Ownership

The Women Media Center’s annual examination found that, at 20 of the nation’s top news outlets, men produced 62.3 percent of news reports analyzed during a studied period while women produced 37.7 percent of news reports. That WMC “Divided 2017” analysis showed hardly any progress since the WMC’s previous “Divided” report, when women produced 37.3 percent of news.

The Trump administration urged the Supreme Court to expand states’ authority to collect sales tax on internet transactions, joining a chorus of state officials seeking to overrule a 1992 precedent exempting many online retailers from having to add taxes to a consumer’s final price. In 1992, the justices “did not and could not anticipate the development of modern e-commerce,” Solicitor General Noel Francisco wrote in a friend-of the-court brief.

[Commentary] In February of 1968, President Lyndon B. Johnson’s National Advisory Commission on Civil Disorders issued the Kerner Report—which detailed an extensive and daunting list of inequalities and inequities that led to civil unrest in Detroit, Chicago, Los Angeles, and Newark. Among its findings, the commission highlighted how the lack of adequate representation among the people assigning, reporting, and editing media coverage might drive “the underlying problems of race relations.” 

[Commentary] The big Internet service provider gate-keepers may have bought the silence of Congress, but they cannot buy the silence of the people. We know there is overwhelming popular support for an open internet with strong net neutrality rules.  But we have to demonstrate this support and the power behind it.  We must make our voices heard.  Contacting Congress now on the CRA is vital—your Senators, of course, but your House members, too.  Tell them your vote in the next election depends on their vote now to restore net neutrality. 

He’s derided them as “bot-infested badlands,” “dysfunctional and sometimes dystopian,” and platforms for “the fake, the faux and the fallacious.” On a recent earnings call, he called them “mephitic,” prompting his spokesman to tweet the definition: “foul smelling.” No media executive has more tirelessly criticized Google and Facebook -- and done so with such a colorful vocabulary -- than News Corp Chief Executive Officer Robert Thomson.

Sinclair Broadcast Group is selling WGN-TV (Chicago) to a Maryland auto dealer but would remain in control of the station in what critics say is a bid to skirt ownership limits and win federal regulatory approval for its proposed $3.9 billion acquisition of Tribune Media.

AT&T raised the price of one unlimited smartphone data plan by $5 a month and lowered the price of another by $10, for single-line users. Instead of the entry-level unlimited plan costing $60 and the better plan costing $90, the single-line prices are now $65 and $80 a month (plus monthly taxes and fees and a one-time $30 activation fee for each line). AT&T raised the family plan prices by $5 a month for both of these unlimited plans. For example, four-line plans that used to cost $155 or $185 a month now cost $160 or $190.

[Commentary] The Supreme Court heard oral arguments in a pivotal antitrust case involving American Express (“AmEx”). The decision could have a profound impact on the way platform-based companies such as Google and AmEx will be treated under the law. Some of the Court's questioning was truly impressive, showing knowledge of both economics and the inner workings of credit card markets. Other questions? Not so much. Before pointing out the uneconomic utterances, let’s quickly review the case. Credit card companies make money two ways.

In the early years of the 20th Century, Louis Brandeis was America’s most influential advocate for antitrust enforcement but his contributions to antitrust have been much debated ever since.