MEDIA OWNERSHIP and DEMOCRACY in the DIGITAL INFORMATION AGE Promoting Diversity with First Amendment Principles and Market Structure Analysis MARK COOPER Director of Research, Consumer Federation of America Center for the Internet & Society, Stanford Law School Associated Fellow, Columbia Institute for Tele-information Center for Internet & Society Stanford Law School Acknowledgments Many of the concepts in this book are the result of a twenty-year Vulcan mind-meld with Gene Kimmelman of Consumers Union. Steve Cooper provided the initial drafts of most of the material in Chapters 3 and 4 and reviewed numerous drafts of the entire document. Dean Alger provided materials for Chapters 2 and 3 as part of comments filed by the Consumer Federation (et al.) at the Federal Communications Commission. Bob Brandon and Melanie Wyne relentlessly demanded simple En- glish in a series of documents which make up most of the chapters of this book. Susan Punnett tirelessly edited the manuscript. The Ford Foundation provided sig- nificant support for the research through its funding of the Consumer Federation of America’s Digital Society Project. Cover design by Jeff Middour. Licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike License. To view a copy of this license, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/1.0/ or send a letter to Creative Commons, 559 Nathan Abbott Way, Stanford, California 94305, USA. ISBN 0-9727460-9-9 Mark Cooper 1424 16th Street, N.W. Washingtion, D.C. 20036 [email protected] Contents PART I: LEGAL PRINCIPLES AND ANALYTIC FRAMEWORK ...... 1 I. A BOLD ASPIRATION FOR THE FIRST AMENDMENT ........... 3 OWNERSHIP OF ELECTRONIC MEDIA AND THE FREEDOM OF SPEECH ................3 The Current Debate Over Media Ownership Limits.......................................3 The Expanding Debate Over Media Reform and Justice .................................7 OUTLINE ............................................................................................................8 NOT A TOASTER WITH PICTURES OR PEANUTS AND POTATOES .......................11 Democratic Debate v. Commercial Media Markets .......................................11 Participation in Democratic Debate...............................................................14 Information Dissemination, not Entertainment ............................................17 Limits on Ownership to Promote Diversity ..................................................18 THE NEED TO IMPROVE DEMOCRATIC DISCOURSE .........................................22 Demographic Changes....................................................................................22 Technological Change.....................................................................................25 SELLING FIRST AMENDMENT PUBLIC INTEREST PRINCIPLES SHORT ................26 PUBLIC OPINION ABOUT THE MEDIA ...............................................................29 II. MEDIA ECONOMICS AND DEMOCRATIC DISCOURSE ..... 33 THE TYRANNY OF THE MAJORITY IN THE MASS MEDIA..................................33 Competition, Democracy and the Shortcomings of Mass Media...................33 An Economic Theory of Discrimination ........................................................35 The Impact of Market Failure on Civic Discourse .........................................39 OWNERSHIP MATTERS .....................................................................................44 Bias-Bashing Among the Most Prominent American Journalistic Icons......45 Systematic Evidence on Systematic Bias .......................................................47 Direct Financial Interests Affects Coverage ..................................................48 TENSION BETWEEN COMMERCIALISM AND CIVIC DISCOURSE IS CLEAR .........50 Happy News at the Lowest Cost ....................................................................50 Minority Communities and Unpopular Points of View are Under served ...52 iii Concentration and Consolidation of the Media Undermines Localism.........53 THE MASS MEDIA ARE CRITICAL TO POLITICAL PROCESSES ...........................55 Agenda Setting and Influencing Public Opinion ..........................................55 Diversity Is Critical to Supporting Democratic Discourse ...........................56 DIFFERENT ROLES OF DIFFERENT MEDIA ........................................................57 Identifying Media Functions .........................................................................57 Television Plays the Central Media Role in Civic Discourse ........................58 CONCLUSION ...................................................................................................60 Old Theories that No Longer Apply ..............................................................60 Empirical Concepts of Media Diversity .........................................................61 PART II: QUALITATIVE STUDIES OF MEDIA TRENDS ........... 65 III. PRINT JOURNALISM ...................................................... 67 THE UNIQUE IMPACT OF NEWSPAPER-TELEVISION MERGERS .........................67 Pressure From Concentration, Vertical Integration and Conglomeration on Journalistic Values ....................................................................................68 Reducing Antagonism and the Watchdog Role .............................................71 Consolidating News Production ....................................................................73 TRENDS WITHIN PRINT JOURNALISM ..............................................................75 Concentration Eliminates Diversity ..............................................................76 Profit at the Expense of Journalism................................................................77 Happy News ...................................................................................................81 Under Serving Commercially Unattractive Audiences.................................82 IV. THE ELECTRONIC MASS MEDIA ................................. 85 THE CRITIQUE OF TELEVISION’S IMPACT ON POLITICAL DISCOURSE ...............85 Commercialism ...............................................................................................85 Technology Influencing Social Processes.......................................................86 Demobilizing Voters.......................................................................................90 HOPE & HYPE V. REALITY: THE ROLE OF THE INTERNET ................................92 Commercialism ...............................................................................................95 Technology Influencing Social Processes.......................................................96 iv Social Alienation ............................................................................................98 Demobilizing Citizens ..................................................................................100 EPILOGUE: WAR COVERAGE ..........................................................................102 News American Style ...................................................................................103 Covering-All-Sides In Britain......................................................................105 Conclusion ....................................................................................................107 PART III: QUANTITATIVE STUDIES OF MASS MEDIA MARKETS................................................ 109 V. DEFINING MASS MEDIA INFORMATION MARKETS ..... 111 DEFINING THE PRODUCT AND ITS USES ........................................................111 EMPIRICAL MEASURES OF MARKET STRUCTURE ............................................112 THE PRODUCT: MEDIA USE FOR NEWS AND INFORMATION ..........................116 GEOGRAPHIC MARKETS ................................................................................127 VI. ANALYSIS OF MEDIA MARKETS .................................. 131 BROADCAST TELEVISION ...............................................................................132 Revenues and Output .................................................................................132 Concentration of Local Markets ...................................................................135 TV After Relaxation of the Duopoly Rule ...................................................136 CABLE TV .....................................................................................................139 Revenues and Output ..................................................................................139 Concentration of Local Markets ...................................................................140 Cable TV After Deregulation .......................................................................141 PROGRAMMING..............................................................................................144 National Markets..........................................................................................144 Concentration of Local Markets ...................................................................149 Prime Time Programming After Repeal Of The Fin-Syn Rules .....152 NEWSPAPERS..................................................................................................154 Revenues, Output and Owners....................................................................154 Concentration of Local Markets ............................................................157 v Cross Ownership and Quality .....................................................................158