Veta,

The First amendment was intended to preserve the privatization of the Fourth Estate. Particularly, the individualizaton of the Fourth Estate. Meaning pamphleteers, not journalists.

Modern reading: bloggers.

Fairness doctrine lol what a joke...

what's your problem with the Fairness Doctrine dead? it seemed to serve the United States fairly well during its tenure from 1949 to 1987.

and i think we can both agree that the current system of megacorporations and the free market running the media has definitely compromised the integrity of contemporary journalism.

what other suggestions do you have?

I think the current trends of the media are healthy. The crony capitalism media companies are being discredited daily. More and more of the US populace is getting their news from the internet.

I view media for all the different biased sides and form my own opinion. I think the government should keep it's hands off and let the market decide which sources they tune into.

The SOPA bill is very dangerous bill and should be killed immediately.

Fairness doctrine is a bill that allows the government to dictate to the media who and what content they must air. How you are for this type of setup is beyond me. But personally I do not see how you could possibly be against SOPA and for Fairness Doctrine; that seems bi-polar to me.

veta and bi polar...yup seems about right.

deadcode writes...{I think the current trends of the media are healthy.}

wut?... lol, you don't really mean that do?... right?.. wait, I'm gonna speculate that you really do. I mean if you consider the current mainstream media being in bed with (and hamstrung by) various guv officials/congress via campaign financing and lobbying/special interests, and above else in fear of losing tax breaks should they actually decide to start reporting real news once again... to be healthy, well, okie dokie...


{The crony capitalism media companies are being discredited daily.}...

by whom ?.. by people such as you as you and I ? Big deal, means nothing. Seriously man, when placed up against what current reality strongly suggests otherwise it means fuck all. What you call being discredited amounts to "mouth noises" by people such as you, myself included which has little or no effect on the fact that say as an example, CNN at one time used to deliver some hard hitting news which today amounts to dishwater. I'm inclined to accept some of the evidence that Turner was unfairly ambushed (perhaps even threatened) into losing control over his own network, but really all of that in hindsight is quite irrelevant. In spite of your claim, reality speaks differently given the never ending proliferation and "success" of today's version of CNN, add FUX News, add Housewives of Beverly Hills and the likeness of say Two and a Half Men whose success and ability to remain on air is (or was) governed by.... "ratings". The more people eat that shit up, the more it's delivered to satiate the appetite. The fact Two and Half Men was such a roaring success had little or nothing to do with cronyism or the powers of corporate TV executives. Sad but true it had more to do with the character portrayed by Charlie Sheen himself, who Ashton Kutcher has not shown capable of holding a candle to. It's simple economics fueled by demand.

{More and more of the US populace is getting their news from the internet.}

again, same answer. I fall into that group, but so fucking what. When you say "more and more" it's marginal compared to what the masses continue swallow up like it's so much wholesome bulbous cock that will cure your ails in boredom. While I support getting ones info off of various alternative sources off the Internet, it takes considerable effort and ability to filter out what's real and what's closer to unsupported conspiracy theory ridden hoopla having little or no basis in reality. The point is, the individuals you point to capable of such, currently represent the minority, meanwhile the current overall state of the social structure is NOT getting better, it's getting worse.

{{Modern reading: bloggers.}}

I've nothing against the recent social trend known as blogging. And indeed there's information to be had often difficult to find elsewhere, but I'm a believer in having standards or benchmarks set in place which need to be met and/or forces the practitioner to abide by or adhere to, hopefully aligned with or at least somewhat analogous to the method. It's the same set of benchmarks while certainly not perfect lessens the chance of my lawnmower's crankshaft finding a home inside my skull as well as instilling more confidence in the crew at the emerg room in the event of a ruptured appendix as opposed to some loinclothed tribesman jangling some bones and shrunken heads in my face. While the standards journalism once upon a time held itself to have indeed gone to shit, (see veta's reference to yellow journalism) the realm of blogging carries virtually no such guidelines whatsoever.

{{I couple the relatively recent failures of our representative government with the privatization and destruction of the fourth estate....Restore journalistic integrity by reinstating the fairness doctrine or other yellow journalism laws and we're likely to see a renewed and educated electorate.}}

I tend to agree with the basic sentiment of what you're saying, but it's something of a chicken before or after the egg paradox. For one, if we started today it would take (I'm only guessing) at least one or two, perhaps three generations of hard work in re-educating the electorate before you'd arrive at anything tangible or workable in my estimation. Perhaps sooner, I dunno, I could be wrong, but I seriously have my doubts. Problem is you'd have to somehow inform or convince the current electorate that their thinking models are seriously screwed and fucked in the head. And you can only do that via sound demonstration, preferably at the formative years through sound educational practices. Problem is you need an educated electorate to ensure all of that is put in place and round it goes. I'm not saying it's impossible, but it's a formidable task to say the least in face of the millions upon millions of under developed eaters who are so out to lunch and incapable of seeing past anything beyond their own self interests.

Personally, I wish it were different, but as it stands unless something truly remarkable comes along I see no other outcome but having shit continue to deteriorate straight into the toilet of total collapse proving once and for all that, ok, that sure as fuck didn't pan out so well. Time to change up the models boys and girls unless we want a continuous rerun of similar events.

Interesting word "forces" in the second line.

In case of harm caused by libel or slander, there are the courts.

Gangster: "deadcode writes...{I think the current trends of the media are healthy.}

wut?... lol, you don't really mean that do?... right?.. wait, I'm gonna speculate that you really do. I mean if you consider the current mainstream media being in bed with (and hamstrung by) various guv officials/congress via campaign financing and lobbying/special interests, and above else in fear of losing tax breaks should they actually decide to start reporting real news once again... to be healthy, well, okie dokie..."

Do you read my posts in their entirety before posting? I address this later in my post.

{The crony capitalism media companies are being discredited daily.}...

Gangster: "by whom ?.. by people such as you as you and I ? Big deal, means nothing. Seriously man, when placed up against what current reality strongly suggests otherwise it means fuck all. What you call being discredited amounts to "mouth noises" by people such as you, myself included which has little or no effect on the fact that say as an example, CNN at one time used to deliver some hard hitting news which today amounts to dishwater. I'm inclined to accept some of the evidence that Turner was unfairly ambushed (perhaps even threatened) into losing control over his own network, but really all of that in hindsight is quite irrelevant. In spite of your claim, reality speaks differently given the never ending proliferation and "success" of today's version of CNN, add FUX News, add Housewives of Beverly Hills and the likeness of say Two and a Half Men whose success and ability to remain on air is (or was) governed by.... "ratings". The more people eat that shit up, the more it's delivered to satiate the appetite. The fact Two and Half Men was such a roaring success had little or nothing to do with cronyism or the powers of corporate TV executives. Sad but true it had more to do with the character portrayed by Charlie Sheen himself, who Ashton Kutcher has not shown capable of holding a candle to. It's simple economics fueled by demand."

Blah blah blah blah blah....

Focus dude; you ramble like hell and go off on tangents. I stated that the crony capitalism media companies are being discredited. This is plainly apparent by the polls showing that news companies are at all time low trust levels with the American viewer. This is widely published.

http://www.gallup.com/poll/149624/Majority-Continue-Distrust-Media-Perceive-Bias.aspx

{More and more of the US populace is getting their news from the internet.}

Gangster: "again, same answer. I fall into that group, but so fucking what."

Is this your counter point?

Sorry I've stopped reading; you've lost my interest.

tl;dr;