The Media Drop

Chris Houchens made some great points in a post on Tuesday night about the FCC’s relaxation of media ownership news in Top 20 markets in the U.S., restating what needs to be obvious to people, that the “media” in their marketplaces isn’t left to the big companies any longer.

While I can most certainly appreciate the media ownership concern messages that many a group are distributing right now, I have to say that my perspective on this whole situation has most certainly changed in the last four or five years, most of which has had me writin this blog.

Let’s put this in perspective, folks. We live in a time when lots of people are becoming the media. I get to work every day with the fine folks at Baristanet, who are melding traditional media stories with their own local reports and commentaries, and we’re all familiar with “publications” that only exist online but have serious draw and long-term potential. Additionally, we’re currently living in a world where attrition of newswriting talent isn’t staying put like it used to be, and that newsrooms and newsgathering organizations can’t necessarily afford the britches they’re wearing. Without shutting them all down and “starting over” with a newer model of doing business, something has got to give, or you’re going to see a lot more JOAs like the one you see in Seattle with the Seattle Times and Post-Intelligencer, or the death of the weekly (and storied) publication, and more.

Companies are going to do what they need to do to stay afloat, whether that means Tribune Co. selling itself off, one of the major publications in a major market going all-digital when it sees that as the samrt move (and with things like e-paper on the horizon, who might blame them?), or combining forces with other talent in the marketplace. There was once a time that we had concerns that someone owning a major television station, radio broadcast station and a print outlet of any note could really do damage to getting news in front of the public. Those days are relatively over, if you ask me. Most news doesn’t get hidden, at least for long. It ends up on someone’s blog, in a forum somewhere, or part of a text message flurry going on between you and your friends when one of you is “connected” to someone. The “time to market” is pretty darn close to zero. Additionally, “hiding” news or not reporting ethically on certain things if you’re a major player is only going to lose eyeballs, viewers, and listeners from your content delivery, so why even go down that road?