By Gavin Mackintosh-
Ofcom are right to investigate Murdoch over his £13bn bid to own the other 61 percent of Sky The idea of one man monopolising a large section of the media sounds preposterous.
It creates an opportunity for the one man to dictate his agenda in terms of perspectives and news topics that are given priority.
There is nothing wrong with a man aspiring to create empire that furthers their philosophies and ideologies. Murdoch has been an achieved of epic proportions in doing this.
However, the idea of limiting the plurality of the media is synonymous with assuming excessive power. It can be seen as one that seems to dictate the influence of opinion instead of allowing open reasoning to flourish.
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The hacking scandal in 2015 that implicated some segments of Murdoch’s empire highlighted the importance of regulating ethics in the media industry. The public and media uproar against the hacking was so bad that it brought he entire media info disrepute throughout the period of the investigation and the revelation of the hacking.
The News of the World, which up until then was so popular, influential, and broad in its investigative coverage of various scandals and of salacious stories, had to be shut down. That was a shame because the News of the World was hot in its day.
It is doubtful that it’s replacement – the Sun on Sunday, fully compensated for the influence and popularity the News of the World had, though the Sun and it’s sister paper generally do well for numbers in terms of its readership.
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If Murdoch is allowed to control the media and sideline its competitors, it will undermine the right for other news outlets to have their voice.
Fake news has been a highlighted issue since the 2016 U.S elections in which falsehoods are said to have been spread through fake world sites all over the world who were more interested in money and hits than in integrity.
Mechanisms to regulate fake news are being established, and online social media platforms like Facebook, YouTube have now been obligated with the task of observing and getting rid of fake news, hate speech, and Paedophilia material.
So, there is no valid reason for other news media outlets to be limited or sought to be limited by people or organisations. Newspapers are now a relatively dying business with the emergence of online platforms in the modern age .
POWERFULLY
Newspapers are not to be undermined because they remain powerful, but most newspapers have long acknowledged the power of he internet, and frequently post news online even before in comes out in print. In this respect, online media remains a dominant force of spreading information.
IMPACT
Television will always in terms of reach have more immediate impact in a given country, potentially, but with a growing global web, it is easy to see why monopolising most of the other mainstream news outlets is an attractive ambition for a media mogul with the financial pockets of Rupert Murdoch. It should be discouraged.
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