Week 6 Lecture

“Advertisers are the real customers of a commercial media organisation, not its readers, viewers or listeners.”

This week’s lecture was about Commercial Media. Commercial media organisations are non-government funded organisations that aim to make a profit through selling advertising to their audience.

Major players in the commercial media arena include:

· News Limited

· Fairfax Media

· APN News & Media

· Southern Cross Broadcasting

· WIN Corporation

· Seven West Media

· Ten

· Nine Entertainment Co.

These companies produce a range of different media, such as television, newspapers, films, books, sports, advertising, magazines, and cable television. The commercial media industry is basically a competition - who can bring in the most advertisers? This brings up the point; can these companies be trusted to accurately and fairly portray news and other events, when their main goal is to make a profit?

In answer to the above question, commercial media companies have to meet certain legal requirements, formal state requirements and are overseen by the state to make sure everything is kosher.

But despite these requirements, commercial media players still manage to do the wrong thing. For example, Rupert Murdoch’s 2011 phone hacking scandal, in which it was revealed that the phones of the British Royal Family, celebrities, politicians were hacked and accessed by News of the World employees. Public outcry ensued when it was unearthed that employees had also hacked the phones of a murdered schoolgirl, deceased soldiers and victims of the London Bombings. The following video shows Rupert and James Murdoch giving a statement about the scandal:

Murdoch's defence for the hackings was that News of the World accounts for less than 1% of his company and that he employs many other ethical people. This shows that commercial media companies' only aim is to gain the biggest audience in order to profit from their true customers ... advertisers.