Ownership

The Communications Workers of America (CWA) and Writers Guild of America West (WGAW) have joined with Consumer Reports, Common Cause and others to call for House hearings on the proposed T-Mobile-Sprint merger in the next Congress. In letters to likely new House Commerce Committee Chairman Frank Pallone (D-NJ) and likely new House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jerrold Nadler (D-NY), the groups said that hearings in their respective committees would be an "excellent" first step toward the incoming Democratic Reps vision of stronger antitrust enforcement (something Rep Nadler has pushed for),

Over the last few years, Luarene Powell Jobs, an activist, investor and entrepreneur, has been investing in media companies through her social impact firm, Emerson Collective. Buying up a range of unusual properties, she seems to be making an effort to turbocharge storytelling in this fractured digital age. It’s an interesting experiment to watch, because the investments include a panoply of the cool, hip and fresh in a mostly glum content industry.

Officials from nine countries examining Facebook’s business practices have spent weeks trying to get the company’s chief executive, Mark Zuckerberg, to face questions at a hearing. Instead, Zuckerberg was represented by an empty chair. He skipped the session, which was organized by a British committee investigating Facebook and the spread of misinformation.

Federal Trade Commission Chairman Joseph Simons told the Senate Consumer Protection Subcommittee at an FTC oversight hearing that the FTC needs three things to protect consumer privacy: 1) rulemaking authority; 2) civil penalty authority—currently it can only try and make consumers whole for losses, not penalize the conduct responsible; and 3) jurisdiction over nonprofits and common carriers. Currently, the FTC has to sue or settle with alleged violators, then monitor enforcement of the settlements it secures.

Through a series of interviews with Native media practitioners and experts, Jodi Rave of the Indigenous Media Freedom Alliance reports on the major trends and challenges for American Indian media today:

Apple's exclusive market for selling iPhone apps came under fire at the Supreme Court, as justices considered whether consumers should be allowed to proceed with a lawsuit alleging the company has an illegal monopoly that produces higher prices. The plaintiffs are a group of consumers pursuing a class-action lawsuit seeking damages on behalf of people who have purchased iPhone apps. They argue that prices are higher than they would be in a competitive market because Apple requires that all software for its phones be sold and purchased through its App Store.

Google (Alphabet) had a whopping 91% share of the $59.7 billion market (revenue) for search engines in 2017. In the social media category, Facebook had 72% of the $25.6 billion share of revenue from social networking sites. In e-commerce, Amazon had a 49% share of the $525.9 billion revenue pie, followed by eBay at 7%. 

Facebook chief operating officer Sheryl Sandberg admitted that she had received information about the company’s work with Definers, the Republican-affiliated consultancy that conducted opposition research into Facebook’s critics. Her comments, written in a blog post the night before Thanksgiving, appeared to walk back her statements from the week of Nov 12 in which she said she did “not know” Facebook had hired Definers.

Facebook chief executive Mark Zuckerberg has declined to testify at a rare joint hearing with lawmakers from seven countries, representing more than 368 million people. Instead, Facebook will dispatch Richard Allan, the company’s vice president of policy solutions, to answer questions at a Nov 27 hearing featuring top policymakers from Argentina, Brazil, Canada, Ireland, Latvia, Singapore and the United Kingdom.