Okay, it's just that you come across as very disparaging about regulation, for instance when you say that calling for it is 'whining'. You sound like (honestly, not a joke) more of a libertarian than a LibDem.Digby wrote:I think oligopolies are likely to be problematic, and I'm a Lib Dem partly because I believe in a regulated market. Still I don't put my faith in the current government legislating for the good in this, so I don't consider hoping for improved regulation to be any more useful than hoping for a lottery win.Son of Mathonwy wrote:Obviously. But that's like saying that it's against Xi Jinping's interests to introduce democracy to China. Obviously true, but does that mean that the Chinese people should not want him to? Or that it's not, nonetheless, the right thing for him to do?Digby wrote: Why would the Tories implement regulation against their interests? And if that's the case you need to win power, and the point about winning power is it's being noted would be easier with more favourable media.That's the strange thing. You say that you're a LibDem, but you come across as an anti-regulation neo-capitalist. If you're a LibDem, don't you believe in regulation? Don't you want to break up an oligopoly?I think fwiw it's a big problem, I'm just expecting someone needs to do something about it not hope someone does something about it for them
I'm used of course to arguing a case and getting nowhere, just a fringe benefit of being a Lib Dem member. But it is what it is, we either do better or we continue to be something of an irrelevance. Just because we think we have some good ideas doesn't mean shit
And anyway, nothing is stopping people trying to build media options, other than mostly people cannot be bothered. And some better media outlets would be better. And yet despite complaining for decades about the unfairness of the media the left (including the Lib Dems for those like myself who'd consider them centre let) do nothing about it, granted sometimes they try, but even when they try they fail. And to succeed you need to win, which leaves trying again and being better as really the only practical option for mine. Or you could hope to win the lottery
Agreed that hoping for better regulation under this government is like hoping for a lottery win. But it narrows the terms of the debate enormously if we only consider things that can be done, in this term, by those not in government. In fact it makes it impossible to criticize the government.
So, yeah, If we limit the scope of the discussion as above I agree that one of the best options in that short term is for the left to develop their own media voice in some way. However, in the longer term, even if this project were to be fabulously successful and create a left wing tabloid to rival the Sun, this would hardly be the complete solution to the problem. It would improve balance in newspapers, but they would still be projecting the opinions of a tiny number of billionaires to a large section of the population. What we actually need is to remove any single person from such a position of power, and that can only be done by regulation. Additionally, we would improve matters dramatically if 'news' and 'opinions' were strictly separated in newspapers and 'news' be subject to strong rules of impartiality (as they are in television), which would also require regulation.