Concentration of media ownership

Concentration of media ownership means that fewer and fewer people or companies own more and more of the news and entertainment sources we rely on. Like how you might have lots of toys but only one or two favorite ones, some companies have lots of different media outlets, but only a few that make most of the money.

For example, imagine you have ten different ice cream flavors, and you like three of them the most. Now imagine you can only eat one flavor of ice cream forever. That's kind of what's happening with media ownership: we used to have lots of different news sources and TV shows and movies to choose from, but more and more of them are owned by the same companies.

When this happens, those few companies get to decide which stories get told and how they're told. It's like having only a few teachers who decide what everyone learns in school. That might be okay if those teachers have good intentions and teach everyone a variety of subjects, but if they only teach things that they personally like or that help their friends, then everyone else misses out.

There are other concerns with concentration of media ownership too, like how it can limit competition and innovation or how it can lead to biased news coverage. Like any problem, there are ways to address it, but it's important to understand what's going on first.