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Tuesday, 18 August 2015

NBC Invests $200m in BuzzFeed

The decision by NBC to invest big time in Buzzfeed had been rumored for some time but the staggering size of the commitment just underscores what I referred to in my last article.
The media moguls are not making significant inroads into the new mediums whereby the youth (especially the youth) of today are getting their sources of key information.
I said that it was my belief that the days of the media moguls are nearly at an end.
I should have qualified this by saying the 'old' media moguls.
Buzzfeed certainly will give NBC a footprint it was hitherto unable to obtain – being seen as 'old school' but even with such a 'new' portfolio, independent trail blazers will continue to evolve to offer a variety of online access services, entirely free, which are already leaving behind entities such as Buzzfeed.
I will just give one example of this:
One of the main problems has always been the useage of copyright material.
Independent media services are starting to offer free access to archives of materials to freely download for unrestricted useage. This, I believe will become even more common in the future. I would go even further and say that these same outlets will also offer editing and broadcasting software to facilitate the capabilities of any  6th Grader to both download, edit, remodel and podcast materials for educational and other non-profit purposes, without any red tape.
This is already creating a revolution in schools which have in-house technology to take advantage of such new facilities provided by (as yet) a limited number of major world media organizations.
There are many more new developments which the 'old school' media moguls simply cannot stop – like King Canute attempting to turn back the tide – so, in desperation, they will attempt to buy up those identified as 'trail blazers' in the belief that they can at least manage the direction (and impose costs) of such access – rather than allow it to be simply 'given' away.
There is no doubt that such investments will have an impact on the availability of 'free' news (as the ultimate aim of the moguls is to charge for all content on as many mediums that they control.)
Already we can see how they are blocking out public service entities – such as PBS from mainstream (lower income and poor) access.
Even the British BBC (the mother of all propaganda networks) is being threatened with extinction. Recently a former Conservative Minister said that the National Licence fee to support this public service network should be abolished or, at the very least, refusal to pay it be decriminalized. 
It is through this licence fee that the BBC retains it's position as the country's only Public Service Network, independent of commercial (big business) control.
The BBC has been instrumental in the development of 'independent' or State broadcasting services worldwide and has contributed enormously to the fabric of social, political and economic development in many parts of the world, something it could never have achieved as a commercial controlled body.
Organizations like CNN, even today, are not as highly rated, worldwide, for intelligence, accuracy and fair coverage as is the BBC.
When you hear a Conservative (Republican Party) Minister encouraging decriminalization of refusal to support the only British media public asset with a global footprint, you really do need to think carefully about what is the ultimate objective.
[Lord Coe is  reported to have declined an offer made  by British Premier David Cameron to Chair the BBC Trust.  As the Mafia always say, when you want to 'hit' someone you really love (and it's just 'business') don't let it appear that it was you who sent them to 'sleep with the fishes.' No doubt Coe was appreciative of what the true nature of such an appointment would entail so he respectfully declined the offer - at this particular juncture in time.]
All governments want their own local and national media services to be compliant and servile so that they serve the policy interests of commerce.
It's only foreign media services which are to be criticized as 'unfree' (!)
The problem for the BBC is that it failed to evolve with the times and it's present woes, I contend, are a direct result of this inability and of it's past effectiveness - or success - as a vehicle for social and political change.
No government want's an independent media service (see my last article about independent thinkers) as such is too threatening to short-term  objectives pursued by big business and commercial media outlets -such as CNN, Fox, MSNBC.
For example, CNN are running an Anti-Slavery Campaign – a rather unusual move for a network which never reports on slavery and slave wages in countries such as Brazil, China, and anywhere else global companies have outsourced jobs from the U.S. to maximize their profit to a minority of shareholders – at the expense of impoverishing U.S. citizens back home.
Likewise CNN will be amongst the last of the networks to back non-slave wages in the U.S. (a fair minimum wage of at least $15 an hour) because their commercial backers will simply not permit it to happen – until, like the already mentioned Canute, they can no, longer 'stand in the doorway' and block the inevitable 'winds of change' (Bob Dylan, The Times They Are A Changin'.)

So, back to Buzzfeed, yes NBC's investment of $200 million dollars is significant – but only because it emphasises the desperation of the 'old school' to retain control and direction of a rudderless, sometimes also anarchic and unpredictable global media craft.

As more and more digital media entities from developing countries enter the global information stream, can the 'old school' 'freeze' them all out and impose a new order?; only time will tell - but I think you already know the answer.






Bob Dylan, The Times They Are A-Changin' 1964:


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