Headline, March 29, 2005:
MoveOn.org has purchased the New York Times Corporation
Major shakeup of media giant leaves managerial, editorial staff, several lead reporters stunned, shocked...and out of a job.
AP News (New York City) Okrent, Collins, Friedman, Safire, Miller, Nagourney, Brooks...some names are well-known, others known only to insiders and media fanatics. Now they share one thing - they're all fired!
Do you like the sound of this headline and news story???
Then read on.
Short and sweet, my proposal is a strategic and tactical outline for a means of buying out, taking over, and repossessing a media outlet, or outlets...like the New York Times...firing the bozos we all keep writing so critically, funnily and scathingly accurately about.
As many of you here know, I have been harping on the media control, media conglomerates, and media whores for a long time in this space.
Many many others are doing the same, most better than me.
There are entire blogs, collectives, and bookshelves devoted to media criticism, fact-checking, connections and incestuous linkages checking, hypocrisy alerts, whore of the year awards, word counts, contextualization checks...so numerous, so good, so on target...
And yet...and yet...we can criticize, harp on, fact check till we are blue in the face.
And it will change little or nothing, because we do not have POWER. We do not OWN a media outlet. We do not control who is hired or fired, who does what, who reports where, and what the standards for fact-checking, sourcing, reportage, tone, spin, and so on.
read on - it's long...but dammit, it's important, it's legal, it's possible, and what a massive incredible victory it would be!
Outline of a proposal for distributed buyback and takeover of media outlets, with some key observations, strategies, and questions.
"Repossessing" the media: Leveling the information playing field.
1) The problem we (Democrats, Liberals, Progressives, the "left") face, and will continue to face is lack of unfettered access to major media to get our ideas and our perspective aired.
Some encouraging signs...
We (the liberal, progressive, and leftward-leaning political sphere) have seen, by now, that internet activism can be extremely powerful in certain venues, and in certain aspects of political/social organizing. Through examples including, but not limited to,
a) MoveOn.org ad campaigns, fundraising, demonstration and petition drives
b) Howard Dean's (and John McCain's) presidential campaigns,
c) (on a smaller scale) the online contributions to the victory of Ben Chandler in Kentucky,
d) recent online contributions to John Kerry's presidential campaign.
We have seen that we, the online liberal/progressive/left can win some battles, we can influence politics, policies, and perceptions, and that we CAN contribute as individuals and as groups, literally (in terms of dollars or in terms of content), figuratively (philosophy) and substantively (reporting, research, debunking).
Media criticism, watch-dogging, and analysis have reached all-time heights as evidenced by the success of sites like TheDailyHowler, MediaWhoresOnline, Atrios, Hesiod, DailyKos, ThisModernWorld, TakeBackTheMedia, MetaFilter, Eric Alterman's blog, Josh Marshall's blog, Calpundit/PoliticalAnimal (Kevin Drumm), Billmon's Whiskey Bar, Brad Delong, and others. These sites have helped raise awareness, produce cogent criticism, temper and craft sharp responses, and have helped pave the way toward an objective Fourth Estate...
...And the depressing reality
At the same time, we have also seen, experienced, and run headlong into the limitations of these methods, this mode and the internet medium as tools for combating the ongoing rightward drift in the media.
While we have grown our effectiveness, we have reached people, we have contributed and thereby attracted people looking for help (Chandler, for example), we have begun to "hit the wall" - and in many ways it is an inherent "firewall" built into the structure of modern media ownership, conglomeration, and interpenetration. Seymour Hersh, in describing the passing of intelligence through "stovepipes" that bypassed the CIA, DIA, and Army War College and went direct from people like Chalabi and the Iraqi National Congress to the "White House Iraq Group" and the "Office of Special Plans" used the phrase "incestuous amplification" when describing the overall effect of such practice. I think that the current media climate is a larger-scale version of the same thing, whereby the media "stovepipes" particular themes and moods and "facts" (that really are not facts) to the American public, and operates as a means of "incestuous amplification" for particular perspectives, fact sets, and moods. Other phrases circulating that describe this effect include "the Mighty Wurlitzer" and "the Echo Chamber."
