Reply #23: News as a public service, not a "profit center" [View All]

[many a good man]

You make some very salient points. Radio and broadcast TV use the public airwaves, which belong to the American people, so government was able to mandate that they be used to serve the public in a limited way in exchange for licensing the spectrum. Cable TV is totally private so there is no such public stake and even broadcast TV has given up its public service ethos in search of ratings. The abolition of the fairness doctrine and corporate concentration has killed any hope for viable news programming.

We can't boycott the mainstream media and be satisfied with the internet. There is a huge vital public service that is unmet. It is essential to a functioning democracy. Without it we have no hope of turning around America's rapid descent.