Media consolidation

Overview

Number of corporations controlling the majority of US media, 1983-2004

Media consolidation refers to an ongoing process in which more and more media companies (e.g. radio, television, newspapers, magazines) are falling into the hands of fewer and fewer owners.

These owners can then increasingly frame and direct the national discourse (or what passes for it, these days) in such a way as to control what a majority of voters believe. This gives them subtle but nonetheless enormous power to control the national mindset and government, by determining what issues get "airplay" (and how they are presented) and which candidates win elections.

It is primarily an issue in the United States, where there are no government-owned media companies to provide a voice that is not driven by any requirement to maximize profit or donations.

Related Issues

• The new webcasting rules in the United States will be another step towards media consolidation if not repealed, as only large companies can afford to operate internet radio stations under the new rules.

Links

Tagged

version 3

• 2014-05-14 [L..T] How Five American Companies Control What You Think

version 2

• 2008-05-16 [Talk|Index] Senate Votes to Reverse FCC Decision Allowing Media Consolidation § “Thursday night, the Senate cast a near-unanimous vote to reverse the Federal Communication Commission's December 2007 decision to let media companies own both a major TV or radio station and a major daily newspaper in the same city.”
• 2007-12-18 [Talk|Index] FCC changes media ownership rules § “The Federal Communications Commission in a party-line, 3-2 vote, agreed today to overturn a 32-year-old ban and allow broadcasters in the nation's 20 largest media markets to also own a newspaper.”
• 2007-12-06 [Talk|Index] Dow Jones CEO to leave after News Corp. takeover § “Dow Jones & Co. Chief Executive Richard Zannino said Thursday he'll step down from his post after News Corp.'s pending acquisition of the company closes, beginning what is expected to be a series of high-level executive changes in connection with the historic change in ownership.”
• 2007-08-08 [Talk|Index] The Unseen Lies: Journalism As Propaganda § “In 1983 the principle global media was owned by 50 corporations, most of them American. In 2002 this had fallen to just 9 corporations. Today it is probably about 5. Rupert Murdoch has predicted that there will be just three global media giants, and his company will be one of them.”
• 2006-09-14 [Talk|Index] Media ownership study ordered destroyed § “The Federal Communications Commission ordered its staff to destroy all copies of a draft study that suggested greater concentration of media ownership would hurt local TV news coverage, a former lawyer at the agency says.”
• 2006-05-18 [Talk|Index] Uncovering Project Censored § “There once was a time when you couldn’t trust anyone over 30. Today, some are wondering if that isn’t true of Project Censored.”

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Projects

• Media Consolidation at Free Press

Reference

• Wikipedia
• Conservapedia: no information as of 2010-03-25
• dKosopedia: no information as of 2010-03-25
• SourceWatch: no information as of 2010-03-25
• Who Owns the Media?: interactive charts, research, reports, and some history