The spectacular rise and fall of DeanForAmerica showed us that a committed core of support and the ability to use the Internet to raise money and organize on-the-ground activities did not translate into votes.
Attempts by MoveOn (and MediaFund and Center for American Progress, and others) to air advertisements have showed us that well-organized, well produced, high-quality information dispersal is for naught, or can be significantly muted if the product (the Ad) is not placed where people can see it (CBS superbowl programming).
The money for the ad buys was there, but the money was refused. The ads were high quality, but the air-time was refused...
More recently, Moveon and the others mentioned are airing a series of ads criticizing Bush in response to his recent (and extremely offensive and divisive) 10 million dollar media blitz...we have now seen the RNC, using the FCC, to try and...again...censor these ads and their content.
We have also seen Howard Stern, hardly a liberal or progressive, get taken off the air by ClearChannel under the cover of "decency" - in a clearly hypocritical move brought on by Stern's open criticism of Bush...the only real difference in terms of content, quality or "decency" between Stern and Dr. Laura, or Savage, or Rush Limbaugh.
All of these examples show that our messages were ready to transmit, but the medium was not prepared or willing to carry those messages.
Where does this lead me?
2) Restating the problem in short: We are STILL preaching to the choir.
In many respects, while we on the liberal/progressive/left have certainly expanded our base, while we have certainly grown the community and increased its visibility, support, and power through online activities....
We are still preaching to the choir. The choir is larger, its voice is louder, its range is greater... but it is still the choir.
Major media outlets (television, radio (especially AM radio, and newsprint/magazines) reach more people, reach a broader spectrum, and is still more "passive" - they do not require sitting down at a computer, searching the web, building a database of links, favorites, and etc.
I think the "passive media" aspect is the most important piece of the puzzle, at least for the moment. The Internet requires active participation - getting an internet hook-up, turning on the computer, going online, searching out the news sites...at the least. Finding the sources for media criticism and alternative news (other than the online recapitulations of TV and News (CNN, MSNBC, NYTimes, Washington Post, FoxNews and the other news websites) requires yet another level of action, another degree of commitment, and one more series of steps and searches.
Most people in American do not have an internet connection, and of those that do, most do not have a "hot list" of thirty (or more) websites that they browse every morning for news and views and commentary. Most people read the newspaper in the AM, listen to the radio on their way to work (or at work), and watch the TV news in the PM.
Therefore, after the above lengthy backgrounder, I come to the following "modest proposal"...
3) Proposed - to buy out a major media outlet through cooperative combination.
Basically, the Democrats/Liberals/Progressives/Left, will never get a fair hearing or be able to "get our message out" in the current media climate...please refer to recent headlines in the NYTimes regarding the "jobs report that gives ammunition to both sides" an obvious and blatant false spin on a jobs report that is unquestionably miserable for Bush and the GOP, and unquestionably supportive of critics like MoveOn)...or refer to the censoring of MoveOn ads by CBS, or the current attempt to censor MoveOn ads by the RNC and the FCC...or the censoring of Howard Stern...or the "spin" put on each and every report or interview or statistic regarding Iraq, the War on Terror, the Elections in Spain, the "Casualty Count" and so on. Consider the reportage on Clarke, Rice, Tenet, Frist, Bush, and the recent fracas - honest reporting of events and statements of such magnitude would most likely have resulted in massive anger and calls for resignations - if not arrests, litigations, or lynching...
I suggest that above and beyond media criticism (see FAIR, takebackthemedia, MWO, dailyhowler, and so on)...we need to "repossess" the media. We need to definitively and incontrovertibly own, control, and use our own media outlet to remake the political "playing field" - this is being tried on a couple of fronts, most specifically Al Gore's attempt to buy a cable news network...an effort that is being stymied by the owner's refusal to sell. I think the proposal I have outlined below is a better tactic to achieve that aim.
4) Outline of planned action.
The basic principle is one of distributed cooperative action.
