Slashdot Mirror

Nearly 100 American media resources today are owned by only 5 corporations.

First, I don't understand what the statistic is talking about -- "100" what? Second, I think it's probably wrong by vastly understating the problem.

The top media corporations in America include Advance Publications, Disney, General Electric, News Corp., Time Warner, Viacom, and Vivendi Universal. You can go here to see who owns what. Where in 1983 it took 50 large corporations to accumulate control of half the media outlets, today 5 corporations control over half the outlets. Don't forget that there are also vastly more outlets today that were two decades ago.

Some examples: Viacom's Infinity Broadcasting unit alone owns 184 radio stations. The infamous Clear Channel puts that to shame with over 1200 radio stations. As Clear Channel notes, there are over 13000 radio stations, not to metion the other types of outlets. The statistic in the question is at least confusing and probably badly wrong.

This is an important topic, but please fact-check the question.

Do you think Disney is just a few cartoon studios and some crappy theme parks?

Their movies and theme parks account only for a *small fraction* of their money.

I suggest you educate yourself as to how big Disney is. While at that site check out some other megalopolies, you may be surprised at who owns what.

"the people at WTVT trying to work with the correspondents regarded them, especially Wilson, as combative, contentious, insulting, and unprofessional. The Fox lawyer participating in the editorial review complained to them that they were stating "in almost every way possible that you are fed up with our process of legal and editorial review."

Independant ? I think not. Who do you think owns Jive ?

The big problem with science fiction isn't specific to the genre; instead, it is a problem in the whole publishing world. Books aren't being edited like they once were. Major chains are giving shelf space to the next Harry Potter or Da Vinci Code, and don't have the time or energy to edit books that will have far smaller circulations. That being said, authors aren't coming up with work that is both intelligent and massively popular; the last example of that was probably Neuromancer, and maybe Snow Crash.

$20 1802USD = $333 2002USD

So, we'd need to adjust for more than inflation; we'd need to adjust for the public acceptance of the insane corporate culture that now pervades our society. Corporations have gotten laws passed that push huge penalties onto individuals. Copy a VHS movie get a $20,000 fine? How can an individual possibly combat that? That would have been about $1200 in 1802, and that's still quite a bit today.

I do think your point about moving the right to demand a civil trial by jury from $20 to $20,000 is interesting. Fireworks would happen.

Turner's not "head of one of the biggest media conglomerates" AFAIK. Which one are you talking about?

I thought he was sinking his money into motion pictures and bison, and that his picture company was a pygmy on the media veldt. You do know he sold CNN and most of the other Turner media holdings to AOL-Time-Warner almost a decade ago, right?

Sorry about the subject line, I liked your .sig so much I had to use it.

My bet is that Newsweek has some kind of relationship with some big music company that has a big stake in iTunes.

More uninformed consipracy mumbo-jumbo from the Tinfoil Hat Brigade.

Fifteen seconds of Googling ("who owns Newsweek") shows that Newsweek is owned by The Washington Post Company. Visiting their web site shows that The Washington Post Company owns no stake in any record/music company. Additional Googling shows no evidence that any record/music company owns any stake in The Washington Post Company.

The main reason Newsweek got this scoop is because in 2002 Time Magazine got the last one, and made its story about the new flat-panel iMac publically available online before the machine was officially unveiled at MacWorld-- thus drawing the ire of Steve Jobs.

This time, the iPod article *is* the major part of the unveiling, though I'm sure Apple press releases and a new Apple.com front page will follow tomorrow or Tuesday.

So Wired puts out an article stating that a Wall St. Journal writer is all-powerful.

Did anyone bother running these companies through http://www.cjr.org/tools/owners/ along with the writers names? You'll find some interesting connections. I'm always suspicious of news pieces that fawn other news pieces.

The Columbia Journalism Review has made this interesting report available. It shows the depth/breadth of media formats that Time Warner has control of. It's quite astounding, check it out.

