Structure And Ownership Of The Media Sector

For my first assignment, I have learnt about the structure and ownership of the media sector by assesing two different media companies, a major company and not so big company of my choice. Each company has been researched in depth to show the understanding of each company.


Time Warner

Time Warner is one of the world’s largest media conglomerates which have formed from two separate companies; Warner communications, Inc. and time Inc which operates in different major sectors of the media with it being films, television and even publishing. Time Warner therefore is a cross-media company. Paramount Communications attempted to end a stock-swap deal between Time and Warner communications with a bid around $12.2 billion in hope it would end the deal. Then a small feud as such broke out between Paramount and Time Inc who then raised its bid for Warner to a $14.9 billion in cash and stock resulting in a major different response of filing a lawsuit in a Delaware Court from Paramount in hope to block the Time/Warner merger. However, the court ruled against Paramount and twice in favour of Time which forced Paramount to then drop both the Time acquisition and the lawsuit, allowing the two companies to merge together and was then later completed on January 10, 1990. This then resulted in employees and shareholders of Warner Communications, especially Warner CEO Steve Ross which was then paid cash for their shares as the deal was lopsided.

Time Warner has many subsidiary companies such as holdings in Warner Bros, Home Box office, Time Inc and Turner Broadcasting System who owns CNN.

In 1972, Kinney National Company split off its non entertainment asset because of a financial scandal which involved its parking operations and due to this financial scandal they renamed themselves Warner Communications Inc. Warner Communications Inc. was the parent company for two company’s during the 1970’s and 1980’s which where Warner Bros. Pictures and Warner Music Group. In 1976, Warner Communications Inc. bought Nolan Bushell’s Atari Company for $2-$12 million estimated. Due to buying this company, Warner made considerable profits but also later losses from Atari which was owned from 1976 to 1984. In 1984, the division of Atari was later sold to Jack Tramiel due to a video game crash in 1983.


Warner then expanded under the guidance of CEO Steve Ross as they formed together with American Express and then renamed them Warner-Amex Satellite Entertainment which included cable channels including MTV which was launched in 1981, Nickelodeon which was launched in 1979 and the Movie Channel. Soon enough Warner then bought out Americans Express’s half of the company in 1984 and then went on to selling that share to Viacom which then renamed it MTV Networks.

The Franklin Mint was then purchased by Warner for about $225 million. However, the combination of Warner and The Franklin Mint didn’t last very long as the American Protection Inc. bought The Franklin Mint from Warner for $167.5 million in 1985, but Warner retained Franklin Mint’s Eastern Mountain. Before The Franklin Mint was sold, Warner expanded their interests into baseball which was under the direction of Caesar P.Kimmel, executive vice president whom bought 48 percent of the Pittsburgh Pirates for around $10 million. Again this was short lived as the company put their share up for sale in November 1984 following a loss of around $6 million.

CNN is one subsidiary of Time Warner which has a huge impact on the community who watch the US cable news channel. People claim that CNN has liberal bias. Upon CNN’s launch, it was the first ever channel to provide viewers with 24-hour television news coverage and was the first all-news television in the United States. CNN is an international TV programme which operates in America but other countries can view the channel.

CNN is liberal bias in comparison to Fox News whom is a right-wing. Both channels focus on similar stories but share it in a different way to another. For example, CNN spoke about how Obama was doing everything good such as how he was doing things quick and had a big agenda already compared with the past presidents. He was described as “breathe taking” and “stunning” were as Fox News said the complete opposite and put him in a different prospective than CNN. The complained about how he was doing things such as saying he was taking on too many tasks at once, and how they thought it was ludicrous for him to think he can do everything at once. According to Fox News, Obama was very misleading to his fellow Americans and start to focus on the big agenda’s on his list.

In conclusion to what i have studied on Time Warner, I don't think that them owning a lot of media companies is such a good idea. Time Warner having access to a lot of media companies narrows down the choice people have to hear what they want to. They can tell us and make us believe what they want us to. Not having many media companies in the world limits our choice which shows that media companies can have a hold of what us as people want to believe and think as its all mainly one sided.

EMAP

EMAP is a British media company who is a business-to-business multimedia group whose brands inform people as well as, inspire and connect within the sectors they operate in. It is a company which specialises in the production of business-to-business magazines. EMAP has around 20 magazines in its portfolio including the following;

v  Architects’ Journal

v  Architectural Review

v  Broadcast

v  Construction News

v  Drapers

v  Health Service Journal

v  Local Government Chronicle

v  Nursing Times

v  Retail Week

v  Recycling & Waste Management

v  Screen International

EMAP is a multination company as EME (Emap Middle East) as it is the leading provider of business information and all of the events in the Middle East. EME is brand-led and seeks to be genuinely media-neural by providing many formats in which the multinational audience requires such as insight, news, analysis and sales opportunities.  It has a clear focus on the fast growing area of the GCC (Gulf Co-operation Council) the main sectors Oil & Gas and Construction which drive it, EME seeks to grow their profits in the Middle East. The EME is made up of two main brands. The first was acquired in 2006, AMEinfo.com is the quickest and easiest website to keep up with everything that’s happening in the Middle East as it’s a free-to-access business and news and directory. They target mid-to-senior level managers across all of the countries and sectors in the region. The second main brand is MEED which was established in 1957, which is a accompanying senior management media brand what encompasses a print magazine. They also encompass an accompanying website.  Two high-value content businesses, MEED Projects and MEED Insight run along MEED Events all run more than 40 C-level executive conferences.

Spalding Guardian was purchased by Richard Winfrey in 1887, who then later went to buy Lynn News and Peterborough advertiser. ‘Sir’ Richard Winfrey was a liberal politician and campaigner for agricultural rights who bought several newspapers to promote his political views around different areas such as Spalding, Boston, Sleaford and Peterborough. He also started the North Cambs Echo. Richard Winery’s newspaper interests where soon passed through the family as during World War II, his son Richard Pattison Winfrey got involved.