Ownership of the Media

• Three companies dominate 90% of the UK's national newspapers
• Facebook/Meta own three of the top five social media sites used to access news in the UK
• Tabloids continue to sell more than broadsheets
• Traditional Marxists say the media is controlled by its owners, the ruling class
• Owners inject political ideology into the media - Althusser's ISA
• Journalists are not free to pursue stories that conflict with the politics of the paper
• Milliband said the media promoted false class consciousness
• Political issues may be simplified and some information left out to encourage partisan views from readers
• Audiences are passive and accept information as fact, in whatever way it is presented
• Owners can choose not to present certain stories
• Inequality is rarely given a human face - statistics are used to create a distance between the reader and the issue
• Ownership is becoming concentrated meaning more media is aligned with the interests of the few
• Curran found evidence of owners getting involved with day to day affairs of production
• A majority of newspapers are conservative so are less critical of right wing governments
• Pluralists argue media is a business and is simply providing what the audience wants to consume
• Marxists suggest the audience is passive, but lots of media is critical of mainstream politics
• Neo Marxists disagree that control of the media is intentional
• The GUMG found most reporters and editors had similar backgrounds: Oxford educated, white, middle class
• 51% of journalists were privately educated compared to just 7% of the total population
• Journalists are unlikely to be critical of people from the same background as them
• Agenda setting - the media determines what is important to the public
• Media focuses on issues that are relevant to the ruling class eg economy
• Gramsci said the media passed on hegemonic ideas that were centrist and looked to preserve the status quo
• The media suggests radical and revolutionary ideas are dangerous
• Pluralism emphasises the range of media that is available and how this reflects the needs of the audience
• Media driven by rational economics - media is supplied to meet a demand
• Whale says the range of media reflects competing groups in society
• The most popular media is often repeated using the same formula or familiar content
• Media earns money through subscription fees and advertising - no audience means no revenue
• Audience creates and dictates content - eg you cannot predict what will and won't become a meme
• The choice of media may be an illusion as it is creating false needs
• Davies says it is harder for media to be objective in contemporary society, but the choice remains for audiences
• Postmodernists say we live in a time of media saturation
• People are selective about what they consume as it is impossible to process all the media they are bombarded with
• There are more owners and types of ownership to reflect an increasingly diverse range of views
• Baudrillard says people are unable to discern between what is real and imitating reality - hyperreality
• Coverage of the gulf war presented a version that was distorted from how the war actually was
• Lyotard says people now reject metanarratives and are distrustful of experts
• Echo chambers create a false impression of what norms and values are in wider society
• Consumers don't choose - algorithms choose for us