Thoughts on Corporate Takeover of the Media By Ronnie Dugger

I knew that corporations owned most of the media, but I never realized how much of it and even how much of a problem that is.

When Dugger said that the largest radio group only owned 39 stations as opposed today's 1100, it really hit me as to how much that actually was. What I really don't understand is that law states no entity should be allowed to broadcast to more than 35% of the American population, yet CBS Viacom is broadcasting to 41%.

It really comes as no surprise to me that the FCC's newly appointed chair (as appointed by Bush.. that's always good news) believes that the public interest standard is, "about as empty a vessel as you can accord a regulatory agency."

Dugger made a good point when he gave the example of a channel not broadcasting anti-war stories because the boss is a weapons merchant.

It seems obvious that this logic makes sense, but at the same time it's very hurtful to society as a whole.

The only thing that I didn't like about this reading was this:

Even though the author had many good points and in turn was very convincing, he could have gone on to explain a few ways that we could help the public service sector be more dominant within the highly corporatized industry.