Shaping the future: Mergers, acquisitions, and the U.S. publishing, communications, and mass media industries, 1990–1995

Abstract

Between 1990 and 1995, a substantive reconfiguration took place within the publishing, communications, and mass media industries in the United States. These changes were triggered primarily by five pivotal developments: (1) the direct impact of strategic planning theories and practices on a relatively small number of U.S. and foreign media executives; (2) a dramatic technological convergence within the entire communications industry; (3) a quest to gain hegemony over the creation, production, and distribution of electronic and print information and entertainment products and services in the United States and the global marketplace; (4) a sharp increase in media usage and expenditures in the United States; and (5) the impending passage of a massive, revolutionary telecommunications bill. This legislation (the Telecommunications Act of 1996) changed drastically the ground rules created by the Communications Act of 1934, lifted restrictions on the ownership of media properties, allowed media companies to enter formerly forbidden markets, and reduced or eliminated governmental controls over the burgeoning communications business. The deeply etched lines separating “newspapers” from “books” and “magazines”, or “television” from “telephone”, “radio”, “film”, and “video” became hazy, and, in some instances, disappeared. Media scholars and industry experts realized that the communications landscape had to be viewed as a totally interconnected industry, albeit a rather diverse one.