Slashdot Mirror
Does Mega Media Control 90% of Content?
smitty777 writes "FastCo has an intriguing article on the vast control of our media by the mega corporations. In the article, Cliff Kuang disputes such claims by the the Frugal Dad that the revenue for the Big Six was over $275.9 billion, and that these companies are in cahoots to control our viewing. Just how much do these companies control?"
Let's think about how business works - if there are 10 companies doing a particular thing, at any given time, 1 or more will decide that they want to do more of the particular thing. They will then use leverage/bribery/corporate espionage/collusion/etc to acquire 1 or more of the others. Over time, this will continue until the original 10 are consolidated to the lowest number possible to avoid anti-trust/monopoly actions. And, during all of this time, they will continue to produce whatever thing that the general public will most readily consume. This usually entails things of medium to low quality (high quality is expensive and, in the case of tangible products, has a low replacement rate), dumbed down to appeal to the lowest common denominator and mass marketed with loud, brightly colored advertising. This has been the way of things for many years, this will be the way of things for many years to come. There are a few different models that have managed to squeak by briefly, but theyre rare and often not much better.
Simple obvious fact one: The larger company will have a larger market share.
Simple obvious fact two: The smaller company will have less market share.
So if some companies are bigger then they will have more Market Share and control then the others.
So if the top 6 companies (assume they are all equal) own 90% share then each one only has 15% market share. Which is big but no means a monopoly.
Percentages are a way of summarizing real data. However by grouping and summarizing the summary. And clustering data in a particular way you can prove anything you want.
Think the 99%ers vs. the 53%ers they both choose different measurements and summarize and group values differently to prove their point.
If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
With only five competetitors, and all of them producing dreck, there's no need to produce anything BUT dreck.
You make it sound as bad as domestic car companies. Or banks. Or fast food "restaurants". Hmm. I think we're on to a pattern here...
"Science flies us to the moon. Religion flies us into buildings." - Victor Stenger
Well, many of us don't like the MSM, and are now getting our news raw and unfiltered.
Provided they have the time to sit in front of a computer desk. A lot of people have trouble giving up the MSM for video because they don't want to buy another PC for the HDTV or worse yet both buy a PC and replace the SDTV in the living room with an HDTV. Other people have trouble giving up the MSM for music because only smartphones can play Internet radio in the car or on the bus, and they aren't willing to pay for smartphone service.
I don't care that the MSM controls 90% of the content, because it is the same old crappy content they've always controlled. With the internet, there is a whole new world of content waiting to be discovered.
Until the MSM starts suing Internet artists on trumped-up charges of plagiarism.
The 90% of the people can't really appreciate the finer nuanced artistic works, let them have the MSM.
Are you sure that we'd want that? If 90 percent have the MSM, then 90 percent are letting the MSM tell them for whom to vote and on which issues to choose a candidate. For example, which MSM source has thoroughly covered opposition to the Stop Online Piracy Act?
The quote from Jobs pretty much sums it up well.
"When you're young, you look at television and think, There's a conspiracy. The networks have conspired to dumb us down. But when you get a little older, you realize that's not true. The networks are in business to give people exactly what they want. That's a far more depressing thought. Conspiracy is optimistic! You can shoot the bastards! We can have a revolution! But the networks are really in business to give people what they want. It's the truth." - Steve Jobs, Interview in WIRED magazine (February 1996)
This signature is a waste of 42 characters
Even with the price of HDTV cameras plummeting, I don't see the price of competent writing, directing, acting, sets, and the like plummeting.
Not to mention the cost for a commercial MPEG license, required for anything you film with that HD camera.
"Somebody has to do something. It's just incredibly pathetic it has to be us."
--- Jerry Garcia