Media Ownership – Essay plan and structure

NB – This essay plan highlights the way you should structure your
essay. You may fund you don’t have enough time to write this amount
in the exam. You may also wish to site other case studies and make
other points (for example I haven’t discussed AOL Time Warner or NTL
Universal here).

However you MUST remember to follow this format –

1) Make your point

2) Develop it with a case study example.
3) Relate it back to the question

To what extent is the ownership of the media of any

significance to audiences?
Introduction
• Very significant!
• However as this essay will explain – sometimes the effects are
positive, sometimes negative

Point One: Increased concentration of ownership threatens diversity

/ plurality in media.
• Lack of representation of minority voices and opinions
• Case Study example: Murdoch & Berlusconi – provide detail of
their ownership (eg: Berlusconi controls 90% of Italian Media,
Murdoch reaches 2/3 of world’s population)
• Explain HOW their increased ownership prevents alternative /
independent media organizations from competing with them
• Hence threat to democratic life and representation of different
viewpoints

Point Two: Political / ideological viewpoints of media moguls are

presented as correct and just
• Again – a threat to democracy
• Case Study example: Murdoch backing Blair in the Sun (The Sun
Backs Blair headline), Fox News – O’Reilly and Republican bias
• Case Study example: Berlusconi – how can opposition leaders in
Italian politics compete with a PM who owns so much of the
countries media?
Point Three: Regulation of media and PSB is argued by our
government to prevent biased and misleading output –
if this is the case, ownership shouldn’t be of significance
• Case Study examples: OfCom and the BBC in Britain
• The remit of BBC to present balanced and diverse output that
reflect the cultural make-up of Britain (eg: different radio stations)
• However – Hutton report showed the extent of government
influence over the BBCs output.
• Hence the regulatory body OfCom and the PSB in Britain is still
flawed

Point Four: Negative impact of cross media promotion and synergy –

media companies with cross media ownership can practically dictate
what media an audience consumes
• Case Study example: News Corporation ensure that Sky is
constantly promoted and advertised through its newspapers: The
News of the World, The Sun and The Times.
• Additionally Fox films will be given favourable reviews in these
newspapers, stating they are a must see even when they are
mediocre. The films will also be shown on Sky Channels.

Point Five: Companies with greater ownership can afford to invest in

new products, technologies and services
• Case study example: Sony – constantly developing new products,
such as PS2 and can afford to take risks on developing new
products as a consequence of their oligopolised ownership, eg
Betamax videos.
• Hence the audience arguably benefit from these improved
technologies and services.

Conclusion:
• We can see the extent to which ownership is very significant.
However we must also acknowledge that the audience can make
choices about what they consume. If they don’t like a programme
they can switch it over, they can choose which newspaper they
wish to read.
• This underlines the importance of diversity of media ownership
and output and how the prevention of a monopolized industry
must be ensured.