{"id":1274939,"date":"2022-02-05T21:37:36","date_gmt":"2022-02-06T02:37:36","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=1274939"},"modified":"2022-02-05T21:37:38","modified_gmt":"2022-02-06T02:37:38","slug":"former-antitrust-enforcer-nothing-this-country-needs-less-than-media-cartel","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/former-antitrust-enforcer-nothing-this-country-needs-less-than-media-cartel\/","title":{"rendered":"Former Antitrust Enforcer: &#039;Nothing This Country Needs Less&#039; Than Media Cartel"},"content":{"rendered":"<aside class=\"mashsb-container mashsb-main mashsb-stretched\"><div class=\"mashsb-box\"><div class=\"mashsb-count mash-medium\" style=\"&quot;\"><div class=\"counts mashsbcount\">22<\/div><span class=\"mashsb-sharetext\">SHARES<\/span><\/div><div class=\"mashsb-buttons\"><a class=\"mashicon-facebook mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/sharer.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.conservativenewsdaily.net%2Fbreaking-news%2Fformer-antitrust-enforcer-nothing-this-country-needs-less-than-media-cartel%2F\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Facebook<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-twitter mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/intent\/tweet?text=&amp;url=https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=1274939&amp;via=ConservNewsDly\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Twitter<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-subscribe mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"#\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Subscribe<\/span><\/a><div class=\"onoffswitch2 mash-medium mashsb-noshadow\" style=\"display:none\"><\/div><\/div>\n            <\/div>\n                <div style=\"clear:both\"><\/div><\/aside>\n            <!-- Share buttons by mashshare.net - Version: 4.0.47--><div><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/12\/GettyImages-547524708-640x335-1.jpg\" class=\"ff-og-image-inserted\" alt=\"image\" \/><\/div>\n<p class=\"subheading\">Speaking at the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.breitbart.com\/politics\/2022\/02\/02\/watch-live-senate-lawmakers-debate-controversial-media-cartel-bill\/\">Senate Judiciary Committee\u2019s hearing<\/a> on the Journalism Competition and Preservation Act (JCPA) last week, Harvard fellow and former FTC antitrust enforcer Dr. Daniel Francis told lawmakers that he \u201ccannot think of anything the country needs less, now or ever\u201d than the kind of national news media cartel the bill would create.<\/p>\n<p>The JCPA, which Breitbart News has&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.breitbart.com\/tech\/2021\/03\/15\/bokhari-hearing-on-establishment-media-cartel-act-only-deepens-concerns\/\">covered extensively<\/a>, would create an antitrust exemption for media companies, protecting&nbsp;<a class=\"x5l\" href=\"https:\/\/news.gallup.com\/poll\/355526\/americans-trust-media-dips-second-lowest-record.aspx\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener external\">widely distrusted<\/a>&nbsp;media companies from competition by allowing them to form a legal cartel to collectively bargain with Silicon Valley.<\/p>\n<figure id=\"D-ROS-B1\" class=\"a8d\"><\/figure>\n<figure id=\"M-ROS-B1\" class=\"a8d\"><\/figure>\n<figure id=\"gmxrevmore\" class=\"H\"><\/figure>\n<p>If the bill passes, big media companies would be able to strike deals with Facebook, Google, Twitter. The language of the bill stipulates that organizations or one-man journalistic operations that do not have \u201ca dedicated professional editorial staff\u201d would be left out of the benefits of such deals, excluding a wide swathe of independent and local journalism.<\/p>\n<p>Dr. Francis, who worked as a senior antitrust official at the FTC for just under three years, told lawmakers that passing the bill would not have the effects its proponents claim.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI cannot think of anything the country needs less, now or ever, than&nbsp;a national news media cartel,\u201d said Francis.<\/p>\n<figure id=\"M-ROS-B2\" class=\"a8d\"><\/figure>\n<p>\u201cCartels are the supreme evil of&nbsp;antitrust. They are so reliably harmful that we extradite and imprison people who form them, they are automatically&nbsp;illegal in civil litigation with no justification allowed at law, and for decades, the justice department has had a&nbsp;flagship policy project of fighting cartels and opposing exemptions just like this one.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The Harvard lecturer went on to poke holes in the corporate media\u2019s arguments for passing the bill, in particular the argument that tech platforms don\u2019t pay media organizations for linking to their content because of their unfair buyer power, a position known as <a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Monopsony\">monopsony<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cPlatforms aren\u2019t linking and previewing for free because they\u2019re monopsonists exercising&nbsp;buyer power, it\u2019s because our property laws very wisely don\u2019t give a website owner, whether it\u2019s the owner of a news website or&nbsp;something else, the power to veto or tax linking or fair use previewing of that website,\u201d said Francis.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt\u2019s pretty easy to see that this has&nbsp;nothing to do with monopsony power, because no one pays for it. We could, if someone has the coding ability,&nbsp;start an app today and link and preview websites without paying for that privilege. Our law gives everyone that freedom.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cLinks are the lifeblood of the internet. Imagine how hard it would be to write even a traditional article&nbsp;or book if you couldn\u2019t cite a source or quote a sentence or two without paying for that privilege. And now imagine the consequences of that&nbsp;rule for our internet today.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThis is not really about monopoly or monopsony at all, it\u2019s a request&nbsp;to dramatically expand [property] rights on the internet, and then to allow that property right to be sold by a new national news cartel, with major&nbsp;media conglomerates at the helm. I think whatever antitrust reform we need today \u2014 and I think we need some \u2014 this is not that.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Francis concluded his remarks by warning that the JCPA would simply create another monopoly-like organization, led by some of the wealthiest and most powerful media conglomerates in the world.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cA national news cartel sure would be a monopolist,\u201d said Francis. \u201cI think this subcommittee would be really&nbsp;concerned if even two of the major publishers were to propose a merger. The idea that we might put all of them together under one roof to agree on&nbsp;rates and terms and business models strikes me as a consumer\u2019s nightmare.\u201d<\/p>\n<p><strong><em>Allum Bokhari is the senior technology correspondent at Breitbart News.&nbsp;He is the author of&nbsp;<a class=\"x5l\" href=\"https:\/\/www.amazon.com\/DELETED-Techs-Battle-Movement-Election\/dp\/154605930X\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener external\">#DELETED: Big Tech\u2019s Battle to Erase the Trump Movement and Steal The Election.<\/a><\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Speaking at the Senate Judiciary Committee\u2019s hearing on the Journalism Competition and Preservation Act (JCPA) last week, Harvard fellow and former FTC antitrust enforcer Dr. Daniel Francis told lawmakers that &#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2315279,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mo_disable_npp":"","fifu_image_url":"","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1274939","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1274939","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1274939"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1274939\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2315279"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1274939"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1274939"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1274939"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}