It's what you don't see that sells you.

[P3nT4gR4m]

Economic collapse is the inevitable outcome of an expansion-based economy.

Totally. History proves this but what you're failing to consider is the big picture. You draw a distinction between corporations and government. While this may still be the case (but only just) it's not part of the larger corporate agenda. The government should be nothing more than one arm of their PR department. As you correctly noted - the corporations are making a fucking packet from sales of equipment which merely serves to increase the profitablity of the venture. It's the consumer that pays for the purchase of said equipment, via taxation. In other words we're forced to purchase the shiny new splodey toys that we don't even get to play with but, much like car insurance, it's still just a sale of goods and services.

There are two types of military action - offense and defence. Offence is where the profit lies and defence is a cost, no different on the spreadsheet from any other overhead or depreciation. Of course you can't expand forever, you can only hold all the territory and resources but, once you have this, you need to hold it. You'll still be fighting uprisings and hostile takeovers and keeping the whole thing secure but where are you going to invade when it's all yours?

[The Good Reverend Roger]

I didn't see clearchannel in that list, they own a ridiculous percentage of radio stations and billboard advertising.

I was looking at TV broadcasters, particularly news outlets.  I can do something with Clearchannel.  Oh, my, yes.

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

Economic collapse is the inevitable outcome of an expansion-based economy.

Totally. History proves this but what you're failing to consider is the big picture. You draw a distinction between corporations and government. While this may still be the case (but only just) it's not part of the larger corporate agenda. The government should be nothing more than one arm of their PR department. As you correctly noted - the corporations are making a fucking packet from sales of equipment which merely serves to increase the profitablity of the venture. It's the consumer that pays for the purchase of said equipment, via taxation. In other words we're forced to purchase the shiny new splodey toys that we don't even get to play with but, much like car insurance, it's still just a sale of goods and services.

There are two types of military action - offense and defence. Offence is where the profit lies and defence is a cost, no different on the spreadsheet from any other overhead or depreciation. Of course you can't expand forever, you can only hold all the territory and resources but, once you have this, you need to hold it. You'll still be fighting uprisings and hostile takeovers and keeping the whole thing secure but where are you going to invade when it's all yours?

That's pretty much exactly what I already said, only simplified, rephrased, and omitting the part about eroding their own consumer base by concentrating wealth, so please explain to me where I'm missing the big picture?

[P3nT4gR4m]

Dunno. You seemed to be arguing with me about something. Maybe it'd help if I pointed out that, IMO (as in yours I think), it's completely unworkable. Every empire in history has overextended their borders, way short of taking the big prize and there's always a bunch of hungry, pissed off, hard as nails opportunists ready to step in and feed on the bloated corpse. I never said I thought it was a good idea but where you and me seem to differ is you actually seem to be surprised or incredulous about the stupidity of it all, whereas I expect it - it's what monkeys do. They can't seem to help themselves.

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

Dunno. You seemed to be arguing with me about something. Maybe it'd help if I pointed out that, IMO (as in yours I think), it's completely unworkable. Every empire in history has overextended their borders, way short of taking the big prize and there's always a bunch of hungry, pissed off, hard as nails opportunists ready to step in and feed on the bloated corpse. I never said I thought it was a good idea but where you and me seem to differ is you actually seem to be surprised or incredulous about the stupidity of it all, whereas I expect it - it's what monkeys do. They can't seem to help themselves.

You appeared to be arguing with me, actually, via the condescending tone of "don't kid yourself" and "you're failing to consider the big picture". Now with the "you actually seem to be surprised".

Not sure where you got that idea, I was just pointing some things out the same way Roger was pointing out the concentration of media control in the OP. Once again, I will ask you not to condescend to me.

[P3nT4gR4m]

What the fuck is this condescending stuff all about? Either you know me better than that after all these years or maybe it's about time I did?

[navkat]

GE owns Universal now. Which merged with Comcast/NBC.

Here's the thing.

Our economy is based on growth; not just profit, but continually larger profits. The stock market absolutely requires growth. After a certain point, the only way for a company to grow is to absorb its competitors. The inevitable result of that is acquisitions and mergers. Acquisitions and mergers lead to several large companies holding functional monopolies over the market. Furthermore, interlocking directorates mean that in many cases these corporate giants are collaborating with each other, not competing. Anti-trust laws used to limit how much control any one company had over the media... not anymore; thanks Telecommunications Act!