A) Form an Investment Club ( http://www.sec.gov/investor/pubs/invclub.htm ) and duly register it under the proper laws regarding such clubs.
B) Do the research on a particular media company, outlet, or corporation, for example
- The New York Times http://finance.yahoo.com/q?s=NYT
- Clear Channel http://finance.yahoo.com/q/ks?s=CCU
- CoxRadio http://finance.yahoo.com/q/ks?s=CXR
- CitadelBroadcasting http://finance.yahoo.com/q/ks?s=CDL
- JournalRegister http://finance.yahoo.com/q/pr?s=jrc
- DowJones http://finance.yahoo.com/q/ks?s=DJ
- ScrippsHoward http://finance.yahoo.com/q/pr?s=ssp
- WashingtonPost http://finance.yahoo.com/q/ks?s=WPO
determine the number of shares, the largest blocs of shares and their holders (individual, institutional), the outstanding debts and the leveraging potential, and calculate the volume of shares we need to control in order to:
1) obtain a controlling share and conduct a hostile takeover,
2) obtain a large enough bloc of shares to directly influence or control the board of directors,
3) obtain a large share over a long period of time and sell it in a short period of time
C) Create a central location (website) to attract participants, coordinate individuals, conduct tallying and accounting, signing up, and so on. This central location would consist of
1) an informational section, outlining this proposal and background;
2) a research section, outlining the nuts and bolts of the program and the target(s)
3) a resources section, with links to legal, economic, financial, and functional tools
a) links to the SEC laws pertaining to our activity
b) example legal documents such as the ceding of control over shares to a proxy (see below)
c) links to information on the finances and structure of the target institution, corporation, or media company
d) links to online trading tools and groups
4) a progress section, in which the current and ongoing status of the project is updated and maintained
5) a "politics and current criticisms" section that would provide data and examples outlining the background, current sorry estate of the Fourth Estate, political reality, and the trap we are in...this section would primarily link to the existing high-quality media criticism and media watch Internet sites and sources.
D) Plan out a buying strategy and schedule based on sign-ups, registration, ceding of shares, and timing the market. Those individuals who want to join and have no current stock in the target company could sign up for a date to purchase their stock based on alphabetical order, date of sign-up, or some scheme to distribute the purchase. Distributing the purchase is important to keep the share price down and to prevent too much attention to our project too early in the game. Those individuals who wish to participate who already own shares in the target company could simply cede control of those shares as per the SEC procedure outlined below.
E) Conduct the buy, one, five, ten, fifty, one hundred shares at a time, and keep track of the total and the aggregate percentage share....all done over time to prevent the price from rising too high and to prevent getting too much notice. It is absolutely crucial at this time to mention, highlight, emphasize and stress the following basic points:
1) That this project is based on individual purchases of stock, by individuals, with their own money.
2) That by ceding control over the voting rights to their shares, people ARE NOT ceding away their stock, ARE NOT donating money or shares, and WILL ALWAYS retain ownership of, profits (or losses) from, interest on, taxes on, and rights to their stock.
This is not a charity venture. The stock will remain the property of the purchaser. Should this project succeed, they would have all the basic rights of a stock owner in a corporation. Should this project fail, they would retain the right to sell their stock or keep it, to realize a profit, or sustain a loss on the stock they purchased. At worst, I imagine that people might lose a few percent on the value of the stock purchased...however, if we can organize a large enough number of people, each individual would only need to purchase a small number of shares...limiting risk.
3) That if this project is successful, people would (via the website) have input as to the direction, composition, structure, personnel, and philosophy of the Board, the Editorial and Managerial staff, and the overall content of the media outlet captured.
F) We work out the procedure for Ceding stock or shares or control ( http://www.sec.gov/cgi-bin/txt-srch-sec?text=proxy&x=0&y=0 ) of the shares we own as individuals to a holding company or proxy in order to affect those policies and obtain the goals outlined. Ceding shares via legally sanctioned channels to a designated proxy will precede the actions taken by that proxy, and those actions will be determined in entirety by the volume of shares we control with respect to the overall company structure.
