When Lisa Chen launched her local news website in Oakridge, Oregon, she didn’t set out to challenge media giants. She simply wanted to fill a void.
“Our newspaper had closed three years earlier,” she explains. “No one was covering city council meetings or high school sports. It felt like our community had become invisible.”
Lisa’s site attracted loyal readers but struggled financially. Advertisers preferred spending their dollars with the tech platforms and media conglomerates that dominated digital advertising markets.
Lisa’s story isn’t unique. Across America, local news sources are vanishing while a handful of enormous companies control more of what we read, watch, and hear. This concentration of media ownership threatens not just journalism but the foundations of our democracy.
This chapter makes the case for breaking up media monopolies. It explains how we arrived at this dangerous concentration of media power, why it matters for every American, and what we can do about it. The solution isn’t simple, but the stakes couldn’t be higher: the health of our public discourse, the strength of our communities, and ultimately, the functioning of our democracy itself.
How We Got Here: The Rise of Media Giants
America once enjoyed a diverse media landscape. Most cities had multiple competing newspapers. Radio and television stations operated under local ownership. Regulations limited how many media outlets a single company could control. This system wasn’t perfect, but it ensured that a variety of voices and perspectives reached the public.
Three major shifts changed this landscape: deregulation, technological change, and economic pressures.
Deregulation
Deregulation began in earnest during the 1980s. The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) relaxed rules limiting media ownership concentration. The 1996 Telecommunications Act accelerated this trend, removing caps on how many radio stations a single company could own nationwide. Clear Channel (now iHeartMedia) grew from 40 stations to more than 1,200 in just a few years.
Michael Powell, who chaired the FCC in the early 2000s, justified further deregulation by claiming that “the market will protect the public interest.” The market, however, had different priorities. As ownership limits disappeared, waves of consolidation followed. Local stations were purchased by distant corporations. Newsrooms were merged. Journalists were laid off.
Technological Change
Technological change—particularly the rise of the internet—further transformed media economics. Digital platforms like Google and Facebook became powerful gatekeepers, controlling how content reaches audiences and capturing the lion’s share of advertising revenue. These companies don’t primarily create content themselves, but they profit enormously from distributing it.
David Chavern, who represents news publishers, describes the situation bluntly: “The platforms get the money while the publishers bear the costs.” By 2021, Google and Facebook captured approximately 60% of all digital advertising spending in the United States. This duopoly extracts value from news content while returning little to its creators.
Economic Pressures
Economic pressures intensified as these changes unfolded. With advertising revenue flowing to tech platforms, traditional media companies consolidated to cut costs and maintain profitability. Television networks purchased film studios. Newspaper chains merged. Private equity firms acquired struggling outlets and extracted value through deep cuts to journalism.