And they're not done merging, yet. No matter how big they get, they still have to keep growing, which explains a lot about our intensely militarized society and the reasons we have to keep going into other countries to "fight for democracy". At present, over 51% of the entire U.S. budget goes toward our military. And that military is fighting to "protect our interests", which really means to "gain access to resources and markets" for Big Corp. The U.S. government works for U.S. assets, not U.S. citizens.

Rah rah, go USA!

Precisely. I used to raaaaaage about this fact and I've been accused of everything from communism to tinfoil habberdashery so I just stopped, put on a pair of cat ears and started giggling uncontrolably at the futility of the thing. Between you and Roger, I'm starting to get angry again.

[Triple Zero]

You draw a distinction between corporations and government. While this may still be the case (but only just) it's not part of the larger corporate agenda. The government should be nothing more than one arm of their PR department.

Problem with that is, while being a PR dept for big corporations is of course a major purpose of the government, it is not its singular purpose. Government also deals with all these finicky details such as managing the nation and such. A shit job, but someone's gotta do it, not for the People cause corporations don't function properly without it either. Still, corporations are all too happy to defer that responsibility to Them Govt.

Maybe some corps are too stupid to realize they really don't want to have to deal with keeping the nation afloat if they were planning on eating the Government, but those aren't the ones that will last because at some point some cleverer corporations will stomp on them.

Of course, such an event would be like Cthulhu stomping on Nyarlathotep: Uncaring Gods battling it out for their own unknowable purposes, completely cold towards the fate of the microscopic individual.

[Kai]

GE owns Universal now. Which merged with Comcast/NBC.

Here's the thing.

Our economy is based on growth; not just profit, but continually larger profits. The stock market absolutely requires growth. After a certain point, the only way for a company to grow is to absorb its competitors. The inevitable result of that is acquisitions and mergers. Acquisitions and mergers lead to several large companies holding functional monopolies over the market. Furthermore, interlocking directorates mean that in many cases these corporate giants are collaborating with each other, not competing. Anti-trust laws used to limit how much control any one company had over the media... not anymore; thanks Telecommunications Act!

And they're not done merging, yet. No matter how big they get, they still have to keep growing, which explains a lot about our intensely militarized society and the reasons we have to keep going into other countries to "fight for democracy". At present, over 51% of the entire U.S. budget goes toward our military. And that military is fighting to "protect our interests", which really means to "gain access to resources and markets" for Big Corp. The U.S. government works for U.S. assets, not U.S. citizens.

Rah rah, go USA!

In a nutshell, perfectly fucking illustrated, why capitalism is a fucking bombscare of a system and why it continues to get worse and only ever will, until the inevitable endgame conditions are met - one single human being, controlling all the resources on the planet. It might be the best we can come up with but that's it's one single plus point.

Legislative shit like monopolies and antitrust only work until the point where supercorporations become powerful enough to buy the legislature and the government (a necessary step in the growth of any organisation) It's a milestone in corporate growth - either they control the law or they cease to grow, thereby ducking out of the race and leaving their assets to a competitor, thus giving said competitor a leg up in their own assault.

Sooner or later military control becomes necessary, usually via the same control of government. We're seeing this already with a conspicuous percentage of global military action carried out in accordance with corporate interests in securing territories and resources required for continued expansion. I'm pretty sure this will continue to escalate until eventually we'll all be under a state of martial law. subject to execution for buying the wrong sneakers.

One interesting side of this would be a corporate world war which would be the result of a stalemate between two or three of the "last men standing" Imagine being conscripted to fight for the Macdonalds army, against the evil Burger King Empire - the uniforms alone would make this global carnage potentially hilarious

You should read Jennifer Government; that's basically what it's about.

Or Rash by Pete Hautman. It's not quite "Burger King versus MacDonalds", it's a little more realistic and prophetic than that. Reminds me of MT Anderson's Feed. Damn, all the best dystopic fiction is being written for teenagers these days.

[Wolfgang Absolutus]

With so many gullible people, monopolies really do suck, especially when their business is information. Good thing the internet is still sort of free.

[Q. G. Pennyworth]

With so many gullible people, monopolies really do suck, especially when their business is information. Good thing the internet is still sort of free.

You're adorable.

[The Good Reverend Roger]

With so many gullible people, monopolies really do suck, especially when their business is information. Good thing the internet is still sort of free.

You're adorable.

You're my favorite noob since Pixie, QG.

[Wolfgang Absolutus]

With so many gullible people, monopolies really do suck, especially when their business is information. Good thing the internet is still sort of free.

You're adorable.

Which part am I mistaken about?