What consequences follow the character and quality of media coverage of political news when news organizations are privately owned? How does this differ from the type of coverage provided by publicly owned organizations?
What will be an ideal response?
An ideal response will:
1, Discuss the fact that American media ownership structure is highly concentrated in a few corporate conglomerations. Note that there is very little publicly owned media in the United States.
2, Explain how private ownership, because it is driven by profits and is totally dependent on advertising revenues, affects political reporting through the need to cut costs—including reducing the number of foreign bureaus, for example, and to limit the depth of coverage of news issues.
3,Discuss how private ownership, coupled with the First Amendment protection of free speech, provides American journalists greater opportunities to be critical of government.
4, Explain how public media, because it is not driven by profit, can serve the public interest without worrying about the size of their audience. This means that the news tends to be more substantive and informative.
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