Don't Like the News? Make Your Own.

October 6, 2021 3:17 PM

A Reuters special report is out detailing AT&T's involvement in the creation of the far right news outlet OAN.
posted by Dr. Twist (34 comments total)

Wait… AT&T owns CNN, don't they?
posted by bz at 3:27 PM on October 6, 2021 [2 favorites]

Yes

something something Sheman Antitrust Act (little dominos) -> seditionist pillow salesman infomercials (big dominos)
posted by RobotVoodooPower at 3:32 PM on October 6, 2021 [14 favorites]

The consequences of the Trump FCC's failure to enforce antitrust and communications laws will last for decades.
posted by They sucked his brains out! at 3:34 PM on October 6, 2021 [5 favorites]

OAN actually ran the Reuters story for a short time.
posted by RobotVoodooPower at 3:36 PM on October 6, 2021 [12 favorites]

Don't Like the News? Make Your OAN.
posted by It's Raining Florence Henderson at 3:42 PM on October 6, 2021 [55 favorites]

Will the viewers of the new outlet be known as OnANists?

(in my head at least, yes)
posted by Greg_Ace at 3:48 PM on October 6, 2021 [11 favorites]

Don't Like the News? Make Your OAN.

dammit, that's SO MUCH better
posted by Dr. Twist at 3:53 PM on October 6, 2021 [14 favorites]

The article states that ATT regarded 7 existing networks as left-wing and promoted OAN as a right-wing alternative to Fox. That raises the question of what these 7 channels/networks were, the so-called left-wing in ATT’s opinion. IMO, there’s really no left-wing network. There is the usual center right Dem/corporate/neoliberal spin, but when was the last time you heard a Marxist or even a Labour take on the US news? Evah?
posted by sudogeek at 3:59 PM on October 6, 2021 [39 favorites]

That raises the question of what these 7 channels/networks were...

There are the three broadcast networks, NBC, CBS, and ABC. Then there’s CNN. After that, probably NPR/PBS, CNBC, and MSNBC.
posted by Thorzdad at 4:11 PM on October 6, 2021 [2 favorites]

If Americans had a conscience AT&T would be out of business inside of a month.

But it doesn't, so nothing -- NOTHING -- will change.
posted by dobbs at 4:14 PM on October 6, 2021 [4 favorites]

AT&T is in the middle of spinning off WarnerMedia. I think it’s being bundled with Discovery to make huge media company. The Warner acquisition has been a huge fiasco for them.
posted by interogative mood at 4:24 PM on October 6, 2021 [1 favorite]

there’s really no left-wing network.

Yeah, but from where the modern GQP sits, anyone who questions Trump, believes in vaccines/masks, or acknowledges climate change counts as “left wing.”

Letting experts talk in interviews? Appealing to logic and/or empathy? Reporting any actual news, instead of absurd Gary Stu fanfic about a septuagenarian toddler?

Welcome to the left wing.

We offer mild, medium, and extra-medium wing sauce, and we feature live smooth jazz on Thursday nights.
posted by armeowda at 4:45 PM on October 6, 2021 [22 favorites]

There is some number N such that any privately owned or publicly traded company with greater than N employees should be immediately dissolved and have all its assets turned over to its workers and/or the public trust, depending on whether it operates as a natural monopoly or other form of utility. I'm not sure what N is, but I know that it's finite and almost certainly less than the size of the largest privately owned or publicly traded company in the US, and probably less than the size of AT&T.

I'm sure there are many practical reasons why such a policy cannot or should not be implemented, but in a more perfect world it would be.
posted by biogeo at 4:46 PM on October 6, 2021 [6 favorites]

AT&T is actually an assumed name for Southwestern Bell, which was one of the way-back-when AT&T spin-offs. The whole damn original break-up has spun around and swallowed itself.
posted by PhineasGage at 4:47 PM on October 6, 2021 [17 favorites]

I think Dominion Voting Systems may have just suddenly increased their request for damages.
posted by TheWhiteSkull at 4:57 PM on October 6, 2021 [13 favorites]

Appealing to logic and/or empathy?

They don't have to care, they're the phone company
posted by I paid money to offer this... insight? at 5:07 PM on October 6, 2021 [29 favorites]

The consequences of the Trump FCC's failure to enforce antitrust and communications laws will last for decades.

Meanwhile, President Biden for some reason still hasn’t nominated a new FCC commissioner, which leaves the commission currently in a 2–2 deadlock, and could even lead to a 2–1 Republican majority when one Democratic commissioner’s term expires in a few months.
posted by mbrubeck at 5:29 PM on October 6, 2021 [16 favorites]

there’s really no left-wing network.

I myself am (quite) left of the American left; but I do not readily consume overt leftist media just because you end up getting to the same place. It doesn't matter if you're listening to like the Tom Hartman hour or old Rush Limbaugh reruns: everyone eventually sounds like they're calling into Coast to Coast AM with Art fucking Bell on time traveler night.

