Mark Crispin Miller

Mark Crispin Miller is a media critic and professor of media studies at New York University. His books include Boxed In: The Culture of TV and The Bush Dyslexicon: Observations of a National Disorder. In the following viewpoint he argues that the growing control of the mass media—including television networks, radio stations, movie studios, and book and newspaper publishers—by a handful of large multinational corporations is a harmful development in American society. The interests of the public (especially poorer and working- class Americans) in political debate and serious journalism are being compromised by corporations more interested in making money than in informing the populace.

As you read, consider the following questions:

1. Does Miller describe the problem of media ownership concentration as an old or new problem?
2. How has...