-pararox-

If Microsoft acquires AOL/Time-Warner and Comcast acquires Disney, then Microsoft will effectively control the cable broadcasting and communications market.

The key to this deal is Microsoft's position as the largest single shareholder in Comcast owning 15% of the companies stock. Compare this to the Roberts family (Ralph Roberts, founder of Comcast, and Brian Roberts, CEO) holdings of slightly over 1% of the company.

If Comcast acquires Disney, then a voting policy dictating that the Roberts family shares are weighted in voting to = 7.5 votes per share while other shares are = to only around .85 votes per share will likely be determined to be unfair, as all shareholders that are brought along in the merger will have not been given opportunity for fair consideration of those terms.

Just think about the future that these two deals could bring us, Microsoft being in control of the vast majority of news, music and recording, movie, and print media in the United States while being capable of dictating the protocols that are used to connect to, and to filter the trafic to and from, the internet.

It's not a tin foil hat theory. It's simply the logical extension of such consolidation of communication and media marketplace under the control of one company that has a rather nasty history of not respecting the wishes of the community that they chose to do business in.

Oh yeah, Paul Allen's vompany Vulcan Northwest Inc. owns a 5% share in Microsoft, so we can probably count Charter Cable and a number of other media and telecom companies as being involved in this as well.

If Microsoft acquires AOL/Time-Warner and Comcast acquires Disney, then Microsoft will effectively control the cable broadcasting and communications market.

The key to this deal is Microsoft's position as the largest single shareholder in Comcast owning 15% of the companies stock. Compare this to the Roberts family (Ralph Roberts, founder of Comcast, and Brian Roberts, CEO) holdings of slightly over 1% of the company.

If Comcast acquires Disney, then a voting policy dictating that the Roberts family shares are weighted in voting to = 7.5 votes per share while other shares are = to only around .85 votes per share will likely be determined to be unfair, as all shareholders that are brought along in the merger will have not been given opportunity for fair consideration of those terms.

Just think about the future that these two deals could bring us, Microsoft being in control of the vast majority of news, music and recording, movie, and print media in the United States while being capable of dictating the protocols that are used to connect to, and to filter the trafic to and from, the internet.

It's not a tin foil hat theory. It's simply the logical extension of such consolidation of communication and media marketplace under the control of one company that has a rather nasty history of not respecting the wishes of the community that they chose to do business in.

Oh yeah, Paul Allen's vompany Vulcan Northwest Inc. owns a 5% share in Microsoft, so we can probably count Charter Cable and a number of other media and telecom companies as being involved in this as well.

If Microsoft acquires AOL/Time-Warner and Comcast acquires Disney, then Microsoft will effectively control the cable broadcasting and communications market.

The key to this deal is Microsoft's position as the largest single shareholder in Comcast owning 15% of the companies stock. Compare this to the Roberts family (Ralph Roberts, founder of Comcast, and Brian Roberts, CEO) holdings of slightly over 1% of the company.

If Comcast acquires Disney, then a voting policy dictating that the Roberts family shares are weighted in voting to = 7.5 votes per share while other shares are = to only around .85 votes per share will likely be determined to be unfair, as all shareholders that are brought along in the merger will have not been given opportunity for fair consideration of those terms.

Just think about the future that these two deals could bring us, Microsoft being in control of the vast majority of news, music and recording, movie, and print media in the United States while being capable of dictating the protocols that are used to connect to, and to filter the trafic to and from, the internet.

It's not a tin foil hat theory. It's simply the logical extension of such consolidation of communication and media marketplace under the control of one company that has a rather nasty history of not respecting the wishes of the community that they chose to do business in.

Oh yeah, Paul Allen's vompany Vulcan Northwest Inc. owns a 5% share in Microsoft, so we can probably count Charter Cable and a number of other media and telecom companies as being involved in this as well.

If Microsoft acquires AOL/Time-Warner and Comcast acquires Disney, then Microsoft will effectively control the cable broadcasting and communications market.