My (much loved) micropower local radio station has some left wing shows on it. I've given jacobin's podcast a couple of honest attempts too. They both end up just leaving me feeling like I've watched Fox News, and I fucking agree with what they're (trying) to say most of the time (the rest of the time it's mostly incoherent...why let people call into radio shows at all?).

I think it's a safe critique that the far left is way better at zines than the right is.
posted by furnace.heart at 5:31 PM on October 6, 2021 [16 favorites]

"One of their human specimens, an editor from a major US newspaper, was demonstrating their website when it became clear that he had lost the room.
"And one person finally says, ‘is that screen indicative or is that the news now?’ And he said ‘Yeah, that’s live.’ And we all look up at the screen and it says, ‘IRA announce ceasefire’. And in that one moment everybody in the room went ‘OK, we get this now.’”
posted by clavdivs at 5:59 PM on October 6, 2021

when was the last time you heard a Marxist or even a Labour take on the US news? Evah?

Democracy Now! has been broadcast on the Free Speech TV channel for decades. It's worth checking out if you want to see something that is quite different from what most are used to as news.
posted by hippybear at 6:11 PM on October 6, 2021 [7 favorites]

"If Adolf Hitler flew in today
They'd send a limousine anyway"

The Clash, White Man in Hammersmith Palais
posted by gimonca at 7:19 PM on October 6, 2021 [2 favorites]

Ah, good ol' AT&T...
posted by latkes at 7:40 PM on October 6, 2021 [1 favorite]

I have no comment at this time except to say that Friday is my last day at AT&T.
posted by RustyBrooks at 8:17 PM on October 6, 2021 [21 favorites]

If Americans had a conscience AT&T would be out of business inside of a month.

If Americans had more choice in telephone carriers and/or internet providers, maybe.
posted by Apocryphon at 8:22 PM on October 6, 2021 [9 favorites]

I think [leftwing] was not what the interviewee said, they said "the other side" which is more accurate, since the ideology is secondary to the grift.

And you really can't call PBS leftwing, the network whose most popular show is people who auction off family heirlooms / stolen artifacts to anonymous millionaires
posted by RobotVoodooPower at 8:27 PM on October 6, 2021 [5 favorites]

And I gotta point out that Roku runs OAN / Real America's Voice too. It's interesting to settle into your AirBnb, flip on the TV and meditate on what decisions Germans had to make about when to leave their country when they saw certain things.
posted by RobotVoodooPower at 8:30 PM on October 6, 2021 [2 favorites]

Now, I'm dying to know what show you're watching on RBS, RobotVoodooPower. If you're referring to Antiques Roadshow, we have very different ways of viewing content and interpreting it.
posted by sardonyx at 8:59 PM on October 6, 2021 [3 favorites]

Speaking of questionable creations, OANN (One America News Network) rhymes with the awkward Biblical story of Onan (who selfishly committed coitus interruptus and suffered the unfortunate consequences).
posted by cenoxo at 9:07 PM on October 6, 2021

thatwasthejoke ;)
posted by Greg_Ace at 9:42 PM on October 6, 2021 [1 favorite]

The article states that ATT regarded 7 existing networks as left-wing and promoted OAN as a right-wing alternative to Fox. That raises the question of what these 7 channels/networks were, the so-called left-wing in ATT’s opinion. IMO, there’s really no left-wing network. There is the usual center right Dem/corporate/neoliberal spin, but when was the last time you heard a Marxist or even a Labour take on the US news? Evah?

I think the "mainstream media is all a bunch of leftist commies!" rhetoric is all about moving the Overton Window. We think of it as primarily being about how broadening the window on one end makes more and more radical ideas on that end seem acceptable. But narrowing the window on the other end -- painting even centrist or moderate ideas as hard left makes genuinely leftist ideas seem like the lunatic ravings of the outer fringes.
posted by jacquilynne at 6:15 AM on October 7, 2021 [5 favorites]

I got rid of ATT back when they started spying on Americans for the Bush administration in 2003. Too bad more people didn't do the same.
posted by ambulocetus at 6:42 AM on October 7, 2021 [2 favorites]

And you really can't call PBS leftwing, the network whose most popular show is people who auction off family heirlooms / stolen artifacts to anonymous millionaires

Apparently my assumptions regarding what Downton Abbey is about are completely incorrect.
posted by a box and a stick and a string and a bear at 9:02 AM on October 7, 2021 [8 favorites]

when was the last time you heard a Marxist or even a Labour take on the US news? Evah?

If you listen to KPFA long enough over the course of a day, you will almost certainly hear those views espoused by a commentator or guest.
posted by JDC8 at 2:44 PM on October 8, 2021

President Biden for some reason still hasn’t nominated a new FCC commissioner

Update: Biden finally nominates FCC chair and new commissioner.
posted by mbrubeck at 3:34 PM on October 26, 2021