G) That proxy, once control over the shares has been ceded, will then engage in
1) hostile takeover or buyout ("you're ALL FIRED!!") (best case, success scenario)
2) influence corporate direction, personnel, and/or policy (For example see Eisner's recent humiliation at Disney via shareholder revolt) (middling case, some results scenario)
3) the decimation of the stock price via bulk sell-off (worst case, reset and try again scenario)
5) Conclusion, some thoughts and some generally optimistic observations
I realize that such a project as I outlined has a lot of potential legal, financial, and organizational pitfalls, and it may wind up being impracticable on the scale that I dream of (who WOULDN'T want to own the NYTimes or the Washington Post??). However, I have including the links some companies' (potential targets) financial information as benchmarks, while keeping in mind that smaller, more vulnerable targets - a regional or local paper in a key district, AM radio station, small television network or distributor, a wire service, or etc may be more immediately practicable both in terms of finances and in terms of demonstrating the feasibility of the project. Then again, aim for the stars, and we might get to the moon, right?
I also recognize that my knowledge of the nuts and bolts of this kind of operation are lacking in the key areas of finance and securities law...however, I am in the process of personally researching the legal ramifications and getting advice from a long-time market player.
Also, in terms of scope and scale, I invite you to keep in mind the following "back of the envelope calculations" coupled with some observations.
The readership of MoveOn, DailyKos, TalkingPointsMemo, MediaWhoresOnline, Atrios (Eschaton), Hesiod(CounterspinCentral), ThisModernWorld, TakeBackTheMedia, DemocraticUnderground, Billmon, ThisModernWorld, Calpundit, BradDelong, and the general "left blogosphere" is very, very large - probably numbering in the millions (possibly tens of millions??) in aggregate.
Last fall, more than ten million people were organized in a coordinated, worldwide, single-day event...largely or at least in significant part over the internet.
Last fall, MoveOn submitted 1 million signatures to congress...signatures collected in ONE week, over the internet.
There is a LOT of interest overseas in helping the American Liberal and Left, and there are NO laws banning foreign ownership of corporate stock.
The NYTimes (for example) has a market cap of ~7 billion dollars - 10 million people buying 700 dollars worth of stock each could buy it ALL...ALL of it...
And we don't need to buy it all to get a LOT of power in such a corporation. In the case of the New York Times, for example, the largest single bloc of stock owned by an individual or institution is about 10% of the total stock volume. If we could get 25% of the stock, we could boot them all.
(Keep saying that over and over in your head, and you will soon walk around muttering and twitching like I have been recently!)
This procedure is perfectly legal...the basis for organizing, buying, and coordinating already exists, and links to such an enterprise could easily be promulgated and coordinated using blogads, blog links, a "special campaign", or links, or whatever.
We don't really know if such an undertaking would work, mainly because no one has ever tried it!!!
If it did NOT work, the worst we could do is have a large number of liberals and progressives with shares of stock in a corporation, entitling us to go to the shareholders meetings and cause a ruckus - that is the "pester factor" -a time honored practice in political activism.
If it did NOT work, we could all sell our shares on an agreed upon date, get our investment back (plus or minus a few percentage points) and be none the poorer...and potentially cause some heartburn in some boardrooms.
And if it DID work...ooooooh...talk about generating some serious fear, gaining some serious clout, and causing a whole lot of trouble!!
And we could BUY OUT a media outlet and run whatever damned ads hire whatever reporters and editors, fire the losers, change wire services, run the cartoons we wanted, whenever we wanted!!
If you find this proposal interesting, please pass it on, please think about ways to make it better, and please keep your eyes and ears peeled - I and some compadres are in the process of designing and implementing a web site devoted to this project...
We will combine the website and this proposal and start "marketing" the idea to some of the movers and shakers in the online community of active progressives who want to make a difference...MoveOn, MediaFund, CAP, Soros, and etc...
After all, you never know...
And...think of the headlines...
MoveOn.org purchases New York Times Corporation...
Yow!