Consolidation of mass-media essays

Consolidation of mass-media essays The most revered and respected of all rights we Americans share is the freedom of speech; moreover, the freedoms of a free press. These freedoms are basic necessities of a free and fare society. Walter Lippmann said that a free press should consist of many newspapers decentralized in their ownership and their management, and dependent for their support... upon the communities where they are written, where they are edited and where they are read(Blethen B07). Consolidation of our nations mass-media outlets threatens the essence of integrity in our nations free speech, and freedoms of a free press. Many would wonder why such a thing would be permitted, if the repercussions of such actions would be so damaging. In fact if you look back in time there was a concern to such a problem. Thus many laws were drafted to prevent such occurrences. For instance the Local Radio Ownership Cap of 1947 limited number of stations on company can own in a single market (The). The National TV Ownership law of 1941 stated that a company may not own stations that reach more than 35 percent of the national audience (The). The Dual Television Network rule of 1946 prevents one company from owning two of the top four television broadcast networks (The). The Duopoly rule of 1964 that a single company may own two television stations in a single market only if one or both of them is not rated among the top 4; moreover, that there will be at least eight remaining Independent stations after the acquisition (The). The Radio/TV Cross-Ownership Restriction of 1970 limits the ownership in the markets in regards to how many stations one company can own in a single market, and is different depending upon the size of the market (The). The Newspaper/Broadcast Cross-Ownership Prohibition of 1975 states that broadcast companies may not buy newspapers in communities where they own stations (The). These rules and regulation...