The key to this deal is Microsoft's position as the largest single shareholder in Comcast owning 15% of the companies stock. Compare this to the Roberts family (Ralph Roberts, founder of Comcast, and Brian Roberts, CEO) holdings of slightly over 1% of the company.

If Comcast acquires Disney, then a voting policy dictating that the Roberts family shares are weighted in voting to = 7.5 votes per share while other shares are = to only around .85 votes per share will likely be determined to be unfair, as all shareholders that are brought along in the merger will have not been given opportunity for fair consideration of those terms.

Just think about the future that these two deals could bring us, Microsoft being in control of the vast majority of news, music and recording, movie, and print media in the United States while being capable of dictating the protocols that are used to connect to, and to filter the trafic to and from, the internet.

It's not a tin foil hat theory. It's simply the logical extension of such consolidation of communication and media marketplace under the control of one company that has a rather nasty history of not respecting the wishes of the community that they chose to do business in.

Oh yeah, Paul Allen's vompany Vulcan Northwest Inc. owns a 5% share in Microsoft, so we can probably count Charter Cable and a number of other media and telecom companies as being involved in this as well.

Or in Blizzard's case (note that Blizzard is a subsidiary of Viviendi Universal), it will be used as an example of how to modify the client so that illegal distribution is impossible. Granted, distribution without Blizzard's permission will be impossible, but will the court care about that distinction?

Holy Crap! Disney owns Discovery?

I don't think so. Here's a list of what Disney owns. Discover magazine is on there (scroll up to magazine titles), but it has no connection to Discovery Communications that I can find (scroll down to cable TV).

...since they have a habit of censoring just about everything under the sun.

The C stands for Censorship. After all of this, what's left to justify broadband? :)

Columbia Journalism Review's Who Owns What is an interesting read.

I don't think you know what you're talking about. Disney Corporation owns a LOT of stuff

To be truly Disney free you will have to:
- Never watch ABC
- Never watch ESPN
- Not use Tivo
- Not watch any of these Touchstone movies
- Not watch any of these Miramax films
- Not watch any of these Hollywood pictures

The list goes on. I will be very impressed if you have indeed managed to be Disney-free but the smart money is going against you.

No documents in Who Owns What were found that match your query of Slashdot.

Everyone knows that OSDN owns the major media company Slashdot! Or are you saying (gasp!) that Slashdot isn't a major media company? Or that trying to figure out who owns an Internet company is like keeping track of who is dating whom in your local high school?

Actually, this was a pretty cool find. I guess you were right. Find out here who owns what...

CNET is owned by Paul Allen's Vulcan Northwest. Paul Allen has a 5% stake in Microsoft.

Tin foil, get your tin foil!

Yes, and those megacorporations that control almost all of those outlets are certainly noted for their Leftist views. GE is a bunch of leftist peaceniks, and Disney is controlled by the unions.

