In case you’re ever tempted to think your local news is independent and looking out for you, watch this.
How can they all be on the same page, with the same concerned look on their face, spouting out the same melodramatic lines? They’re owned by the same few publicly traded companies.
Nextsar Media Group has 199 full power stations (including partner stations) in 116 markets addressing more than 68% of U.S. television households and a growing digital media operation
Sinclair Broadcast group owns 294 television stations.
Gray Television owns about 94 stations
The fact that they are publicly traded means their allegiance is to stakeholders and the bottom line. The way to make money is through advertising. As I show in my article “How big brands are dangerously shaping the news” advertisers do get involved in censorship.
Here’s an experiment for you. Watch CNN for about an hour and make a list of the advertisers you see there. Then, watch Fox for about an hour and make a list of the advertisers. Feel free to mute whichever station offends your political sensibility and just watch the commercials. See a difference? CNN has the bigger brands, right?
Our news is a joke, folks. It’s a bad joke with a terrible punch line hitting us directly in the stomach. Stop watching the fools and demand more of your big brands. We must demand that local news be made by local journalists.
RL Martin 