I don't really get this "have the old media survive" stuff.
Media always need resources to get produced, no matter which format. So they are never independent. Whoever provides these resources has the power. But that's not a big deal because it applies to almost everything. And if you say profit is the master ,then you need to do attention whoring and advertisement. If politics is your master then you do propaganda. If a super rich is your master, then you will keep silent about their allys and denounce their enemies. All that is normal. It's not perfect but it can't be improved either. You can only exchange one master for another.
And you also don't have to worry that there won't be a master. Of course there will always be people who want to reach out to N other people for a number of reasons. Some people just like the attention, some use it for power plays, some use it to convince people to do something.
And no matter what's in it, there will also always be consumers. Because they too like a good show and some attention.
So honestly we should simply not mind. If you work in the industry see where things are going and develop skills in that direction. If you own a medium, try to innovate and/or buy developing new media. If you are a consumer simply consume what you like the most.
> Media always need resources to get produced, no matter which format. So they are never independent. Whoever provides these resources has the power. (…) It's not perfect but it can't be improved either. You can only exchange one master for another.
There’s a big difference between being dependent on (a) a wealthy owner, (b) big advertisers, and (c) readers.
This is a strikingly nihilistic view. "Just consume what you want, some of it will be propaganda, so it doesn't matter whether any of it is accurate or not and it's not worth trying to strive for anything better. Just lie down in front of the tanks and enjoy the show."
Is it nihilistic to say "you can't have objective media"? I don't think so. "Objective" is an illusion. It doesn't exist. A computer log maybe is objective. But the moment an admin looks at it and decides for which messages he restarts a service and for which messages he writes emails, it becomes subjective reporting. The intentions at this point are an important part of the messaging that he produces.
Same for news. There's always an intention. The reporter has an intention, the newspaper/tv-channel/youtuber/instagrammer has an intention, the reader has an intention.
The main idea I want to bring across is that one needs to have another method of consuming. It's always important to read the text and guess the intentions involved.
And actually it's optimistic, because even if newspapers how they exist today die, there will still be news, reporters will still have work, etc. No need of saving anything but the leadership position of the current dominating powers behind the media.
When discussing the media, it’s singularly important to speak of “citizen”, not “consumers”. The importance of media is far larger than entertainment. You could never read a single newspaper or magazine, neither in print nor online, nor watch TV or listen to podcasts, and still you would profit immensely just from others having access to quality news.
Media always need resources to get produced, no matter which format. So they are never independent. Whoever provides these resources has the power. But that's not a big deal because it applies to almost everything. And if you say profit is the master ,then you need to do attention whoring and advertisement. If politics is your master then you do propaganda. If a super rich is your master, then you will keep silent about their allys and denounce their enemies. All that is normal. It's not perfect but it can't be improved either. You can only exchange one master for another.
And you also don't have to worry that there won't be a master. Of course there will always be people who want to reach out to N other people for a number of reasons. Some people just like the attention, some use it for power plays, some use it to convince people to do something.
And no matter what's in it, there will also always be consumers. Because they too like a good show and some attention.
So honestly we should simply not mind. If you work in the industry see where things are going and develop skills in that direction. If you own a medium, try to innovate and/or buy developing new media. If you are a consumer simply consume what you like the most.