IBC
article here
As media, technology and politics become increasingly intertwined, the stakes extend far beyond the balance sheet.
“NAB Show New York reflects a media industry where
technology and business strategy can no longer be separated,” said Karen
Chupka, EVP, Global Connections at NAB as the broadcast technology community
gathered in Manhattan for its annual East Coast event.
It’s an accurate summation but missing one defining
characteristic. With the US midterm elections looming, the business of American
media is being reshaped as much by politics as by economics and technology.
Paramount Skydance’s greenlight to consume Warner Bros.
Discovery is the most politically charged. Former BBC DG Mark Thompson remains
in charge at CNN and apparently assured of editorial independence but the
future of the five decades old 24/7 news channel and 85-year old CBS News, also
owned by Paramount Skydance, remains up in the air according to reports.
Supporters of large-scale mergers contend that media
companies require greater size to compete against technology platforms such as
YouTube, Netflix and Amazon. They contend that scale allows organisations to
invest in journalism, premium content and technological innovation. Opponents
argue that concentrated ownership increases the influence of a small number of
wealthy individuals and corporations over public discourse, potentially
narrowing the range of viewpoints available to everyone.
Not coincidentally a NAB NY conference session ‘The Great
Media Reshuffling: Consolidation, Spin-Offs and the Battle for Scale’ didn’t
turn to broadcast executives for the answer but to suits from Wall Street and
private capital.
The central question is whether greater scale can solve
structural business challenges or merely combine struggling assets into larger
organisations.
This whole process began 30 years ago when the Telecommunications
Act loosened restrictions on media ownership and accelerated consolidation.
Deregulation was intended to increase competition, but it also created
conditions that allowed companies to expand rapidly through acquisition. The
resulting concentration has shaped much of America’s media economy and
continues to influence policy debates today.
Market share data illustrates how concentrated audience
attention has become. According to Nielsen
TV ratings, YouTube accounted for 12.9% of television viewing in October
2025, ahead of Disney at 11.4%, Netflix at 9.2%, NBCUniversal at 8.6%, Fox at
8.4% and Paramount at 8.2%. These numbers reveal a media ecosystem increasingly
dominated by a small number of powerful distributors, many of which operate
across television, streaming, advertising and data services simultaneously.
The effects of consolidation are often felt most acutely at
the local level. Local television stations remain a primary source of
information for millions of Americans, but ownership has become concentrated
among a handful of groups including Nexstar, Sinclair and Hearst and Scripps.
Executives from each appeared as part of a day long series of sessions on Local
TV Strategies at NAB New York.
Recent regulatory
changes by the FCC have made further expansion easier by removing
long-standing restrictions on national audience reach, replacing hard caps with
case-by-case reviews. Supporters argue that larger station groups can achieve
operational efficiencies and keep local broadcasters financially viable.
Critics counter that consolidation can reduce editorial independence and
replace uniquely local reporting with centrally produced content.
News deserts
Since 2005, the US has lost
more than 3,500 newspapers and over 270,000 newspaper jobs. Hundreds of
counties now have no local news outlet at all, while approx. 50 million
Americans live in ‘news
deserts’ with little or no meaningful access to local reporting.
Pew Research led one of numerous studies
to link strong local reporting to higher levels of civic participation, greater
accountability among elected officials and more informed voters. When local
newsrooms disappear, fewer journalists are available to attend council
meetings, scrutinise budgets, investigate corruption or explain public policy
decisions. A reduction in media diversity can therefore affect democratic
participation as much as it affects the business of publishing itself.
Digital media complicates the picture further. According to research
by US media watch group FAIR and UK based Press Gazette, more than half of
visits to major news websites are directed toward organisations controlled by
just seven corporations.
Decisions about ownership affect not only shareholder
returns but also the flow of information. Regulatory rulings shape competitive
dynamics while influencing the diversity of voices available to the public.
Streaming platforms determine what content reaches audiences, while algorithms
increasingly influence what viewers discover and consume.
Alarms are ringing
about the scale of deepfake misinformation flooding the mid-terms
discourse. AI is producing reality-bending midterm ads about defaced Bibles, upscale
dinners and a board game with a ‘Death to America’ playing card, according to
news site Axios.
It blames the failure of regulators to update election laws
to curb AI-generated video which “can put words in opponents' mouths and create
realistic-looking scenes that didn't happen.”
The FCC, however, is more intent on warning broadcasters
about reporting on what its chair termed as “fake” polling data ahead of the
midterms.
Brendan Carr spoke out on Wednesday this week about a series
of polls such as by New
York Times/Siena College and Washington Post–ABC News–Ipsos which showed widespread
disapproval of President Trump.
Carr wrote on X, “Many journalists and broadcasters have
been amplifying or airing these Polls without regard to basic journalistic
ethics and without informing the public that those Polls lack a scientific,
accurate, or even real basis.”
Although it claims to be the East Coast’s leading event for
media, entertainment and technology, NAB Show NY is small. In 2025 it mustered
11,500 attendees including 248 members of the press. By contrast, London’s two
day Media Production and Technology show attracted 13000 folk last spring and
unlike NAB NY this event isn’t shrinking.
Broadcast to Everything
The Next Generation digital TV standard ATSC 3.0 is a
salvation of sorts for local US broadcasters. It gives broadcasters new tools
to deliver interactive, personalised and on-demand news, information and
programming while building on the strengths of local television the ATSC list
as “trusted journalism, live coverage and deep community connection.”
A session at NAB NY was led by the NextGen TV News
Technology Lab which is helping local broadcasters experiment with NextGen TV
workflows, audience experiences and public service applications.
In this regard, a new standard aimed to extend the reach of
local broadcasts, has just emerged. The new ‘Candidate
Standard’ being developed by the ATSC establishes a foundation for a
‘Broadcast-to-Everything’ (B2X) platform.
“B2X can bring together broadcast efficiency in the mobile
ecosystem, create new business opportunities, and ultimately extend advanced
services to a broader range of devices, including very low-power devices such
as wearables or remote sensors,” said Joe Fabiano, CTO of EdgeBeam Wireless and
Chair of the ATSC technology group on B2X, in a press release.
Rather than changing existing ATSC 3.0 standards, the
specification is envisioned as the first building block in a broader suite of
standards that ATSC expects will ultimately define a complete B2X platform.
No comments:
Post a Comment