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Comcast In Deal Talks With NBC Universal
schwit1 sent us an LA Times article about another step in the seemingly unending media consolidation. This time it's Cable giant Comcast Corp. looking at NBC. NBC owns a slew of channels, including Bravo, USA and Syfy (who might have the single lamest rebranding since Spike). The article says that it would be far cheaper than the Disney deal Comcast tried to pull off 5 years ago.
.....the content, the distribution channel, and the local government-granted monopoly over neighborhoods, then they control the minds of the people.
"I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it." - historian Evelyn Beatrice Hall
Actually, those are pretty good rebranding efforts. They replace a cumbersome word that might not be easy to remember or that doesn't have a good connection with the content of the site with a single short commonly-used word that is on target and easy to remember. (Of course, nobody ever visits either one of these sites unless they come up in a Google search....)
On the other hand, Sci-Fi's decision to call themselves "Syfy" is simply a lame attempt to justify having professional wrestling in their lineup.
Critiques of media consolidation involve a number of issues and notions:
That consolidation and globalization of media over the past decade have been massive.
That media consolidation is served by government deregulation and subsidization of
the airwaves.
That media consolidation and globalization are viewed as predecessors of global
capitalism.
That the bottom line of corporate media is profit, not content.
That media industries have become media oligopolies, that is, media conglomerates
are not agents of a democratic citizenry, but of a business and state elite.
That critiques of globalization and corporate power are marginalized.
That media audiences are treated as consumers rather than citizens.
That the traditional notion of media having a public interest obligation has
disappeared.
That democratically-based media outlets have expanded and while marginalized
provide an alternative to corporate media messages.
http://libr.org/amtf//bibliographies/bib.1.pdf
"Kill 'em all and let Root sort 'em out"
When the deal is complete, Comcast will raise the rates to carry their newly acquired channels to DirecTV, to ridiculously insane levels, just like they did with the Versus channel... all in an effort to try putting DirecTV out of business. After the royal shafting they tried sticking those of us with their Internet service, but not their cable TV service* (which they referred to as "bundling", but which was, in reality, a "satellite tax"), I will never spend another cent with those greedy bastards. Fuck Comcast.**
*I had AT&T Broadband, and when Comcast bought them out, they decided to modify their price structure to bring it in line with the rest of the country (their words). In doing so, my bill went from $32.95/mo., to $37.95, to $42.95, and then to $57.95/mo., in the span of less than 10 months. (No promotional rates were involved, either.) The last increase of FIFTEEN dollars a month was because I didn't have cable TV. Funny that I didn't have it at the beginning, and only paid $32.95 a month to AT&T, for the exact same level of speed and service. As far as I'm concerned, Comcast is even more evil and untrustworthy as Microsoft, which is really saying something. Stay classy, Comcast!
**Come on already, Qwest - where's the FTTH that your commercials keep trying to pitch to me, but I STILL can't get, less than 5 miles from Downtown St. Paul?!?
Isn't professional wrestling fantasy anyways?
On the other hand, Sci-Fi's decision to call themselves "Syfy" is simply a lame attempt to justify having professional wrestling in their lineup.
It was my understanding that the primary issue is that they couldn't trademark Sci-Fi b/c it was a generic term.
"Yes they can go back to dialup." by donaggie03
Okay that isn't fair but I suspect if he were here, and completely honest, that's exactly what he would say. He argues that Comcast is not a monopoly and people have other choices, but he forgets the alternative (50k dialup) is not really a valid choice. You can do a lot over dialup including bittorrent, but you can't watch hulu.com or nbc.com or other tv sites. ----- Also even in areas that have both cable and DSL, that's still just a duopoly... no better than our current political system.
"I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it." - historian Evelyn Beatrice Hall