The purchase of The Baltimore Sun is further proof that conservative billionaires understand the power of media control. Why don’t their liberal counterparts get it?
You have no doubt seen the incredibly depressing news about the incredibly depressing purchase of The Baltimore Sun by the incredibly depressing David Smith, chairman of Sinclair Broadcast Group, the right-wing media empire best known for gobbling up local television news operations and forcing local anchors to spout toxic Big Brother gibberish like this.
The Sun was once a great newspaper. I remember reading, once upon a time, that it had sprung more foreign correspondents into action across the planet than any American newspaper save The New York Times and The Washington Post. It had eight foreign bureaus at one point, all of which were shuttered by the Tribune Company by 2006. But the Sun’s real triumphs came in covering its gritty, organic city. And even well after its glory days, it still won Pulitzers—as recently as 2020, for taking down corrupt Mayor Catherine Pugh, who served a stretch in prison thanks to the paper.
How are these acquisitions making them enough money to bother with given the state of news outlets in general? Arguably among the reasons they’re able to happen at all is that many newsrooms are struggling to even remain operational, resulting in their owners selling them off to cut their losses.
Yet even after acquisition, have there been any indications that the new owners are doing any better with them financially?
I assume they’re willing to take the loss to help preserve the political landscape that allows them to protect and grow their financial interests in other markets. They may not really care if the media outlets are profitable.
Opinions are cheap. So cheap people will offer them up on the internet for free.
Journalism is expensive. Gotta chase down leads that go nowhere. Gotta work hard to confirm a source, because you don’t want to be just printing rumours, right?
Right-wing media doesn’t need to pay the cost of journalism. They print opinion and rumours. So a right-wing paper is cheaper to run than a paper that has journalists working for it.