Free Republic

Who Owns The Media? The 6 Monolithic Corporations That Control Almost Everything We Watch, Hear And Read Back in 1983, approximately 0 corporations controlled the vast majority of all news media in the United States. Today, ownership of the news media has been concentrated in the hands of just six incredibly powerful media corporations. These corporate behemoths control most of what we watch, hear and read every single day. They own television networks, cable channels, movie studios, newspapers, magazines, publishing houses, music labels and even many of our favorite websites. Sadly, most Americans don't even stop to think about who...

Romney on now regarding yesterday's attacks on the US. Reporters are barking like mad dogs in their rage to hurt Romney, bombarding him with questions about his strong denunciation of the attacks yesterday and Obama's craven apology to the Muslim world. 'Do you feel you were wrong when you denounced the attacks yesterday?' 'Do you feel you were unfair to President Obama in your remarks?' 'How would a President Romney have acted?' Disgusting.

The entertainment conglomerate and the satellite TV giant failed to reach a new carriage agreement before midnight Tuesday. Seventeen Viacom-owned cable channels went dark on DirecTV on Tuesday just before midnight Eastern as the companies failed to reach a new carriage agreement. The channels yanked from the satellite TV giant's lineup include Nickelodeon, Comedy Central, MTV, BET, VH1, CMT, Logo, Spike, TV Land, MTV2, VH1 Classic, Palladia, Nick Jr., NickToons and TeenNick, in addition to several HD counterparts. DirecTV has about 20 million subscribers. Including the HD channels, it carries a total of 26 Viacom-owned channels. A Viacom rep wrote...

Viacom Inc. (VIA, VIAB) channels could go dark for DirecTV Group Inc. (DTV) subscribers at midnight in one of the more-significant recent standoffs over television carriage fees. The pending blackout further highlighted mounting pressure on Viacom, which has seen its ratings fall off in recent months for top shows like Nickelodeon's "SpongeBob SquarePants" and MTV's "Jersey Shore." Viacom class A shares fell 2% Tuesday to $49.98, while DirecTV shares slid 0.5% to $48.77. Viacom is seeking an increase of 30%, or more than $1 billion, in carriage fees, DirecTV said in a statement on its website Tuesday. The country's second-largest...

Viacom employees have been hit with a round of layoffs, Adweek has learned. Pink slips were handed down Thursday afternoon. A Viacom spokesperson confirmed the cuts, and said that the downsizing primarily took place within the media conglomerate’s music group, which includes MTV, VH1, CMT, and Logo. A number of departments within the music group were affected, including digital, consumer marketing, and on-air promotions. Outside of the music group, cuts were made in affiliate marketing, an area that supports BET Networks and Viacom Media Networks, which counts Comedy Central and Nickelodeon among its holdings. The downsizing took place the same...

...Adapted from Pamela Des Barres' bestselling book... the doc follows Des Barres... as she travels across the country reconnecting and reminiscing with the women who lived up to their reputations. ...“Rock 'n’ roll is art, but it also means sex, so it’s just the perfect combination -- especially for the young teenage girl. I remember when Mick Jagger lit me up when I was 15, and I thought, 'OK, I want some of that.' [But] our relationship was purely sexual.” Des Barres was motivated to log her experiences, and those of her pals, because she felt the word "groupie" had...

America Prepares to Get Angry at Jon StewartBy Elspeth Reeve | October 26, 2010 11:38am Jon Stewart has begun his tour of the nation's capital with a taping of The Daily Show before a "very, very policy-oriented" audience in Washington, The Washington Post's Dan Zak reports. ("We're not used to people nodding, like, 'Oh, I worked on that bill,' " Stewart said.) Stewart and Stephen Colbert's many young fans are packing their bags and arranging for sofas to crash on as they ready to head into D.C. for the comedians' pro-satire Rally to Restore Sanity and/or Fear. But not everyone's...

Viacom networks MTV, BET and CMT are giving an hour of free air time to President Obama less than three weeks before the midterm elections. The so-called “A Conversation with President Obama” will be live and commercial-free on six Viacom networks at 4 p.m. on Thursday. The networks will not give equal time to a Republican before the election, according to a spokeswoman. MTV denies that the Obama hour of TV is political, despite the timing, weeks before the midterm elections.

When President Obama sits down for his MTV town hall this Thursday, the audience of young people who will ask him questions will have been gathered by a casting call. According to the casting call for the event from talent agency Backstage.com, first reported by National Review Online, the company requests applications for the event, asking what issues the person is “passionate about,” requiring a “short description of your political views,” and also asks for a recent photo.

Comedian Jon Stewart on Wednesday bashed Fox News for parent company News Corporation's $1 million donation to the Republican Governors Association. Unfortunately, Stewart failed to inform his viewers that Viacom, the parent company of Comedy Central, has so far given disproportionately to Democrats this year. Also missing in the "Daily Show" host's attack of FNC and Glenn Beck was that News Corp. prior to this contribution had historically given more to Democrats than Republicans. Such facts were unimportant Wednesday evening, for Stewart was on another in a long line of Fox News is the devil incarnate rants (video follows with...