Television
Fox Broadcasting Company Fox Television Stations
WNYW - New York City , WWOR - New York City , KTTV - Los Angeles , KCOP - Los Angeles , WFLD - Chicago , WPWR - Chicago , KMSP - Minneapolis , WFTC - Minneapolis , WTXF - Philadelphia , WFXT - Boston , WTTG - Washington D.C. , KDFW - Dallas , KDFI - Dallas , WJBK - Detroit , KUTP - Phoenix , KSAZ - Phoenix , WUTB - Baltimore , WRBW - Orlando , WOFL - Orlando , WOGX - Ocala , WAGA - Atlanta , KRIV - Houston , KTXH - Houston , WJW - Cleveland , WTVT - Tampa , KDVR - Denver , KTVI - St. Louis , WITI - Milwaukee , WDAF - Kansas City , KSTU - Salt Lake City , WHBQ - Memphis , WGHP - Greensboro , WBRC - Birmingham , KTBC - Austin
BSkyBFOXTEL , SKYPerfecTV , STAR , Stream , Fox News Channel , Fox Movie Channel , FX , National Geographic Channel , SPEED Channel , Fox Sports Net , Fox Sports South , Fox Sports Pittsburgh , Fox Sports Southeast , Fox Sports Midwest , Fox Sports Rocky Mountain , Fox Sports Arizona , Fox Sports Northwest , Fox Sports West , Fox Sports West#2 , Fox Sports Detroit , Fox Sports Bay Area (with Rainbow Media Holdings) , Fox Sports Chicago (with Rainbow Media Holdings) , Fox Sports New England (with Rainbow Media) , Fox Sports New York (with Rainbow Media) , Fox Sports Ohio (with Rainbow Media) , Fox Sports Intermountain West , Fox Sports Southwest , Sunshine Network , Madison Square Garden Network
Film
20th Century Fox , Fox Searchlight Pictures , Fox Television Studios
Newspapers
United StatesNew York Post
United KingdomNews International , News of the World , The Sun , The Sunday Times , The Times
AustraliaDaily Telegraph , Fiji Times , Gold Coast Bulletin , Herald Sun , Newsphotos , Newspix , Newstext , NT News , Post-Courier , Sunday Herald Sun , Sunday Mail , Sunday Tasmanian , Sunday Territorian , Sunday Times , The Advertiser , The Australian , The Courier-Mail , The Mercury , The Sunday Telegraph , Weekly Times
Magazines
InsideOut , donna hay , SmartSource , The Weekly Standard , TV Guide (partial)
Books
HarperCollins PublishersHarperCollins General Book Group , HarperCollins , Perennial , Cliff Street Books , The Ecco Press , Quill , HarperAudio , Regan Books , Amistad Press , Zondervan , Morrow/Avon , William Morrow , Avon , HarperTorch , Eos , HarperEntertainment , HarperSanFrancisco , HarperInformation , HarperBusiness , HarperResource , Access Travel , William Morrow Cookbooks , Branded Books Program
HarperCollins Children's Book GroupGreenwillow Books , Joanna Cotler Books , Laura Geringer Books , HarperCollins HarperFestival , HarperTrophy , Tempest
Other
Los Angeles Dodgers , New York Rangers & New York Knicks (20% - Through partnership with Cablevision) , Los Angeles Kings (NHL, 40% option) , Los Angeles Lakers (NBA, 9.8% option) , Staples Center (40% owned by Fox/Liberty) , News America New Media , Fox Sports Radio Network , Broadsystem , Festival Records , Fox Interactive , Mushroom Records , National Rugby League , NDS , News Interactive , News Outdoor , Nursery World
last updated 7/21/03

Yup, cnn is own by time warner. They also own all of these music labels.

Warner Music Group - Recording Labels
The Atlantic Group
Atlantic Classics
Atlantic Jazz
Atlantic Nashville
Atlantic Theater
Big Beat
Blackground
Breaking
Igloo
Lava
Mesa/Blu emoon
Modern
1 43
Rhino Records
Elektra Entertainment Group
Elektra
EastWest
Asylum
Elektra/Sire
Wa rner Brothers Records
Warner Brothers
Warner Nashville
Warner Alliance
Warner Resound
Warner Sunset
Reprise
Reprise Nashville
American Recordings
Giant
Maverick
Revolution
Qwest
Wa rner Music International
WEA Telegram
East West ZTT
Coalition
CGD East West
China
Continential
DRO East West
Erato
Fazer
Finlandia
Magneoton
MCM
Non esuch
Teldec
Other Recording Interests
Warner/Chappell Music (publishing company)
WEA Inc. (sales, distribution and manufacturing)
Ivy Hill Corporation (printing and packaging)
Warner Special Products

Source: http://www.cjr.org/tools/owners/timewarner.asp

No-one's gonna license the music people want unless it's protected by DRM.

Really, maybe you should tell Emusic, cause they have a huge selection of music that I enjoy with no restrictions on anything. Oddly enough, look who owns them ......

