Commentary
Breaking Fake News: Media Under Trump?
- by Wayne Friedman , Staff Writer, 9 hours ago
First is the promise of deregulation -- something that can ignite a much-needed fire for media mergers, according to ambitious senior executives.
At the same time, those same executives are concerned about fallout from a number of lawsuits pending by former candidate Donald Trump -- lawsuits against Walt Disney’s ABC and Paramount Global’s CBS.
This all revolves around what Trump perceives is “fake” news content.
Are there hints that he wants to do more? If so, how then to navigate through all this?
Analysts surmise Trump will certainly want to play with the belief that attacking the media will be a popular thing among his supporters.
He has already talked up the vague concept of the “enemy within” -- which seemingly extends with no bounds, into not just his targeted goal of deporting immigrants but also dealing with some businesses, and yes, the media and journalism.
Major local TV station groups -- Nexstar Media Group, Sinclair Inc., Tegna and Gray Television Group -- have been ebullient about the possibility of major deregulation coming, which could remove the longtime 39% cap on TV station ownership -- something that many feel needs updating. The FCC rule was instituted in 2004, twenty years ago.
Throwing out this restriction, in theory, could allow big TV station groups to amass perhaps a hundred or more of stations across the U.S., where they could have 90% to 100% of U.S. coverage of TV markets when it comes to ownership.
TV station groups say current regulations restrict their ability to compete with fiercely competing streaming platforms -- especially locally.
Those stations are also concerned about affiliation deals with legacy TV network groups that could loosen the long-time bonds with affiliates and networks.
In addition, some TV networks are considering the idea of scaling back programming, and/or the programming time periods under those network-station deals. Many might like to be where Fox Corp. is -- in the 8 p.m. to 10 p.m. prime-time period.
Typical network-TV station affiliate deals are also about having local TV stations help their networks with on-air marketing around national TV programming. Does that go away?
While seeming to free up TV stations to do more of their own programming, that comes with the pressure of finding high-impact content for their airwaves.
Taking scores or even hundreds of stations would, in effect, build their own national TV network -- helping them to do just that, and perhaps even multiple outlets in one market. In 2017, there were 1,761 commercial TV stations.
But could the rub come with TV news content? Local TV station groups have been heavily dependent on their ever-expanding TV news content. Where will they go next?
Although it's crazy to imagine, let's just throw it out there: Will any of this be an issue with the Trump Administration amid the promise of freeing their businesses?
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