Media ownership is becoming increasingly consolidated by the day. The ostensible purpose is to achieve synergy & economy of scale for commercial advantage. But does it end there? What about the impact on news reporting, especially editorial comments? And the marketing-led changes in consumption which influence culture & local customs? As also the subtle, undesirable effects on freedom of speech?

After all, press, radio & television influence & control the average persons' understanding of themselves & their environment.

Most nations who have achieved independence in the last 50 years recall the role of their press in their freedom struggle. (In fact, some of these countries continue to favor their newspaper industry with sops & concessions!)

And most politicians have used Govt. controlled media for personal/party propaganda at one time or the other !

Result: Most democracies have some form of legislation pertaining to media consolidation. While some countries stress on fair competition as the purpose, others stress on regulating foreign control.

But governments' real concern is (obviously) to ensure dissenting political viewpoints by making sure that privately owned media are not held by a single entity.

Whether it is U.S.A. or U.K., Italy or India, there are 3 basic planks for regulations/laws pertaining to media ownership with the purpose to ensuring media diversity:
To prevent monopolistic control of a medium within a market
To limit cross-media ownership within markets
To control foreign direct investment in media companies

Current State
Here is a rough & ready reckoner of current media ownership laws in a few leading democracies along with the changes proposed:

	USA	U.K.	Italy	Japan	India
Foreign Direct Investment in media-owning companies	Not Regulated	Regulated	Not Regulated	Regulated	Regulated for Newspapers & News Channels
	No change Proposed	Vast Relaxation Proposed	No change Proposed	Vast Relaxation Proposed	No change Proposed
Monopolistic control of media ownership	Regulated	Regulated	Regulated	Regulated	Not Regulated
	Vast Relaxation Proposed	Vast Relaxation Proposed	Vast Relaxation Proposed	Relaxation Proposed	No change Proposed
Control on cross media ownership	Regulated	Regulated	Regulated	Regulated	Not Regulated
	Vast Relaxation Proposed - 1	Vast Relaxation Proposed - 2	Vast Relaxation Proposed - 3	Relaxation Proposed - 4	No change Proposed - 5

1. The U.S. regulatory body FCC has proposed to revise many existing rules that preserve media diversity. Rules which prevent the same entity from owning broadcast stations and daily newspapers in the same market. Rules which prevent one company from owning broadcast stations with more than 35% reach of U.S. households. And bars major networks from merging. However in response to public outcry, FCC has agreed to review it proposal.

2. The U.K. Communications Bill (proposed) is currently passing through the House of Lords. Expected to generate huge debate. And not without reason. In one fell swoop, the new bill does away with controls on FDI as well as cross-media ownership while introducing relaxations in monopolistic ownership of media within a market.

3. Italy is a special case. Not just because the P.M. (Berlusconi) owns Italy's largest private media empire. But more because of his notorious penchant to modify rules to favor his personal business! His recent attempts to relax existing regulations pertaining to cross media ownership as well as monopolistic ownership of media has run into rough weather with the Italian Parliament opposing tooth & nail.

4. The Japanese Govt. is taking cautious steps to "create an investment-friendly environment for ushering in digital TV ". To ease investments in media owning cos., it has announced plans to relax laws pertaining to mergers & acquisitions as well as FDI in media owning companies.

5. As the world's largest democracy, India stands out because she has no laws for regulating cross media ownership. Neither is there any law to prevent monopolistic ownership of media. Laws capping FDI in newspapers existed, whereas FDI in news channels have been capped at 26% recently.

Note: Both U.K. & Italy media owning cos. may fall under the purview of EU Laws for competition.

Media ownership laws may ensure balanced reporting
Sooner or later trans-national corporations will control all we see & hear on TV, radio & print media. The recent Gulf war has already demonstrated this: electronic & print media owned by single global media empires (stretching from Australia, across Asia, through Europe to include U.S.A.) have broadcast editorial comments & bias favoring one side. While this is possible with regional media, the impact of such an exercise carried out globally is nothing less than awesome.

Media ownership regulation can help control biased reporting on a national level. And each nation may contribute to building a global control model.