While there are more shows on to choose from, the big players have hardly changed.They just have the ability to sell more ads.

Nearly every Cable Channel is owned by a huge media conglomerate. Check out "Who owns What"

http://www.cjr.org/tools/owners/

Hello? The RIAA are the media. AOL/Time-Warner is one of the world's largest music publishers. Disney owns five record companies. Those media outlets that don't own record companies, solidly back the RIAA on copyright issues.

Hello? The RIAA are the media. AOL/Time-Warner is one of the world's largest music publishers. Disney owns five record companies. Those media outlets that don't own record companies, solidly back the RIAA on copyright issues.

It is the same as me, a non-smoker, saying I have boycotted the tobacco industry.

Okay, so here's a semi on-topic question I've occassionaly wondered about. When someone organizes a boycott of RIAA members or say the tobacco industry, do you only target that industry or do you target "the whole thing". For example, let's say you are boycotting the tobacco industry and therefore Phillip Morris cigarettes (Marlboro, Virginia Slims, Benson & Hedges, Merit, Parliament, Alpine, Basic, Cambridge, Bristol, Bucks, Chesterfield, Collector's Choice, Commander, English Ovals, Lark, L&M, Players and Saratoga). Are you also then boycotting Kraft and Nabisco? In this particular case I'm not sure they are still part of the "People of Phillip Morris", but they were at one point.

Asides from arrangers in a boycott, do individual participants often actually boycott subsidiaries, parent companies, or those companies with close related business ties? Should we? I mean it seems like it would be a much better way to induce change, provided enough people did it. If all of a sudden RIAA/MPAA member AOL Time Warner were to start losing sales in all of its industries (lots of Magazines, AOL, AIM, ICQ, Netscape, cable tv, road runner, compuserve, etc), those other parts of AOLTW might pressure the Music labels to reform.

I guess the trend I have seen among participants in boycotts is that they generally focuss only on the immediate evil, rather than the big picture. One of the barriers to a more general boycott seems to be that nobody knows who owns what. I mean there's some stuff out there like the Columbia Journalism Review, but thatonly covers media. Does anyone know of any good online resources for finding out which companies are really all part of the same company?

I hope not. When Sony's Walkman TPS-L2 came out, it listed for $200, in 1979 dollars. Using this page, that's about $496 nowadays!

For the most part the TV networks are the movie studios. In fact, out of all of them I can only think of one that isn't wetting it's beak in both TV and Movies. That would be General Electric. But it does have ties. It owns Bravo, and holds a few interests with FOX, which is obviously big on movies.

Other than GE, though? Viacom is Paramount, MTV, Nickelodeon, BET, VH1, TNN, CMT, Comedy Central, Showtime, The Movie Channel, and more. Most TV holdings have Film Industry counterparts. Nickelodeon and MTV for instance, both make movies of their own. Vivendi Univeral is Universal Pictures, 50% USA Networks, Showtime's Australia counterpart, and partial ownership of HBO Asia. Sony is Columbia Pictures, Tri-star Pictures, Cinemax in Latin America, E! in Latin America, HBO in Brasil, Cinemax in Asia, and (partially) HBO in Asia, among others. News Corp is FOX, their TV/movie interests should be obvious. Disney's movie interests are obvious, in the TV world they are ABC, ESPN, A&E, The History Channel, Lifetime, and E!, along with many foreign counterparts of those same stations. And of course there's AOL Time Warner, who's reach is pretty damn wide, and widely damn obvious, in movies and TV.

For the most part the TV networks are the movie studios. In fact, out of all of them I can only think of one that isn't wetting it's beak in both TV and Movies. That would be General Electric. But it does have ties. It owns Bravo, and holds a few interests with FOX, which is obviously big on movies.

