Media ownership, journalism and securing diversity

今天，媒体企业面临的压力可能比它们历史上的任何时候都要严重。整个西方世界的全国性报纸正在裁员，地区性报纸正在关闭，广播公司正在控制支出，并关闭了外国分社。两个因素共同挑战了媒体公司的传统商业模式。首先，广告收入逐渐向网络转移，加剧了全球经济衰退的周期性问题。其次，新技术正在分散受众，改变消费者行为。随着报纸读者人数和电视新闻的减少，平面媒体和广播媒体都发现，让新闻业盈利越来越困难。试图将网络货币化的努力没有显示出弥补收入损失的前景。对于这些公司中的许多公司来说，最容易的生存途径是与其他媒体企业进行某种形式的合并。这种整合有一个行业逻辑，它允许“后台”职能合理化，更大程度的集中化，以及--理论上--释放资源，投资于新闻生产的核心活动。但是，这对媒体多元化有什么影响呢？表达和编辑方法的多样性是民主生活的基础：控制这些编辑议程的媒体越少，一个充满活力的民主就越不健康。互联网上喧嚣的声音对此有一些补偿，但这些声音来源分散，往往不可靠，受众很少，几乎不进行新闻采集。对于成熟民主国家的绝大多数人来说，传统的新闻和广播机构仍然是迄今为止关于他们周围世界的信息和辩论的最重要渠道。这提出了两个关键问题。首先，媒体企业的所有权实际上在哪些方面影响了编辑产出？对整合危险的理论担忧，需要一些经验证据，证明它们如何对编辑方向、新闻资源的分配、对外国报道和海外分社的投资、专业记者的部署、特定报道的遗漏和委托，以及新闻机构组织其新闻优先事项的各种方式施加影响。在西欧受公正性要求管辖的广播领域，就这些要求是否以及如何影响编辑多样性提出了略微不同的问题。比较英国和美国25年前废除了同等的“公平原则”的经验会很有启发意义。其次，什么样的政策举措可能会调和媒体多元化和行业整合这两个明显相互冲突的目标？对于苦苦挣扎的媒体公司来说，整合是一种直截了当但通常有效的拯救形式。对于政府来说，在面临失业和破产威胁的情况下，防止整合的政策制度可能同样直截了当，而且在政治上也很困难。迫切需要探索创造性的解决方案，如信托、对规模较小的媒体企业的激励、对新闻业投资的担保，或其他减轻媒体权力集中影响的结构性手段(包括公共资金)。在2007/8年度期间，我是上议院一个特别委员会的特别顾问，该委员会负责审查和报道新闻和媒体所有权。这项调查包括对美国的访问，收集了大量口头和书面证据，内容涉及所有者的编辑影响力以及管理媒体所有权的政策制度。这项研究将利用这些素材，并辅之以对英国政策制定者和监管机构的原始采访，试图解决这样一个问题：面对前所未有的经济和技术剧变，媒体多样性是否以及如何能够保持下去？

Media enterprises are under more severe pressure today than perhaps at any time in their history. National newspapers throughout the western world are shedding jobs, regional newspapers are closing, broadcasters are reining in expenditure and closing foreign bureaux. Two factors have conspired to challenge the traditional business model of media corporations. First, the cyclical problem of a global economic recession is being compounded by the progressive migration of advertising revenue to the web. Second, new technologies are fragmenting audiences and transforming consumer behaviour. With newspaper readership and TV news in decline, both the print and broadcast media are finding it increasingly difficult to make journalism profitable. Attempts to monetise the web show no prospect of compensating for lost revenue. For many of these companies, the easiest route to survival is some form of amalgamation with other media enterprises. There is an industrial logic to such consolidation which allows for rationalisation of 'back office' functions, greater centralisation and - theoretically - release of resources to invest in the core activity of news production. But what of the impact on media pluralism? Diversity of expression and editorial approach underpins democratic life: the fewer media outlets which control those editorial agendas, the less healthy it is for a vibrant democracy. There is some compensation from the cacophany of voices on the internet, but these are fragmented and often unreliable sources with tiny audiences which conduct virtually no newsgathering. For the vast majority of people in mature democracies, the traditional press and broadcasting instutions are still by far the most important conduits for information and debates about the world around them.This raises two crucial issues. First, in what ways does the ownership of a media enterprise actually impact on editorial output? Theoretical concerns about the dangers of consolidation require some empirical evidence of how influence is exerted on editorial direction, distribution of journalistic resources, investment in foreign reporting and overseas bureaux, deployment of specialist correspondents, the omission and commission of particular stories, and the myriad ways in which news organisations organise their journalistic priorities. In broadcasting, which in Western Europe is governed by impartiality requirements, slightly different questions are raised about whether and how these requirements impact on editorial diversity. A comparison of experience in the UK and the US where the equivalent 'Fairness Doctrine' was abolished 25 years ago would be instructive.Second, what policy initiatives might reconcile the apparently conflicting aims of media pluralism and industry consolidation? For struggling media corporations, consolidation is a blunt but usually effective form of salvation. For governments, a policy regime which prevents consolidation can be equally blunt as well as politically difficult in the face of threatened job losses and bankruptcies. Creative solutions such as Trusts, incentives for smaller media businesses, guarantees of investment in journalism, or other structural means (including public funding) of mitigating the effects of concentrated media power urgently need to be explored.During the course of 2007/8, I was special adviser to a House of Lords select committee which examined and reported on News and Media Ownership. The enquiry, which included a visit to the US, compiled a huge volume of oral and written evidence on the editorial influence of owners and on the policy regime governing media ownership. Using that material - which has never been properly exploited - and supplementing it with original interviews with UK policy makers and regulators, this study will seek to address the question of whether and how media diversity can be sustained in the face of unparalled economic and technological upheaval.