GERMANY OWNS BIG BIRD. The Munich based media conglom, EM.TV has bought the Jim Henson Co. For $680 million. (Muppet means half puppet / half marionette). Now Oscar the Grouch grumbles, 'I was just following orders.' (I couldn't resist)
It's been a number of months since Musea has looked at the news. There's a lot to tell you, and much has been happening since then. So let's go.
MORE MERGER MANIA. The over inflated stock of AOL was enough to buy Time Warner (one of our Corporate Art 9) in the biggest merger of all time valued at $178 billion. Days later Time Warner bought EMI, the British music company for $20 billion. That merger decreases the number of record companies from 5 to 4 (leaving Britain, the land of the Beatles, Rolling Stones, etc. with no major record company). The combined company will own the rights to 2 million tunes (see Corp. Art list updated from 9 to 8 on the Staff & Stuff section). Will all the Corp. Art Co's begin merging with internet companies? 2 rumors circulating now are: BMG and Sony may merge / Seagrams may put its corporate art co's up for sale. IF both happen we may be down from 8 to 6! Even the staid Washington Post said, "...the trend toward consolidation raises questions about the number of independent voices in the media." DUH!
PIRATE RADIO, LEAGALIZED! The FCC has announced that it will begin licensing micro-broadcasting radio on April 17,2000. (This, their biggest ruling in years, went totally unreported in the mainstream medial. Typical!) Commercial broadcasters won't be eligible. The reach of these stations will be between 1 and, 3 and 1/2 miles. Musea predicts this will allow for alt. viewpoints, music, and culture etc. Obviously mainstream broadcasters are up in arms. They fear these micros will 'rob them of listeners'-WSJ. Their henchmen the NAB, National Association of Broadcasters said, "(the NAB) will review every option to undo the damage caused by low-power radio." Yeah like good content, truth, fun, etc. Fo/mo/info www.fcc.gov. Then YOU start a radio station in YOUR neighborhood. " JUST DO IT!"
3 TV NETWORKS TO SHARE NEWS.
As if the 3 nightly newscasts aren't virtually identical now ... 3 of the 4 networks, ABC, CBS, Fox, are joining their news services into a single domestic news cooperative, called Network News Service. (Neither NBC or CNN were asked to join the club) Any of the 3 can then use the helicopter footage of the latest shootout from say local ABC affiliate channel 8. Affiliates have reacted with 'What's the point of having three networks if you're all covering the same thing the same way.?' And
'I think they're writing there own obituary.' (Broadcasting & Cable) ... In related news- these joint ventures: ABC News is now working with the New York Times , and not to be outdone, NBC News with the Washington Post (who owns Newsweek)
GERMANY OWNS BIG BIRD. The Munich based media conglom, EM.TV has bought the Jim Henson Co. For $680 million. (Muppet means half puppet / half marionette). Now Oscar the Grouch grumbles, 'I was just following orders.' (I couldn't resist)
PRICE FIXING AT THE AUCTION? The anti-trust investigation continues into allegations that Sotheby's and Christies, (the 2 major world auction houses of fine art and antiques who together control 95% of the $4 billion worldwide auction biz) fixed the commissions the auction houses charged buyers and sellers. Except for a few high level resignations, no word yet from either co. (NYT) In related news Sotheby's now has a 10 year alliance with Amazon.com to sell art & collectibles on a joint website. (Art In America)
CAMP CHAMP. We salute the French for passing a law that states that any one who donates works of art to the French Government will get tax credits in return. This law encourages Fr. art to stay in Fr. museums and discourages art to be sold and taken out of the country. We encourage the US and other countries to follow suit. (Art Business News)
NEWSPAPER CHAINS MERGE. 2 of the nations largest newspaper chains The Tribune Co. and Times Mirror Co. have merged in a $6.3 billion deal. The new co. owns LA Times, Chicago Tribune, and 9 other newspapers + 22 TV (KDAF in Dallas), mags, radio, internet, etc. It'll make it the 3rd largest newspaper chain behind Gannett (USA Today), and Knight Ridder. ... In related news: do mergers work? That's what a recent survey by KPMG, an accounting and consulting firm asked. They found that 83% of mergers produced no shareholder value ... and more than half of corp. mergers reduced shareholder returns. (DMN)