Other than GE, though? Viacom is Paramount, MTV, Nickelodeon, BET, VH1, TNN, CMT, Comedy Central, Showtime, The Movie Channel, and more. Most TV holdings have Film Industry counterparts. Nickelodeon and MTV for instance, both make movies of their own. Vivendi Univeral is Universal Pictures, 50% USA Networks, Showtime's Australia counterpart, and partial ownership of HBO Asia. Sony is Columbia Pictures, Tri-star Pictures, Cinemax in Latin America, E! in Latin America, HBO in Brasil, Cinemax in Asia, and (partially) HBO in Asia, among others. News Corp is FOX, their TV/movie interests should be obvious. Disney's movie interests are obvious, in the TV world they are ABC, ESPN, A&E, The History Channel, Lifetime, and E!, along with many foreign counterparts of those same stations. And of course there's AOL Time Warner, who's reach is pretty damn wide, and widely damn obvious, in movies and TV.

For the most part the TV networks are the movie studios. In fact, out of all of them I can only think of one that isn't wetting it's beak in both TV and Movies. That would be General Electric. But it does have ties. It owns Bravo, and holds a few interests with FOX, which is obviously big on movies.

Other than GE, though? Viacom is Paramount, MTV, Nickelodeon, BET, VH1, TNN, CMT, Comedy Central, Showtime, The Movie Channel, and more. Most TV holdings have Film Industry counterparts. Nickelodeon and MTV for instance, both make movies of their own. Vivendi Univeral is Universal Pictures, 50% USA Networks, Showtime's Australia counterpart, and partial ownership of HBO Asia. Sony is Columbia Pictures, Tri-star Pictures, Cinemax in Latin America, E! in Latin America, HBO in Brasil, Cinemax in Asia, and (partially) HBO in Asia, among others. News Corp is FOX, their TV/movie interests should be obvious. Disney's movie interests are obvious, in the TV world they are ABC, ESPN, A&E, The History Channel, Lifetime, and E!, along with many foreign counterparts of those same stations. And of course there's AOL Time Warner, who's reach is pretty damn wide, and widely damn obvious, in movies and TV.

For the most part the TV networks are the movie studios. In fact, out of all of them I can only think of one that isn't wetting it's beak in both TV and Movies. That would be General Electric. But it does have ties. It owns Bravo, and holds a few interests with FOX, which is obviously big on movies.

Other than GE, though? Viacom is Paramount, MTV, Nickelodeon, BET, VH1, TNN, CMT, Comedy Central, Showtime, The Movie Channel, and more. Most TV holdings have Film Industry counterparts. Nickelodeon and MTV for instance, both make movies of their own. Vivendi Univeral is Universal Pictures, 50% USA Networks, Showtime's Australia counterpart, and partial ownership of HBO Asia. Sony is Columbia Pictures, Tri-star Pictures, Cinemax in Latin America, E! in Latin America, HBO in Brasil, Cinemax in Asia, and (partially) HBO in Asia, among others. News Corp is FOX, their TV/movie interests should be obvious. Disney's movie interests are obvious, in the TV world they are ABC, ESPN, A&E, The History Channel, Lifetime, and E!, along with many foreign counterparts of those same stations. And of course there's AOL Time Warner, who's reach is pretty damn wide, and widely damn obvious, in movies and TV.

For the most part the TV networks are the movie studios. In fact, out of all of them I can only think of one that isn't wetting it's beak in both TV and Movies. That would be General Electric. But it does have ties. It owns Bravo, and holds a few interests with FOX, which is obviously big on movies.

Other than GE, though? Viacom is Paramount, MTV, Nickelodeon, BET, VH1, TNN, CMT, Comedy Central, Showtime, The Movie Channel, and more. Most TV holdings have Film Industry counterparts. Nickelodeon and MTV for instance, both make movies of their own. Vivendi Univeral is Universal Pictures, 50% USA Networks, Showtime's Australia counterpart, and partial ownership of HBO Asia. Sony is Columbia Pictures, Tri-star Pictures, Cinemax in Latin America, E! in Latin America, HBO in Brasil, Cinemax in Asia, and (partially) HBO in Asia, among others. News Corp is FOX, their TV/movie interests should be obvious. Disney's movie interests are obvious, in the TV world they are ABC, ESPN, A&E, The History Channel, Lifetime, and E!, along with many foreign counterparts of those same stations. And of course there's AOL Time Warner, who's reach is pretty damn wide, and widely damn obvious, in movies and TV.

