Economic development requires flow of information as part and parcel of the issues that should be advanced. People need to know what happens in other parts of the world so that they may be able to determine whether to invest in these areas or not. Similarly, media is very crucial in ensuring that the citizenry gets to know what their government officials are doing.
In this regard, many people have argued that media freedom is very essential in ensuring free and unbiased production of news. However, there has been a long standing disagreement regarding whether media ownership should be limited for the public interest or not (Fenton 61).
For several years now, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) has been implementing strict rules which are aimed at regulating media ownership. It should be noted that all these has been done to ensure that listeners and readers of news have a choice regarding what they can hear or read (Gillmor 37).
The limitations were put in place to ensure that one media group does not own a huge percentage of the media industry such as to have a monopoly in determining what is broadcasted. FCC therefore deemed it right to regulate the percentage of ownership for each individual in the industry.
Nevertheless, given the current wave of technological advancement, it is becoming extremely hard to control media ownership. The number of people who have access to internet is increasing each day. Nevertheless, the number in itself is not a problem; the problem is that nowadays all news as well as other issues that were initially a responsibility of television and radio stations are found on the internet. As a result, it is quite impossible to regulate who owns what percentage.
Economic freedom is one of the pillars of social development. However, media ownership regulation is a hindrance to freedom of doing business. People have the freedom of choosing what to read or watch. By limiting media ownership, the FCC may actually be limiting diversity of programs for the citizenry. Moreover, gone are the days when people were not informed and making a choice would have been a problem.
Nevertheless, failing to limit media ownership can lead to a scenario where large media corporations would be in control of what the public is told and these is not right (Fenton 78). Having diversity of media owners directly translates to increased diversity of views and thus fair coverage of issues.
With increased global corporations owning American media, people have argued that the media industry has had several challenges. To begin with, global corporations that own most of American media are less conversant with the local issues facing American people. As a result, these corporations concentrate more on international issues and overlook important local issues (Fenton 79). Consequently, international issues which are less important to the common American the get more coverage at the expense of local American issues.
It should also be noted that media houses can actually determine what people think. This is because the news that people read or watch ends up forming the basis of their thinking behavior. Global corporations focus more on issues that affect the world as a whole because they want to remain globally relevant (Gillmor 37).
They are also bound to focus more on negative issues about the government and forget the good things that government has done. Similarly, these corporations will tell the public anything just to maintain their relationship with big advertisers. This has eliminated objectivity in reporting.
Another important issue in media industry is cross ownership. This is a situation where one corporation or individual can own different media platforms for example, a television station and a newspaper. This is important especially to a business because it allows cheap and internal advertisements. Moreover, this leads to increased distribution. Unfortunately, cross ownership is not very good to the citizenry.
Cross ownership increases monopolistic powers which are detrimental not only to the freedom of media, but also to objectivity in reporting (Gillmor 121). It is easy to manipulate news especially for the government because all that is required is to talk to a single corporation. Moreover, when a corporation becomes too big there is a possibility of ignoring outside opinion thus sometimes giving wrong information.
All in all, it should be noted that television stations, cable television and radio stations serve adults and young people alike. Consequently, there should be some limit as to what content is aired at a particular point in time. It is important to note that these three types of media have the highest number of followers.
As a result, there should be some sort of ethical code of conduct regulating them. More often, children below the age of eighteen will be found listening to radio or watching a program on television. If the content of these programs is not controlled then the effects to society are negative (Fenton 57). However, care should be taken to ensure that regulation does not interfere with the freedom of speech. Media houses should be free to broadcast what is good whether it negatively exposes someone or not.
Notably, there is a great difference between new media and old media. To begin with, technological advancements have highly changed the way news is transmitted or even received by people. Gone are the days when breaking news had to be brought only by radio or television stations. Nowadays, people have internet and they can get news on various gadgets wherever they are as quickly as possible.
One big difference between the old and the new media is that while only qualified personnel used to broadcast news and other information in the old media, in the new medial anybody can do that (Gillmor 165). Anybody can get pictures of an event and post them on facebook or twitter. This will spread very fast to various parts of the globe. On the same note, production of the old media basically took place in buildings because various tools had to be used.
On the contrary, new media has its production taking place anywhere because it is all about using technology. Moreover, technology in the new media has allowed a lot of manipulation of news. Notably, while the old media takes care during news to present views that are positive or rather not adverse, new media gets views from all extreme ends. New media provides news in form of a discussion where both ends of the divide are given time to reply.
On the contrary, old media broadcasts in a lecture format where news is just read with no room for immediate reaction (Gillmor 95). In this regard, new media allows interaction between people as they can directly contribute to news. As a result, people have a sense of ownership of the subjects of discussion.
Nevertheless, these two types of media have various similarities. Firstly, all these media serve the society and they therefore discuss matters that affect people’s day-to-day lives. On the same note, top trending stories in both media is mostly the same. Gaining high number of followers is crucial.
Therefore, they all fight to maintain as well as increase their client base. On the same note, in both the new and the old media advertisement plays a crucial role. In this regard, the news from these media platforms is always skewed towards their advertisers (Fenton 78). Arguably, nobody would want to bite the hand that feeds him or her.
As a matter of fact, the new media platform is taking root very first. Many people are nowadays turning to the new media because of the increased mobility. Moreover, new media has gained popularity especially among the youth due to advances in technology. Consequently, the effects of new media on the future of news cannot be assumed.
Firstly, posting of news on the internet is almost instant. Something happens in a given area and a person posts it on the internet (Gillmor 48). This has changed the way professional journalists are working. Unlike the old days when journalists aimed to be the first ones to post breaking news, nowadays they aim at being the first to validate any breaking news.
Similarly, readership of news among the youth, who form majority of media readers, has increased. However, the increase is in internet news while newspaper readers and radio listeners have drastically reduced. The problem is that internet news is generally concentrated on specific and repetitive subjects.
As a result, in the future people will be less informed regarding certain issues of importance in society. Moreover, the new media has introduced a platform where by people forward a topic they like talking about and comment on the same (Gillmor 143). This is against the traditional ways where a person just read what journalists decided was good for people. In the future, the topics of news will have to be proposed by people and not by journalists. Otherwise, people will not listen or read the news.
On the same note, all old media will have to incorporate a facet of the new media in their programs. This has been depicted by the increasing trend whereby old television stations, radio station and news paper printing houses are coming up with blogs and twitter accounts for the public to comment (Fenton 49).
This implies that in the future, participatory sessions will have to be included in the news. Nevertheless, this has negative effects because news will then not be edited (Gillmor 178). Consequently, it is becoming hard to implement journalists’ ethical code of conduct because many of the people posting news on social media are not qualified.
Media determines what people read, hear and by extension what they think. If media misinforms the society about a given issue, chances are that people will take the message as being true. Objectivity is therefore crucial in news reporting. On the same note, media is very crucial in enhancing moral values in the society. However, the emergency of new media is changing the way news is posted. As a result, control of media ownership is crucial. However, this should not limit the freedom of media in reporting.
Works Cited
Fenton, Natalie. New Media, Old News: Journalism and Democracy in The Digital Age. Thousand Oaks: Sage, 2009. Print.
Gillmor, Dan. We the Media: Grassroots Journalism by the People, For the People. Sebastopol: O’Reilly Media, 2008. Print.