FUR FLIES: Looking at the winter Vogue magazines and W, etc. you'd swear Fur and clothes made from ostrich skin, python and other snakeskins, leather, etc. were happily all the rage among the Stepford Wives. Truth is fur protest is on the rise. A number of protestors from PETA (People for the Ethical Treatment of Animas) stormed the NY fall fashion shows, with pies, red paint, and protest signs saying 'Fur Shame'. On March 9, Pretenders singer, Chrissie Hynde was arrested as she and others protested a NY Gap Store's leather products gotten from 'illegally and cruelly' slaughtered cows in India where cattle are sacred. Gap spokesman countered that they got them from apparel factories (i.e. it's their fault) (Reuters)
CHUMP OF THE MONTH: lead story of the September 16, front page of the Dallas Morning News, read "Church Rampage, Gunman Kills 7, self at FW service: 7 injured." It was truly a terrible tragedy. Reading further on the page there is a list of the stories inside. One is titled "HOW TV COVERED IT."Musea says: Dallas Morning News this was NOT a sporting event. What next, a lead story on the TOP 10 MEDIA COVERAGES OF SHOOTINGS? DMN, is there no one in management there that has a sense of decency or sensitivity to this tragedy or the trauma these people were facing? This was no time to play ratings games. I encourage the persons responsible to resign. ... In other news, remember when DMN said it had to raise its newspaper prices because of higher newsprint costs? This quote from DMN story "Belo reports Increases in Earnings, Revenue" 10/28/99 (Belo owns both DMN and channel 8) ... The company also has benefited from lower newsprint prices. Indeed they have!
MEDIA & RWANDA HOLOCAUST.
Headline from NYT News Service article: "U.N., U.S. failed Rwanda in '94 massacre, panel says. Report faults inaction of members in 800,000 deaths."
(Something Musea readers know we have been saying for years) The panel 'challenges the morality of remaining neutral in the face of aggression.' In related news: the March 1 issue of The Weekly - Number One News Weekly Serving the African American Community (Musea recommends them as an alternate news source), had a feature on the 'The National Summit on Africa, a privately funded non-gov org in DC'. Quote: "The American public and senior policymakers are fed a steady, persistent diet of distorted and inaccurate images about Africa. The continent is virtually ignored or ridiculed." Theweekly@hotmail.com Musea salutes the UN Panel Report, The Weekly, and the National Summit on Africa.
LAWSUITS: (try to keep up if you can) #1 Virtually all Corp. Art vs. ICRAVE-TV who is turning live network TV into streaming video on the internet and says it's legal due to a Canadian loophole. Musea would be more inclined to side with iCrave if it was their own original content instead of borrowed. #2 Virtually all Corp. Art versus MP3.Com for their service of allowing customers to store their own CD's through the site. Musea doesn't see the problem, sides with MP3. #3 Federal Trade Commission (FCC) antitrust probe of music industry price practices. Convoluted story, but Musea sides with the feds. Sony and Warners in settlement talks (guilty but won't confess?). And while were at it, CD's cost a quarter to make, so why are they still selling for $10-20? #4 Virtually all Corp. Art versus Napster.com, a sort of search engine for MP3's (musical files). Instead of scouring the net, you go here and find any MP3 on the net (which is virtually any song ever recorded!) Touchy Corp. Art is just sore here. Musea sides with Napster. #5 Federal Trade Commission's price fixing charge versus Nine West Group, one of the nation's largest supplier of women's shoes. Nine West agrees to pay states $34 million and stop dictating what stores charge. #6 Boris Karloff's daughter Sarah versus Universal Studios for unauthorized use of her father's name and image. We side with Sarah. #7 Texas Jury versus Jostens Inc. (1 of just a few yearbook publishers) in anti trust lawsuit Jury wins, fines Jostens $36 mill for dirty tricks. #8 Religious artist Louis Jones versus the makers of the film
