Late Thursday, amid swirling speculation about a shooting at Brown University, CNN’s Kaitlan Collins posted on social media, pointing out the conflicting information and guiding the public to her channel's 9pm newscast.
Even though it is by no means a impeccable news source, her message resonated for a lot of people. It remains one of the broadcasters where one can locate grounded and largely trustworthy reporting – particularly during breaking news situations such as the one developing close to a New Hampshire storage facility.
A Vulnerable Position Amid a Corporate Tug-of-War
However CNN, now middle-aged, finds itself in a uncertain state as two huge media empires vie for ownership of its corporate owner, Warner Bros Discovery.
Whatever the outcome, the future of CNN has turned into a major game of mergers and acquisitions, not as a question of what serves the news-consuming public.
“This is yet another example of the deep structural problems with origins in decades of regulatory actions,” stated Victor Pickard, writer of “Democracy Without Journalism?” and a professor of media policy at the Penn.
The conjecture about the future owner of Warner Bros Discovery – is it going to be Netflix or Paramount Skydance? – misses a larger point.
“It is often framed as a corporate drama with powerful individuals as the main characters, but there is scant discussion of the public interest,” Pickard said.
A Further Element: Donald Trump
The CNN scenario is complicated by Donald Trump’s longstanding stance about a network he has consistently labeled as perhaps his main “fake news” antagonist.
Think back to the chants of “CNN sucks!” at his rallies, his team's disciplinary revocation of reporter Jim Acosta’s press credentials, or his sparring with Collins in press briefings.
Trump now says that the network requires new ownership. You can read that as ownership that will insulate him from negative coverage and examination. That is one reason why he seems to support Paramount Skydance, which has made a hostile bid.
Trump has reason to prefer that suitor more. For one thing, it is run by David Ellison, son of the Trump-friendly Larry Ellison, one of the world’s richest people.
The company, parent of CBS News, also recently installed the conservative Bari Weiss, noted for her “anti-woke” beliefs, as the editor-in-chief of that venerable news network.
An Outcome of Further Turmoil
Notably, if Netflix prevails, CNN and other cable outlets would first be spun off into a separate entity. That would be a welcome development to many at the network, but it’s far from a safe harbor. That arrangement could set up CNN for yet another acquisition. It never ends.
According to Timothy Wu, much of this is against the law, anyway. The influential voice of big tech’s dominance wrote recently that competition laws should disallow both deals.
“Either merger would be bad for the country, and both should be opposed by regulators,” Wu argued.
The Bigger Problem and a Way Ahead
No matter the outcome regarding CNN, the underlying crisis endures.
“The present media landscape is a very structure that undermines democracy, but we ought not succumb to the belief that change is impossible,” Pickard noted. Regulatory choices – from the 1930s and 1940s – helped to foster this hyper-commercialized monster, and revised policy decisions can fix it.
Is this likely in an era where the top communications regulator refuses to acknowledge that the agency is independent? Change is a distant prospect now, but that doesn’t mean it will never happen.
Policies that bolster independent news organizations, bolster local journalism, subsidize public media, and outlaw the accumulation of media power in very few hands are not only possible – they are essential for a healthy democracy.
In the world of media ownership, bigger isn’t better. And news organizations such as CNN cannot be pawns in the latest merger game.
