Transnational corporations

So this post will be dedicated to expanding on what we learned/discussed in class about transnational corporations, focusing upon Time Warner foremost because they were the larger company behind the release of my case-study subject film "Sex And The City"

We learned that the majority of the worlds media is controlled by a small number of primarily US based companies who to a certain extent; have the power between them to influence what we view everyday via the media. But how dangerous is this? When you think about it, the media is more-or-less a part of almost everything in day-to-day life nowadays. From adverts on the interior and exterior of buses, to the news reports and findings we switch on at night time: apart from word of mouth we wouldn't really be aware of what's going on in the world if it wasn't for the all "amazing" media and technological advances of the 21st century. I'm kinda going off on a tangent and i'll probably do so in the rest of this post here but i feel it's necessary (;


Back to Hollywood for abit; the top Hollywood studios are:
-Pixar
-Disney
-Universal
-Paramount
-Colombia Tristar
-20th Century Fox
-Dreamworks
-Warner Brothers
-Fox

But most of these studios are governed by a higher power. An example would be Paramount, they are owned and run by the Viacom corporation.

But, overall the top five biggest Media giants of the world (not just hollywood) are the following:

1- Time Warner
2- Disney
3- Bertelsmann (A corporation more based in Europe)
4- Viacom
5- News Corporation (Rupert Murdoch)

But but but lets concentrats on Time Warner. Time warner forged in in 1989 when Time Inc and Warner communications merged. At the moment Time Warner has almost become a fully global company, with well over two hundred subsidaries worldwide. Here are some of Time Warners select holdings:

- The largest cable system in the US
- Alot of Global and US television channels, such as cartoon network, CNN, and many others.
- Warner Brothers and New Line Cinema film studios
- Fifty percent of DC comics, publishers of spiderman
- Six Flags theme park chain
- All AOL products (AOL purchased Time Warner in 2000)

Here is a list of all the assets owned by Time Warner:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_assets_owned_by_Time_Warner

When i read the big long list i couldn't help but think "What the hell?"
How the hell does one large company run so many other companies? But hey i don't mind, but it is kinda scary the thought that the CEO of Time Warner has (to a certain extent) complete control of all the outgoings from Time Warner.
And they own Loaded and Marie Claire magazines! So many things are all influenced and run by this sodding big greedy company, i would have never had a clud of any of this if it wasn't for film o_0



I liked this page and how it kinda explained all of the "big players" in the media world, albeit it is from nearly ten years ago:

www.fair.org/index.php?page=1406

But, no matter how hard you debate or try and detest; is it inevitable for mainstream society nowadays to become manipulated by the mass media corporations? With the rise of the internet also comes with many subversive people who can easily express their opinions to a broader audience on the whole notion of the world being somewhat "taken over" or manipulated by these media moguls. But in all fairness, if you were never really aware it was happening in the first place and were happy to go along with it; then why should you complain? I kind of think it should be considered in human rights and ethics somewhat, because in all honesty i dont wana see some make-up'd celebrity flicking their hair telling me to kill my hair with dye because "im worth it", or see some bullshit advert about compensation. I don't believe people should have to see all this crap on a daily basis, but if i elaborate upon all of this then i can see myself becoming contradictory and easily open to counter-arguments so i'll just leave my opinion here.

But there we go, the end of a moderately short post, and i spoke to a teacher via Facebook chat tonight! That was something new.

Happy 2009.