5 ms·

I may be lambasted for saying this, but I do not believe that Fox (or any large media company, really) should be permitted to purchase direct access to the TV h

I may be lambasted for saying this, but I do not believe that Fox (or any large media company, really) should be permitted to purchase direct access to the TV hardware of roughly 30-50% of american households.

airstrike 4mo ago
that law does not exist, probably because not enough people feel that way
- thinkingtoilet 4mo ago
  Your reasoning does not stand at all. There are plenty of things that the majority of people agree upon in this country but it does not get done for a variety of reasons. For example, it's not as important as other issues so they can't prioritize it for voting, gerrymandering, etc...
  - jsrozner 4mo ago
    or, you know, lobbying and oligarchy. great at changing outcomes even when the folks agree.
  - airstrike 4mo ago
    It literally does? Things that people care strongly about get prioritized. I said others don't feel like the OP. Maybe they agree with the point if presented with the choice, but again, they don't feel the same way, so they don't think, protest, comment, demand it in the way the OP does.
    - toss1 4mo ago
      More accurately, they adwquately don't give politicians the money and exercise the power of wealth. An extensive study [0], showed "Basically, average citizens only get what they want if economic elites or interest groups also want it" They studied actual attitudes about issues, moneyed attitudes, and tracked what got implemented as laws. NONE of the 'thinking, protesting, commenting, of demanding' was effective. MONEY was. [0] https://www.vox.com/2014/4/18/5624310/martin-gilens-testing-theories-of-american-politics-explained https://www.vox.com/2014/4/18/5624310/martin-gilens-testing-...
    - thinkingtoilet 4mo ago
      Not at all. I can feel very strongly about that, but if I feel more strongly about health care so tens of thousands of people don't die needlessly and countless millions more don't go bankrupt or get maimed from lack treatment, one is going to win over the other. That doesn't mean I don't feel strongly about it. Also, the 600,000 in Wyoming get the same two senators as the 40,000,000 people in California so it's not like there is equal representation by any means.
      - airstrike 4mo ago
        Like I said, not enough people care about it enough to push for legislation. And proportional representation is found in the House of Representatives. We have a bicameral legislature.
        kennywinker 4mo ago
        > not enough people care about it enough to push for legislation. This is a just-so-story. No matter how much people care you can always say they don’t care enough when the law doesn’t match what people want - and when the law does match it’s because they cared enough, no matter how much they actually cared. In practice, the laws don’t match what people want. But all that aside - the laws already exist to block this acquisition, the only thing that’s missing is enforcement.
        anjel 4mo ago
        The Constitution simply states that representation shall be based on population but doesn't specify a fixed cap. The number of Reps in the House was frozen by the Congressional apportionment Act of 1929. How is that proportional, a century of pop growth later?
- harimau777 4mo ago
  Or because the Epstein class has used their stranglehold of the media and politics to push that belief.
- Silamoth 4mo ago
  That’s a pretty naive model of how laws get passed in the US. A lot of laws would be different if your model held true.
- joshstrange 4mo ago
  s/people/money As if the will of the people is what matters... Only if those people are backed by money does matter. I don't agree with that, but that's the world we live in.
njovin 4mo ago
Much in the same way that the company selling tickets and taking a percentage of all ticket resales shouldn't also own the venues which can then force artists to use a specific ticketing provider, thus creating a monopoly. We have antitrust laws in the US but they do us absolutely no good when the government refuses to even consider enforcing them, which seems to be the case in the past few decades.
- mike_bob 4mo ago
  Biden passed some of the toughest anti-trust laws in the past 20 years, but Trump repealed them quite literally in the first month he returned to office, calling anti-trust legislation as "bad for business".
  - starik36 4mo ago
    The only entity that "passes" laws in this country is Congress. You mean via executive order? That's not exactly passing a law.
    - gmueckl 4mo ago
      Executive orders can effectively kneecap any efforts to put laws into effect, as we can see almost daily since 20. January 2025.
      - delecti 4mo ago
        No, quite the opposite. Laws can kneecap efforts to make executive orders (in contradiction with those laws). That's why he's lost in court so many times about so many of his orders.
        gmueckl 4mo ago
        This is ... charitable. Enforcing laws relies on courts which are only reacting slowly to a non-cooperarive administration, which gleefully ignores orders or practices malicious compliance after the damage has been done (and done as fast as possible). Judiciary enforcement is barely existant. The whole dance is really effective at keeping the administration one or two steps ahead of the judiciary and legislative branch.
TMWNN 4mo ago
RCA owned NBC until 1986, when it was bought by GE. GE soon exited the TV business, but retained NBC for another two decades.
kylehotchkiss 4mo ago
The Fox News audience has been told to passionately disagree with you.
Schiendelman 4mo ago
On the other hand, that would mean no Apple TV, no Fire TV stick... I suspect that would have downsides for the market.
- adamrezich 4mo ago
  There's a huge difference between making your own streaming box that people have to buy in order to use, and buying the company that makes the streaming box built into basically every new TV.
  - Schiendelman 4mo ago
    "Built into" - are you talking about them shipping with the app? What's the difference between that and the Apple TV, Prime Video, Netflix apps built into those TVs?
    - gonzalohm 4mo ago
      I think they are referring to the OS installed in the TV (Roku OS in this case)

