Those who have followed The Post and Couriers ongoing Uncovered series realize that its about more than stories of state and local officials abusing the public trust; its also about how residents, voters and others struggle mightily these days to learn about this abuse and hold their officials accountable, partly because of the erosion of local newspapers.
Our media landscape has changed dramatically because of technological forces bigger than anyone in the state; the internet, including Big Tech companies such as Google and Facebook, disseminate local news, but not in a way that adequately benefits the companies that did the hard and expensive work to break the news in the first place. As a result, there may be more content than ever online, but increasingly less of it is reliable local news. Its been a downward spiral for years and remains so.
At least 26 weekly South Carolina papers have shut down since 2007, and while 17 new weeklies have started up since then, many of them serve larger metro areas that already have news outlets. Across the country, about 300 news operations have closed in the past two years.
Congress has an important opportunity to help one that not only would advance high-quality local journalism across the country but also would improve local communities because of the additional transparency and accountability such journalism provides. Thats why we urge Sens. Tim Scott and Lindsey Graham, Reps. Nancy Mace and Jim Clyburn, and all other members of South Carolinas congressional delegation to lend their support to the Journalism Competition and Preservation Act, also known as the Safe Harbor Bill.
In 2018, Google and Facebook had nearly four times as much revenue as all of our nations TV stations, newspapers and digital outlets combined. Those two companies currently get about 80% of digital advertising spending and 45% of all ad spending; its one reason some newspapers, including this one, have begun fundraising drives to subsidize their investigative reporting and routine journalism.
But while Google and Facebook must pay to license music and other types of content, they have refused to fairly compensate companies that produce local journalism. The bill before Congress would let publishers that provide the information that sustains communities organize to bargain better with Big Tech. (Pre-internet antitrust laws currently protect Big Tech from local news publishers trying to take any such collective action.)
As anyone who has read the Uncovered series and so many other important, relevant news stories in these pages likely realizes, this battle is not about benefiting our company as much as it is about benefiting the entire community all of us.
Good, honest, open government is something we all value and seek, but its only possible when there are independent watchdogs, including those (and perhaps especially those) in the media, to investigate problems and shine a spotlight when things go wrong.
Earlier this year, Facebook removed news from its feed in Australia as a strong-arm tactic against proposed legislation that would require it to pay publishers for their content; the void was quickly filled with misinformation and false news before Facebook changed course after a few days.
That bill passed there; its time for our congressional delegation to take action here.
Reach Robert Behreat 843-937-5771. Follow him on Twitter @RobertFBehre.
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