Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Six corporations control 90% of America media

techstartups.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

41–50 of 183 posts

Re: Six corporations control 90% of America media

#41

Post by ipaddr »

rgbrenner wrote: post #32

"Today, 6 media giants control a whopping 90% of what we read, watch, or listen to." Where's the evidence for the 90% number here? Every media mentioned is legacy media. People now spend more time consuming digital media than legacy media.[0] So I don't see how this claim can be true. https://www.statista.com/statistics/565628/time-spent-digita...

Like facebook, instagram, youtube twitter? Now things are owned by two companies google and facebook but you can still get uncensored content on twitter? Not anymore.

Things are more controlled in the digital world.

Soon Apple will buy one of the major legacy companies, followed by Amazon, Microsoft which will allow Google to do the same.

Re: Six corporations control 90% of America media

#42

Post by fallingfrog »

yogthos wrote: post #19
analyst74 wrote: post #2

This is not news for anyone paying attention to the media space. The big question is ... is there a way out? Or are we destined to have a small number of powerful organizations controlling world's information and in extension, our thought?

Open source platforms provide an alternative to corporate social media. These platforms are developed on a non-profit basis and are hosted by volunteers across the globe. A growing number of such platforms are available today and millions of people are using them already. Mastodon is an alternative to Twitter, and it’s currently home to over two million users. This was the first open platform to get serious traction,…

[flagged]

Re: Six corporations control 90% of America media

#43

Post by fridif »

marcusverus wrote: post #39
kfarr wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Or Facebook, Twitter, Reddit, etc? Media consolidation is concerning but agreed this 90% claim seems to be for attention grabbing headline purposes.

Facebook, Twitter and Reddit are social media platforms. They may be the primary mechanism by which the media’s products (articles, videos, podcasts) are shared, but they are not the media.

Which is why they "moderate the content on the platform", right? People get banned for posting their political opinions but media companies

Re: Six corporations control 90% of America media

#44

Post by wombatmobile »

marcusverus wrote: post #39
kfarr wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Or Facebook, Twitter, Reddit, etc? Media consolidation is concerning but agreed this 90% claim seems to be for attention grabbing headline purposes.

Facebook, Twitter and Reddit are social media platforms. They may be the primary mechanism by which the media’s products (articles, videos, podcasts) are shared, but they are not the media.

The biggest loss to society from this change arises from how the billions of dollars of revenue from advertising is spent.

Old media used to plough the money into investigative journalism and local news. New media doesn't do that, which is why our current crop of "leaders" in politics are drawn from celebrity culture and thrive on ignorance.

Re: Six corporations control 90% of America media

#45

Post by DrJokepu »

cptskippy wrote: post #33
DrJokepu wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You must be kidding. Viacom is one of the world's largest entertainment companies.

I guess this article doesn't take into account the fact that CBS and Viacom have since merged. They're history looks a bit like an Alabama family tree with multiple splits and mergers. This is how I felt weeding through all of it: https://thumbs.gfycat.com/MealyDishonestBadger-small.gif

This is very common in the entertainment industry. If you think the story of Viacom and CBS is crazy, look up the story of the Victor Talking Machine Company and its many descendants and “relatives”, including RCA, HMV, JVC, EMI, Capitol Records and many others.

Re: Six corporations control 90% of America media

#46

Post by wombatmobile »

doctor_eval wrote: post #11

I didn’t understand this at first as Chomsky’s “Manufacturing Consent” discussed media consolidation many years ago. But of course the problem is that we’ve gone from a small number of companies controlling _the news_ to a small number of companies controlling _all media_. It’s less Chomsky and more Orwell.

> It’s less Chomsky and more Orwell.

As Neil Postman pointed out, it's less Orwell and more Huxley.

“What Orwell feared were those who would ban books. What Huxley feared was that there would be no reason to ban a book, for there would be no one who wanted to read one. Orwell feared those who would deprive us of information. Huxley feared those who would give us so much that we would be reduced to passivity and egoism. Orwell feared that the truth would be concealed from us. Huxley feared the truth would be drowned in a sea of irrelevance. Orwell feared we would become a captive culture. Huxley feared we would become a trivial culture, preoccupied with some equivalent of the feelies, the orgy porgy, and the centrifugal bumblepuppy. As Huxley remarked in Brave New World Revisited, the civil libertarians and rationalists who are ever on the alert to oppose tyranny "failed to take into account man's almost infinite appetite for distractions.""

Re: Six corporations control 90% of America media

#47

Post by SapporoChris »

>Back in 2018, Jim Morrison, a singer, songwriter, and poet, who served as the lead vocalist of the rock band, once said: “Whoever controls the media, controls the mind.”

Jim Morrison Born: December 8, 1943. Died:July 3, 1971.

It is difficult for me to take an article seriously when there are glaringly obvious mistakes.

Re: Six corporations control 90% of America media

#49

Post by amelius »

motohagiography wrote: post #27

Should we be concerned about them using their media properties to push narratives designed to consolidate their influence, or ask whether some of the things we believe might be artifacts of that influence, or maybe what the sources and motives of those narratives might be? Kidding. This isn't the 90's. The only people who worry about an axis of collaboration between corporations and government to create a surveillanc…

Or perhaps educate people about how to consume information.

Re: Six corporations control 90% of America media

#50

Post by wombatmobile »

chrismcb wrote: post #8

But does your average person use more than six sources for news? You'll hear people talk about CNN, MSNBC, nyt, wsj, maybe la times. Most people also have three or four local news and maybe a paper. If you stick with main stream media, I don't think most people look to more than a handful of places.

> But does your average person use more than six sources for news?

The average person might rely on 2 or 3 sources of news. But it's a different world when they have to choose those sources from 6 that are running the same line, compared to a world in which hundreds of diverse viewpoints are ready and waiting to shine a light on any issue.

Post reply on HN