VITAMEDIAS
Global Media: Big media barons are routinely accused of dominating markets, dumbing down the news to plump up the bottom line, and forcing U.S. content on world audiences. But these companies are not as big, bad, dominant, or American as critics claim. And company size is largely irrelevant to many of the problems facing today's Fourth Estate. [...]
In the United States, today's top 50 largest media companies account for little more of total media revenue than did the companies that made up the top 50 in 1986. [...]
With more news outlets and competition today, there is a greater range of journalism than was typical in the past. Further, a 2000 comparison of 186 countries by Freedom House, a nonprofit devoted to promoting democracy, suggests that press independence, including journalists' freedom from economic influence, remained high in all but two members (Mexico and Turkey) of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, where global media's markets are concentrated. [...]
As the old adage goes, "Freedom of the press is guaranteed only to those who own one." Make no mistake: an activist with a dial-up Internet connection and 10 megabytes of Web server space cannot easily challenge Disney for audiences. But an individual or a small group can reach the whole world and, with a little work and less money, can actually find an audience. [...]
Beware when someone claims to be speaking for the "public interest." In most cases, those who invoke the term really mean "interested publics."