Are Big Media Owners Surpressing Coverage of SOPA?

At a  recent family gathering my much younger cousin (once removed) was trying to convince me that corporate ownership of the mass media biased news coverage in favor of big business interests. I thought I was fairly eloquent in rebutting that myth.

The gist of my argument can be distilled to an observation made by A.J. Liebling, perhaps the most cited press critic of the 1940s and 1950s. He famously wrote in a  "Wayward Press" column that "Freedom of the Press is guaranteed only to those who own one.” But Liebling also wrote, in another column quoted far less often:

The profit system, while it insures the predominant conservative coloration of our press, also
guarantees that there will always be a certain amount of dissidence. The American press has never been monolithic, like that of an authoritarian state. One reason is that there is always money to be made in journalism by standing up for the underdog…. His wife buys girdles and baking powder and Literary Guild selections, and the advertiser has to reach her.”

 That is, any media owner must keep in mind the audience: advertisers who want to reach potential customers through the media outlet they choose to advertise in. While the owners of the media may have the platform to say what they want, their self-interest pulls in the direction of greater populism.

On the one hand...

Apparently I didn't convince my young cousin. In a recent email he wrote me about the proposed Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA):

Just saw this and thought it was an interesting data point given how you've argued that corporate ownership of media was a non-issue in their news coverage in the past, or am I mis-remembering/mis-quoting you?

I'm outraged about SOPA, but they should at least be covering a controversy that has practically every major Internet company considering a "nuclear option" of blacking out their public facing web pages for a day to raise consumer awareness of the issue.... how is THAT now news?

If you, like most of your countrypersons, have not been following the proposed legislation, SOPA, introduced in Congress with bi-partisan sponsors, would expand the ability of U.S. law enforcement and copyright holders to fight online trafficking in copyrighted intellectual property and counterfeit goods. My aim here is not to discuss the provisions of the bill itself, though that would make an appropriate post for The Two-Sided Pancake. Needless to say there are contentious provisions. To draw on the non-judgemental description of the bill from the Wikipedia entry, as it stands today:

Proponents of the bill say it protects the intellectual property market and corresponding industry, jobs and revenue, and is necessary to bolster enforcement of copyright laws especially against foreign websites. They cite examples such as Google's $500 million settlement with the Department of Justice for its role in a scheme to target U.S. consumers with ads to buy illegal prescription drugs from Canadian pharmacies. Opponents say that it infringes on First Amendment rights, is Internet censorship, will cripple the Internet, and will threaten whistle-blowing and other free speech.

 But my cousin's concern is that big media, presumably on the pro-SOPA side, is not providing coverage because they want it to slide under the radar. His implication is that the media owners are keeping this quiet.

I could point out that with a handful of exceptions, the "owners" of most media companies are millions of stockholders, pension funds, mutual funds and the like. Ownership is extremely fragmented. Those who, in aggregate, "own" the companies are interested in a return on their investment. Implementation of SOPA might add a cent or two to earnings, but in any event mutual fund managers do not weigh in with the newsroom editors who decide what to cover.

Flipping the Pancake

The lack of big media coverage of this issue is far from a conspiracy or cover-up of any kind. Lack of coverage of SOPA is indeed a non-issue. And here's why: The major video media rarely cover issues.  It has nothing to do with ownership. TV news specializes in events, in action. Look at how these guys cover the elections: it's about the  "horse race." Even the debates, with two minute answers and one minute responses, are about keeping up the pace. SOPA isn't covered because it is not made for TV. The  issue has many facets and subtleties. The arguments are long and detailed. And most people don't care.  And most people shouldn't. They need to worry about their jobs, paying college tuition, fixing the leak in the roof, repairing the muffler. Intellectual property is not high on the "what do I need to worry about" list. They don't see how it will impact their lives. And it won't, even if it passes (and that's not likely) in its present form.

Now, if there is some contentious hearing, where Bono appears before a Congressional committee, then it might get 30 seconds-- with the focus on Bono and a short description of what the hearing is about.

Moreover, even a Mom-and-Pop media firm would be lining up with the big guys on one side.

