Our resident wise curmudgeon Woody NinetyNiner Konopak says:
It is a HUGE mistake to regard the mediated life-world thrown up around us by television and the rest of the flickering screens as mere “entertainment.” They are, in fact, nothing less than the conduits by which the entire culture receives its epistemological marching orders.
Media consolidation now has reduced the practical number CorpoRat boardrooms which control the WHOLE of the country’s epistemic vocabulary to a mere handful began in earnest in the late ’70s, with the likes of Gannett, Ted Turner, and others. Ben Bagdikian published his first edition of Media Monopolies in 1981, so he had to have gathered the data earlier, and the trends were substantial, evident, and pernicious even then. My old pal, Prof. Bob Picard, published his book on the matter in the mid 80s.
The phenomenon even got a “name” to make it “legit”: Media Consolidation,” and Billy, the Clenis, Clinton reified it all when he (enthusiastically) signed the Communications Act OF 1996.
SOURCE: FRUGAL DAD
http://frugaldad.com/2011/11/22/media-consolidation-infographic/