Google has won a landmark ruling as a judge threw out a $1bn lawsuit brought by Viacom accusing the internet giant of allowing copyrighted material on its YouTube service without permission. Viacom had accused Google of "massive intentional copyright infringement". But the Manhattan judge said Google and YouTube could not be held liable merely for having a "general awareness" that videos might be posted illegally. Media conglomerate Viacom said it planned to appeal against the decision. Google called the ruling "an important victory". 'Safe harbour' Viacom had claimed that "tens of thousands of videos" based on its copyrighted works had...

Appearing on Monday’s The Colbert Report on Comedy Central to promote his book, "The Promise," MSNBC political analyst Jonathan Alter – also of Newsweek – asserted that President Barack Obama had "prevented another Great Depression," and declared that Obama had it more difficult than Franklin Delano Roosevelt because he had to "sweep up" like a "shovel brigade" after President Bush, as he used a word that had to be bleeped out for airing. Alter: "He proceeded to make history almost right away, not only because he was the first African-American elected President ... we were all living history. This man...

F-bombs and Women Kissing at the MTV Movie Awards By Noel Sheppard Created 06/07/2010 - 12:30 As I walked into the Gibson Amphitheatre at Universal Studios Sunday evening, I had no idea the level of vulgarity I was in store for. Attending my first MTV Movie Awards, I was immediately stunned by the number of F-words in the opening video clip of Tom Cruise recreating his movie executive roll in the film "Tropic Thunder." Little did I know that the evening would be filled with F-bombs from a number of Hollywoodans, so much so that the man that accepted the...

NEW YORK--Conservative and religious groups that have long complained about the irreverent treatment of Christianity on Comedy Central have a new target: an animated series about Jesus Christ living in modern-day New York. It's unclear whether the show — one of 28 projects the network listed last month on its slate of potential programs for the coming season — will ever make it out of script development. But that hasn't stopped a coalition of media watchdog groups from launching an effort to persuade advertisers to boycott the project, if it ever comes to fruition. Here's a description of the show...

The 2012 Draft Sarah Committee has produced three videos titled “Summoned” calling for Gov. Palin to run for President in 2012. The videos produced by Randy Highsmith, Chairman 2012 Draft Sarah Committee, and Ron Devito, Publisher, US for Palin, come in 30- and 60-second TV ad spots and 2:51 version

Police in New York are investigating whether a car bomb in Times Square was targeted on the makers of South Park over a controversial depiction of the Prophet Muhammad.The device, which failed to detonate, was left near the offices of Viacom, which owns the irreverent cartoon series. Last month postings on an Islamic website warned the creators of South Park - Matt Stone and Trey Parker - that they could face violent reprisals after an episode of the show featured Muhammad in a bear suit. A posting on the website of a US-based group called Revolution Muslim warned Stone and...

For nearly 13 years, the irreverent -- to put it mildly -- cartoon show "South Park" has ridiculed every sacred convention in the book, from major religions and celebrities to gays and the physically disabled. Nearly every bit of over-the-top satire has outraged someone or some group and prompted calls for the show to be boycotted or even banned. And each time, for better or for worse, the program's network, Comedy Central, has stood firmly behind creator-producers Trey Parker and Matt Stone. Except when it comes to Islam and the prophet Mohammed. This week, to mark its 200th episode, "South...

The “South Park” creators, Matt Stone and Trey Parker, have issued a statement in response to Comedy Central’s decision to alter an episode after a Muslim group’s warning: In the 14 years we’ve been doing South Park we have never done a show that we couldn’t stand behind. We delivered our version of the show to Comedy Central and they made a determination to alter the episode. It wasn’t some meta-joke on our part. Comedy Central added the bleeps. In fact, Kyle’s customary final speech was about intimidation and fear. It didn’t mention Muhammad at all but it got bleeped...

Satirical animated TV show "South Park" beeped out the words Prophet Muhammad and plastered its Wednesday episode with the word "CENSORED" after being issued a grim warning by a U.S. Muslim group. The irreverent comedy show on Comedy Central also substituted a controversial image seen last week of the Prophet Muhammad in a bear outfit with one of Santa Claus in the same costume. It was not immediately clear if the move was a bid to tread carefully following the warning against the "South Park" creators, or if they were poking fun at the fuss.

NEW YORK -- Music videos are still valuable content for MTV, even though viewers' evolving tastes have required an expansion into reality and other shows, Van Toffler, president of Viacom's MTV Networks Music and Logo Group, said here Thursday. Asked about how good a business his firm's "Beatles: Rock Band" video game is, he said: "I believe it will sell forever, and it will be a good deal." The game has so far sold about a couple of million units, he said. Toffler made his comments during a keynote interview at the Billboard Music & Money Symposium here Thursday. Asked...