A reluctant reality is upon is. The Justice Department and the FTC have approved Cablevision Systems bid to purchase Newsday, Long Island's only major newspaper, from Tribune Company. While I was certainly relieved that Cablevision’s bid beat out the alternative, Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp., the repercussions are very unsettling. Cablevision, a cable television operator turned media conglomerate, is a privately held company controlled by the Dolan family. Its assets include Channel 12, Long Island’s only news station ("available only on Cablevision.") When the deal is consummated the Dolan family will have a virtual news empire on Long Island controlling both the major print news and the television news.
Based on the Long Island Power Authority’s (LIPA) 2008 survey, the population on Long Island is 2.85 million. For comparison purposes, the city of Chicago has a population of 3 million people. Can you imagine Chicago having one television news station and one newspaper owned by the same company controlled by one family?
This is certainly not the time for our news sources to be converging. However, that is what we have to look forward to. There are many small publications but all have limited circulation, maybe one of them will become a larger presence in response to “Cablevision media.” Maybe we have nothing to fear and Newsday will become a better newspaper…maybe.
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