MSNBC, CBS News and the like do not have you or me as their target market. A relative few of us live in a rarefied world of issues. And covering SOPA is not going to change that. Anyone who is concerned have many avenues to pursue the argument they like, such as at ReadWriteWeb. The mass audience has the Today Show and the ABC Evening News. Maybe the Daily Show will give SOPA the visibility my cousin wants. That's where more of my students seem to be learning about the news anyway, not on CNN or MSNBC.
 

Use less-- and pay more. What's wrong with this picture?

Conservation is one of the mantras of  the 21^st century. And we are always hearing that by using less we will spend less:  Spend extra for a hybrid Prius and you’ll save on your gasoline bill. Replace incandescent light bulbs with much more expensive CFL bulbs and you’ll save enough on your electricity bill and bulb replacement to justify the difference.

But what if we use less and that causes us to pay more? This is quite possible when there are high fixed costs in providing a service. For example, in my town of Cambridge, Massachusetts, I was notified that water and sewer rates are increasing this year because, said the City Manager, “using less water contributes to an increased rate.”

The Associated Press reported today that apparently this is a national trend.  It confirmed that “Many water utilities are raising rates because water use is down.” The infrastructure of water and sewer systems are fixed costs and don’t vary with the amount of water flowing through it, so the operating costs as well as debt service incurred in building it are insensitive to our conservation efforts. The total cost must be recouped by charging more per unit of water.

So next time I feel the impulse to buy a low flow shower head or pay a premium for a low water use toilet, I’m going to keep in mind that by using less I may end up paying more per shower and per flush.

I’ve never seen a pancake so thin it didn’t have two sides

This blog is about perspective. It is not about right or wrong, about the best or worst. It is about appreciating that there are few absolutes. Free speech is to be honored, but we cannot shout “Fire” in crowded theater in the absence of a fire. War is undesirable but when an enemy bombs our Naval bases in Hawaii, it may be needed. Capitalism seems to work better than other economic systems, but as we have seen repeatedly, it needs to have limits set.

I first heard the aphorism, “I’ve never seen a pancake so thin it didn’t have two sides,” over a decade ago from Lee Fritchler, at the time the President of Dickinson College. It stuck with me, perhaps because it fit my world view.

It summed up my approach to political philosophy, to the business world, and to many of life’s every day issues. It is an extension of the line of thought inculcated in me by S.I. Hayakawa’s classic work, “Language in Thought and Action.” I read that first semester freshman year at the aforementioned Dickinson College as part of the much maligned Social Science 10 course.

Seeing the world from both sides now (another formulation, credit to Judy Collins) is highly recommended for diplomacy, mediating arguments of all sorts and otherwise leading a stress reduced existence. It does not work well for advocates, militants or protest song writers.. You are probably not familiar with the 1960s satirical songs of Tom Lerher. In 1980 a show based on his old songs was produced. In a concurrent interview in The Wall Street Journal, Lerher, who had long since stopped writing or performing, was asked why. His reply, which I may have clipped but have no idea where it might be, responded something to the effect that as a younger man he saw the world and its issues in black and white. As he got older he recognized it was more like shades of gray. “It’s hard to write a protest song with lyrics ‘on the one hand, but on the other hand.’” Lerher had been hobbled by the two sided pancake.

My world view infuriates my teenage daughter. She called to my attention at dinner one evening that I never took “her side” in any dispute. What she was referring to was my two sided perspective, which I wanted to imbue her with, but she saw as being just contrarian. For example, she may have complained back in high school that it was so unfair that Mrs. X didn't allow the students to chew gum in class. I suggested that while she (my daughter) may have chewed quietly, it may be that others annoyingly popped their gum or too often left it parked underneath the desk. Rather than have to single out individual culprits Mrs. X thought it fairer just to make a blanket rule. My point was not that the rule was fair, only that it may not have been arbitrary. At least, I tried to say, see the other point of view.

I’m not going to be writing here about gum in the classroom. But from time to time (these issues don’t arise every day), I will offer in this space “the other side.” In many cases it will be to suggest that in going with one side of the pancake there are untended consequences that had not been considered. If this approach interests you, click in from time to time to get a feel for what I mean.