Over the years we have seen that a massive concentration of corporations and media synergy has been on the rise as a marketing tool:

Synergy in the media

In media economics, synergy is the promotion and sale of a product
(and all its versions) throughout the various subsidiaries of a media conglomerate, e.g.: films, soundtracks or video games. Walt Disney pioneered synergistic marketing techniques in the 1930s by granting dozens of firms the right to use his Mickey Mouse
character in products and ads, and continued to market Disney media through licensing arrangements. These products can help advertise the film itself and thus help to increase the film's sales. For example, the Spider-Man films had toys of webshooters and figures of the characters made, as well as posters and games.

Even the lefts' more trusted corporate owned news sources are almost always, to a degree, caught up in some conflicts of interests because of Media conglomerates that can be damaging to the public good:

Critics have accused the larger conglomerates of dominating media, especially news, and refusing to publicize or deem "newsworthy" information that would be harmful to their other interests, and of contributing to the merging of entertainment and news (sensationalism) at the expense of tough coverage of serious issues. They are also accused of being a leading force for the standardization of culture (see globalization, Americanization), and they are a frequent target of criticism by partisan political groups which often perceive the news productions biased toward their foes.

In response, the companies and their supporters state that they maintain a strict separation between the business end and the production end of news departments.

Eventually the truth leaks out.

What follows is the text of a short talk I will give as part of a roundtable on Saturday, March 21 at the New Jersey College English Association Annual Conference, Jubilee Hall, Seton Hall University, South Orange, NJ at 2:30. The session is called "New Media and the Literary Artifact."

Rather than an extension of our old texts of granite, solid and unwavering, what we have gained, through new media, is a 'book of sand.' As in the Jorge Luis Borges story, it is now impossible to find the first or last page, or to return to a page one has found before. Or, at least, to be sure it is exactly the page we saw before. Text has lost its solidity, textual scholarship its underpinning. You may think I'm stretching the analogy, but think again—by the time you do, the world will be different. And text will be different, too.

Anatoly Kirichenko
"Not Another Campaign"

Anatoly Kirichenko
Wright or Wrong

OhioNews Bureau

ONB COLUMBUS: Ohio blog site DaytonOS posted a link to a story by Editor & Publisher about how the Buckeye State's top newspapers, looking for an alternative to the high rates the Associated Press (AP) charges for its stories, pictures and graphics, have inked an agreement share content amongst themselves.

originally posted 2008-03-11 06:23:57 --promoted for some intriquing analysis, cho

Anatoly Kirichenko
“Hip-Hop is Dead”

In recent years, rap music has become too well connected with the culture industry, and the politically charged overtones and meaningful messages are non-existent. Rap is not only selling albums, but also a lifestyle and a “culture” to its listeners. Essentially, rap music has been transformed into a form of marketing, encouraging young African Americans as well as whites and all other ethnic groups to purchase items that bring these groups more in line with the “ideals” of rap music. The industry has a goal of creating consumers rather than giving them something good to listen to. According to Michael Quinn, “Never Shoulda Been Let out the Penitentiary",

What is intriguing about rap is that it is the culture industry’s main strategy for bringing economically and culturally marginalized blacks into the consumer society. To this end, it is necessary that contemporary notions of black identity must be engaged by the culture industry itself. Quinn 81

ePluribus Media -- new media for a new century

OhioNews Bureau

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE -- Contact: John Michael Spinelli, (614) 578-1237

January 10, 2008

Columbus, Ohio: ePluribus Media and the OhioNews Bureau, its pioneering outpost for state news bureaus, was dealt a blow Tuesday when the Ohio Legislative Correspondents Association (OLCA) rejected its request that three seasoned journalists be considered for active membership in the Ohio Statehouse press corps.