FCC Oversight?

(Maui, Hawaii) This story seems appropriate fodder for an SNL skit. I chuckled.

The call letters KUNT have landed at a yet-unbuilt low-power digital television station in Wailuku, Maui.

Alarmingly similar to a word the dictionary says is obscene, the call letters were among a 15-page list of new call letters issued by the Federal Communications Commission and released this week.

The same station owner also received KWTF for a station in Arizona.

From Skokie, Ill., comes a sincere apology "to anyone that was offended," said Kevin Bae, vice president of KM Communications Inc., who requested and received KUNT and KWTF. It is "extremely embarrassing for me and my company and we will file to change those call letters immediately."

According to Mary Diamond of the FCC's Office of Media Relations, assignment of call letters is automated with no oversight. There's a shock! FCC oversight sucks.

Too bad they're going to change the letters, though. Programming on KUNT and KWTF would have been an interesting challenge for disc jockeys. Also, imagine the advertisers.