For the most part the TV networks are the movie studios. In fact, out of all of them I can only think of one that isn't wetting it's beak in both TV and Movies. That would be General Electric. But it does have ties. It owns Bravo, and holds a few interests with FOX, which is obviously big on movies.

Other than GE, though? Viacom is Paramount, MTV, Nickelodeon, BET, VH1, TNN, CMT, Comedy Central, Showtime, The Movie Channel, and more. Most TV holdings have Film Industry counterparts. Nickelodeon and MTV for instance, both make movies of their own. Vivendi Univeral is Universal Pictures, 50% USA Networks, Showtime's Australia counterpart, and partial ownership of HBO Asia. Sony is Columbia Pictures, Tri-star Pictures, Cinemax in Latin America, E! in Latin America, HBO in Brasil, Cinemax in Asia, and (partially) HBO in Asia, among others. News Corp is FOX, their TV/movie interests should be obvious. Disney's movie interests are obvious, in the TV world they are ABC, ESPN, A&E, The History Channel, Lifetime, and E!, along with many foreign counterparts of those same stations. And of course there's AOL Time Warner, who's reach is pretty damn wide, and widely damn obvious, in movies and TV.

I'm so tired of hearing of how Clearchannel is the "Evil Empire" of the media realm. CC owns roughly 1,200 US radio stations, 40 TV stations, and a good chunk of outdoor advertising. I make no apologies for that. But the question I pose is this: Why does Viacom/CBS/Infinity not come under the same srutiny? By your own link, Viacom's media behemoth may only own a fraction of the radio stations CC does, but control the same number of airwave TV stations, plus MTV, VH1, CMT, BET, Comedy Central, Showtime, Nickelodeon, and a couple more cable stations. Furhter, they produce movies(Paramount Pictures), rent movies(Blockbuster), print books (Simon & Schuster), and they're responsible for KingWorld productions, bringing you hours upon hours of syndicated goodness every day. You tell me who influences the average American's thinking more.
NOTE: Yes, I do work for Clearchannel.

"Media companies continue to grow, and a shrinking number of them shape what we view and read. What does that mean for journalists -- and for the nation?"
Columbia Journalism Review's Web guide to what the major media companies own.

Judging by how tiny the scroll bar becomes when I open the Clear Channel page, I would say they own most of radio while Viacom, NewsCorp and Disney own most of TV.

I know it's offtopic, but things are running 80% offtopic so far...members of the NBC network. And this is before the recent deregulation that one of the FCC's own condemns. (pdf)

Doesn't matter. Friedman is a working journalist employed by a prominent, mainstream news organization. Bias matters, whether it's in his books, columns, speaking engagements or anywhere else in the public sphere. You can't cherry-pick, then turn around and honestly claim he isn't biased.

You seem to misunderstand the definition of the word "reporting" as it's used by journalists. As they use it, reporting is a process. Whether it's for a news article, a column, an editorial, or even a book, reporting is the process they go through to collect and balance information so they can present it to an audience.

RobertFisher: A good op-ed column should generate thought-provoking discussion and debate, which (as evident from the discussion in this thread and by your own account) is precisely what Friedman's column is doing.

I guess you missed the major points of my post, which I prominently summarized so there would be no confusion. Here they are again:

A good journalist:

1. Gets his facts right.
2. Gets her facts right.
3. Gets facts right.
4. Gets good, knowledgeable sources.
5. Writes well.

To be unambiguously clear, my previous post is concerned with facts and their accuracy. That is the most fundamental aspect of good journalism, again, whether it's for a news article, a column, an editorial, or even a book. Anyone who doesn't meet this basic standard is, by definition, a hack.

Any hack who makes facile arguments based on gross oversimplifications, errors, inaccuracies or misrepresentations is, by definition, a simplistic hack.

It's a given that a good column should generate discussion and debate. But the assumption is that the debate is about the substantive elements of the column -- arguments based on accurate facts.

The Friedman column in question is riddled with inaccuracies and obtuse claims. The discussion and debate surrounding it is not about the ideas expressed, it's about the lack of factual accuracy and the claims he then makes.

By any measure, it's not a good column.

I also did not say that a news article "should not generate controversy," as you wrote. I completely disagree with you. Some of the best news stories generate controversy. The Watergate scandal is one example. The Kuwait baby incubator story from Gulf War I is another. A lot of award-winning stories are ones that generate controversy.

RobertFisher: "Apparently the people who hand out Pulitzers (who should know a thing or two more about journalism than you) seemed to agree that Friedman's news reporting set the standards for oustanding journalism on two separate occassions."

I think the Pulitzer committee should know more about journalism than any single individual, too. But they've been known to give Pulitzers to people who didn't deserve them. One prominent example was Washington Post reporter Janet Cooke's 1981 Pulitzer for a fabricated story. She returned the prize.

Another example is the 1932 Pulitzer awarded to the New York Times' Walter Duranty for his reports from the Soviet Union. It's now known that he deliberately ignored the Ukrainian famine of the 1930s, and that his reports were outright propaganda for the Communists. Even the New York Times has distanced itself from Duranty's Pulitzer, yet the award remains unrevoked.

There's more on Cooke and Duranty in the Columbia Journalism Review.

Finally, why do you feel the need to resort to ad hominem attacks to build your case? I didn't attack you personally, so why do you impugn m

AOL Time Warner for one... but in general, I've found this website to be useful in that regard.

Columbia Journalism Review

Oh wait, were you asking for Newsweek examples? I got nothing.

Typical of the washington post's slant. They leave the last words to a bishop
"The one thing that's true of embryo research," Doerflinger said, "is that once people have done a little of it, they want to do more.

I'm always curious to see how the mega-medias treat stories to reflect their stockholders/ chairpersons political and religious interests.

Does anyone know where I can find a topic map of the big media ownership and their political affiliations?

I found this one pretty easily...
Washington Post's Media interests

OT: I hope Disney goes out of business. They've really turned into a one-product company, and that product's not even very compelling, anymore.

Actually disney is pretty well diversified among entertainment-related products. They own book, magazine and record publishers. Also ABC TV, ESPN, 10 TV stations, >25 radio stations, 7 movie production compainies (incl. miramax), theatrical productions, petroleum and natural gas interests (huh?), professional sports franchises, a cruise line, international media partnerships, and this little place called disneyworld.

I hope they go out of business, too (I don't like their marketing to children and I think their broad media ownership is anticompetitive), but probably not likely.

Someone should make a graphical nodemap of what companies own what other companies.

Not quite a graphical nodemap, but if you don't mind clicking on each of the parent companies to view who/what they own, it does the job.

Who Owns What

Alternately, there is a site out there - who owns what: http://www.cjr.org/owners/. It has a pretty good listing of who owns a variety of things.

Of course, I haven't looked too closely at it in a while, so I don't know how current / accurate the info is, but it used to be rather good.

http://www.cjr.org/owners/index.asp

Fair enough.

So then, using your link, let's compare Fox/News Corp. to CBS/Viacom. Viacom owns at least as many television stations and many, many more radio stations.

As such, I ask again: why did the original poster use Fox as an example?

Fair enough.

So then, using your link, let's compare Fox/News Corp. to CBS/Viacom. Viacom owns at least as many television stations and many, many more radio stations.

As such, I ask again: why did the original poster use Fox as an example?

This list is good too.