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Media Monopoly: Thomas Edison to Hillary Rosen
An anonymous reader writes "George Ziemann has posted two excellent articles that explore the early days of the recording and music industry, how their attempts to monopolize their respective mediums in the past failed, and how their attempts to do so strangely mirror those presently being undertaken by contemporary media conglomerates to control digital distribution over the Net. Seems the two industries back at the turn of the century tried to pool their patents to block out competition like the RIAA and the big media companies today pool their copyrights. The first article "The Dawn of Recorded Music and the First Pirates" focuses on early collusion in the phonograph industry. The second "Music, Movies and Monopoly" on Thomas Edison's failed attempts to restrain fair trade in the two new media he gave commercial rise to."
Here's Ted Turner's letter voicing opposition (!) to increased media consolidation.
How Politicians Lie: http://www.factcheck.org/
This "big media monopoly" is such a myth. The networks, newspapers, internet sites compete viciously against each other.
I see plenty of choices on tv, radio, and the Internet than ever before.
This media monopoly is just another bogeyman the leftists have made up as part of their "all big corporations are evil" campaign.
SIG:Slashdot: indymedia for nerds.
You know, with the advent of services like iTunes, and others like Sony, etc etc. It is quite possible that a monopoly will finally be established by the RIAA. It is so convenient to buy music online from someplace like iTunes that people over the years will shift to buying their music online. Everyone wants their favourite music and all the copyrights are owned by the big labels. Any service to attract users will have to have a contract with the RIAA so they can sell all the golden oldies. I mean, if some service pops up and they just have a bunch of unknowns not many people will buy from them. Its the Bruce Springsteens and the Beatles of the world who move music.
As for Kazaa and others, hell they'll keep going strong but they will get harder and harder to use as the RIAA cracks down. I do not forsee my parents using Kazaa. They used it, and the fact that half the songs are low quality and u get many different results for a single song.. Well they don't care, all they want is to put in the name of a song and get back ONE result which they KNOW will work. Kazaa and napster to them are not worth the effort of searching and seeing if the songs are good quality and error free. They will however happily use iTunes. And that is why iTunes and similar vendors are going to make it big in the next 5 years as normal poeple start using them and discover how convenient they are. It is not the ubergeeks sitting downloading tons of music from kazaa and irc. Hell they can do that all they want it still won't detract from the ever increasing success of pay music. I predict that in the future, people will be like: Yeah, the smiths are really poor, they still use kazaa!
Many different online vendors | all having to deal with the RIAA implies a possible monopoly especially with DRM techonology maturing.
The "big media monopoly" isn't a myth at all; what you're stating is, however--that the media is owned or controlled by one group. In fact, there are several very large groups that own or control different parts of the media, and they each have their own strengths and weaknesses.
However, each of these may constitute a local monopoly in a given area of the media or region of the world. And even if any one giant corporation doesn't have a monopoly on a given area of the media or region of the world, that media is most likely still owned by one giant corporation or another, which--ultimately--is what people object to the most.
It wasn't always like this, you know. There once was a much larger place for small businesses and innovation in radio, music, TV, and newspapers, where people could get in on the ground floor, and offer something new, interesting, and unique. But those days are over, and the sort of power that the big media corporations hold is absolutely stunning. They have more power to censor now than the government ever had.
Ultimately, some big corporations are evil; it has to do with the amount of power they have, and how power corrupts. If you have lots of small companies around to keep them honest, then you can expect fair competition. But if you don't, well then you have the mess we have now.
pb Reply or e-mail; don't vaguely moderate.
So society is just being subjected to the same old mistakes of the past?
Why is the name Thomas Edison so revered?
In 100 years, will all the anti-competitive crimes of Microsoft have been forgotten? and
will Bill Gates be "remembered" as the "inventor" of so many key parts of computer systems?
Thomas Edison, like Bill Gates, was first and foremost a businessman. Yet, he gets "remembered"
as the "inventor" of many things that OTHER people actually discovered.
The genius of Edison and Gates _was_ in making inventions practicable through their employees.
http://jesus.everdense.com/
Edison was a true pioneer. He took FUD to new hights. He used paten portfolios to styfle competion in ways never dreamed of by his predicesors. He accuired the ownership of patens in very unsavory ways. He was one of the first to enslave inventors (read developers). Between him and Standard Oil, they wrote the book on monopolistic tyrany. Bill Gates is just extending the techniques pioneered by Edison.
After Monday, the only impartial media out there will be public radio and television.
Support it, or it will die.
Find your local radio or television station and join up.
Only the ignorant and stupid repeat the mistakes of others.
- Sherman
"Many of the early independents were resilient film exhibitors who ventured into production when they found their supply of film threatened. Carl Laemmle (Independent Motion Picture Company or IMP), Harry E. Aitken (Majestic Films), and Adolph Zukor (Famous Players) were among the pioneering independents who protested the Trust, and then laid the foundation for the Hollywood studios. Having entered the business through exhibition, they determined that they liked production better, and got out of the theater business as the nickelodeon boom ended around 1911."
In other words, the movie studios WERE STARTED BY PIRATES! (i.e., independents who were defying the copyrights and patents of the companies described in the articles).
Richard Steven Hack - This sig is TOO GODDAMN SHORT TO DO ANYTHING USEFUL WITH! MORONS!
True, fire which burned down Tesla's lab was attributed to Edison even though nothing was ever proven.
Tesla on Edison:
``If Edison had a needle to find in a haystack, he would proceed at once with the diligence of the bee to examine straw after straw until he found the object of his search.''
``I was a sorry witness of such doings, knowing that a little theory and calculation would have saved him ninety per cent of his labor.''
New York Times, October 19, 1931
~ a low user id is no indication I have a clue what I'm talking about.