provision of opportunities for political discourse, the E-rate, while fighting against children's exposure to TV violence and broadcast indecency.