airstrike 4mo ago

that law does not exist, probably because not enough people feel that way

thinkingtoilet 4mo ago
Your reasoning does not stand at all. There are plenty of things that the majority of people agree upon in this country but it does not get done for a variety of reasons. For example, it's not as important as other issues so they can't prioritize it for voting, gerrymandering, etc...
- jsrozner 4mo ago
  or, you know, lobbying and oligarchy. great at changing outcomes even when the folks agree.
- airstrike 4mo ago
  It literally does? Things that people care strongly about get prioritized. I said others don't feel like the OP. Maybe they agree with the point if presented with the choice, but again, they don't feel the same way, so they don't think, protest, comment, demand it in the way the OP does.
  - toss1 4mo ago
    More accurately, they adwquately don't give politicians the money and exercise the power of wealth. An extensive study [0], showed "Basically, average citizens only get what they want if economic elites or interest groups also want it" They studied actual attitudes about issues, moneyed attitudes, and tracked what got implemented as laws. NONE of the 'thinking, protesting, commenting, of demanding' was effective. MONEY was. [0] https://www.vox.com/2014/4/18/5624310/martin-gilens-testing-theories-of-american-politics-explained https://www.vox.com/2014/4/18/5624310/martin-gilens-testing-...
  - thinkingtoilet 4mo ago
    Not at all. I can feel very strongly about that, but if I feel more strongly about health care so tens of thousands of people don't die needlessly and countless millions more don't go bankrupt or get maimed from lack treatment, one is going to win over the other. That doesn't mean I don't feel strongly about it. Also, the 600,000 in Wyoming get the same two senators as the 40,000,000 people in California so it's not like there is equal representation by any means.
    - airstrike 4mo ago
      Like I said, not enough people care about it enough to push for legislation. And proportional representation is found in the House of Representatives. We have a bicameral legislature.
      - kennywinker 4mo ago
        > not enough people care about it enough to push for legislation. This is a just-so-story. No matter how much people care you can always say they don’t care enough when the law doesn’t match what people want - and when the law does match it’s because they cared enough, no matter how much they actually cared. In practice, the laws don’t match what people want. But all that aside - the laws already exist to block this acquisition, the only thing that’s missing is enforcement.
      - anjel 4mo ago
        The Constitution simply states that representation shall be based on population but doesn't specify a fixed cap. The number of Reps in the House was frozen by the Congressional apportionment Act of 1929. How is that proportional, a century of pop growth later?
harimau777 4mo ago
Or because the Epstein class has used their stranglehold of the media and politics to push that belief.
Silamoth 4mo ago
That’s a pretty naive model of how laws get passed in the US. A lot of laws would be different if your model held true.
joshstrange 4mo ago
s/people/money As if the will of the people is what matters... Only if those people are backed by money does matter. I don't agree with that, but that's the world we live in.

njovin 4mo ago

Much in the same way that the company selling tickets and taking a percentage of all ticket resales shouldn't also own the venues which can then force artists to use a specific ticketing provider, thus creating a monopoly. We have antitrust laws in the US but they do us absolutely no good when the government refuses to even consider enforcing them, which seems to be the case in the past few decades.

mike_bob 4mo ago
Biden passed some of the toughest anti-trust laws in the past 20 years, but Trump repealed them quite literally in the first month he returned to office, calling anti-trust legislation as "bad for business".
- starik36 4mo ago
  The only entity that "passes" laws in this country is Congress. You mean via executive order? That's not exactly passing a law.
  - gmueckl 4mo ago
    Executive orders can effectively kneecap any efforts to put laws into effect, as we can see almost daily since 20. January 2025.
    - delecti 4mo ago
      No, quite the opposite. Laws can kneecap efforts to make executive orders (in contradiction with those laws). That's why he's lost in court so many times about so many of his orders.
      - gmueckl 4mo ago
        This is ... charitable. Enforcing laws relies on courts which are only reacting slowly to a non-cooperarive administration, which gleefully ignores orders or practices malicious compliance after the damage has been done (and done as fast as possible). Judiciary enforcement is barely existant. The whole dance is really effective at keeping the administration one or two steps ahead of the judiciary and legislative branch.

TMWNN 4mo ago

RCA owned NBC until 1986, when it was bought by GE. GE soon exited the TV business, but retained NBC for another two decades.

kylehotchkiss 4mo ago

The Fox News audience has been told to passionately disagree with you.

Schiendelman 4mo ago

On the other hand, that would mean no Apple TV, no Fire TV stick... I suspect that would have downsides for the market.

adamrezich 4mo ago
There's a huge difference between making your own streaming box that people have to buy in order to use, and buying the company that makes the streaming box built into basically every new TV.
- Schiendelman 4mo ago
  "Built into" - are you talking about them shipping with the app? What's the difference between that and the Apple TV, Prime Video, Netflix apps built into those TVs?
  - gonzalohm 4mo ago
    I think they are referring to the OS installed in the TV (Roku OS in this case)