ADVERTISING: Phillip Morris is spending $100 million on ads showing how a portion of their profits (from cigarettes etc.) are given to charities. Musea asks why don't they donate the $100 million and forget about the ad campaign? ... Did you know that 20% of all radio ads are now for dot.com companies? ... Musea recommends the book Deadly Persuasion, Why Women & Girls Must Fight the Addictive Power of Advertising by Jean Kilbourne. Here are some reasons she opposes ads: Ads cleverly promote addictive products, advertising debases human relationships, and advertising debases women . She believes that individually they're harmless, taken together they form a sinister backdrop that portrays anti-social behavior as the norm, and basic human warmth as reason for ridicule. (USA Today)
CITY PLANNING. In a recent special issue of Musea we looked at Dallas and the harm done to it by a big biz controlled city gov. Updates: Councilman Al Lipscomb tried and convicted of bribery, city council hemming and hawing about passing a basic ethics code; money for skyboxes but not playgrounds, for designer bridges but not potholes, for DART rail but not neighborhood buses; the Trinity River project is turning into an useless tollroad and a sludge of lies; and in spite of all the big biz, business know how, Dallas ( with Fort Worth,the fastest growing metro area in the country) ranked a C+ and 23rd of 35 richest cities in city management. Categories in the survey included: capital projects, financial management, personnel policies, information technology, and managing for results., Apparently even if we forget all about art, and community, and everything else - even the biz side of the city gov. - the very thing Big Biz thinks they do best-is mediocre at best. We deserve better. (C+ given by team of researchers from Syracuse Uni. & Governing Magazine.) For an even meaner look at the follies of city council see Sharon Boyd's website at dallasarena.com. Musea highly recommends it and salutes the author as one of our Camp Champs. (Dallas Observer) ... Update: Musea mistakenly credited the idea of turning the courthouse 'Big Red' into a museum, as our own. It was the Dallas Morning News' idea. I apologize. In a side note: when I was talking with them they said that, though they had NEVER heard of my zine, they would send me info in the mail to back up their claim to the idea (I thought they'd stolen it from my report). They did. Only problem is, I never gave them my mailing address, and because my name is quite common, there was no way they could have looked it up. I asked them how they knew my address. Months later I'm still waiting for an answer to that question.
WHO'S REALLY SICK? All 3 TV networks played a lot of attention to flu stories this winter. Any listener would think it was almost an epidemic this year. Truth is the CDC said it was no worse or better than any other year. In a surprisingly frank news story of 3/10/2000 ABC suggested that the extra coverage of their network and others may well have been to help promote 2 new flu medicines - drug companies advertise extensively on nightly news shows. ...And in related media news, after watching the World Trade Organization riots in Seattle you might think that the majority of protestors were violent. The FW Weekly reported that out of the 100,000 protestors, there were 30-60 who resorted to violence. And the violence they did: breaking windows, spray painting police cars, rocking limos, was relatively minor. But what may NOT have been minor was the effect of the riots. Tom Tomorrow, in his cartoon This Modern World said, "They smile reassuringly and tell you everything's fine, that the economy's going gangbusters and a rising tide lifts all boats - but you know something's wrong here, you know that 85% of the wealth is controlled by 20 % of the population (and the 400 richest control 1 trillion, more money than the gross domestic product of China) ...you know that your leaders have been bought and paid for, that corporate money sets the political agenda. You know that the free market has become the dominant religion of our age ... that anyone foolish enough to suggest tempering the quest for profit with a modicum of concern for human rights or the environment is viewed as a heretic - if not an utter lunatic. ... And yet, something extraordinary just happened in Seattle, demonstrators took to the streets and made their voices heard - and it made a difference, the media were forced to address issues they had previously swept under the rug, to explain why anyone could possibly be opposed to unfettered global capitalism. In a few short days, the entire debate was altered, perhaps irrevocably."
News gathered by Alden Scott Crow & Musea.
And finally: