Home » Technology » The Very Richest Owning Media Companies is the Rule Not an Exception $TWTR $FB
As a service to those who have outrage-induced amnesia or to those who are just ignorant of facts, I will remind everyone that the very richest owning media companies is the rule. Elon Musk, the World’s wealthiest owning media company Twitter will not be an exception.
We can go down a partial list.
Charles Ergen is worth about $10 billion and is the co-founder and Chairman of the satellite communications and TV Companies, Echostar and Direct TV.
Robin Li is the CEO and co-founder of Chinese search company Baidu.
Rupert Murdoch is the owner of a media empire that includes Fox News, The Times of London, The New York Post, and The Wall Street Journal. Rupert Murdoch is worth about $21 billion.
Zhang Yiming founded and owns a lot of Tik tok. His net worth is about $44 billion. The people get richer going down this list.
Jack Ma owns a lot of Alibaba. Alibaba owns a lot of social media site Weibo and video platform Bilibili.
Ma Huateng owns a lot of Tencent. Tencent owns WeChat and the messaging service QQ.
David Thomson owns the publishing and media conglomerate Thomson Reuters. Reuters has the newswire that provides articles to most of the newspapers.
Mark Zuckerberg owns Facebook which also has WhatsApp, Instagram, and Messenger.
Carlos Slim Helu is Mexico’s richest man and owns 17% stake of The New York Times.
Michael Bloomberg owns Bloomberg.com and Business Week.
Warren Buffett has a big ownership stake in Verizon Communications. Verizon Media runs digital brands like Yahoo, TechCrunch, and AOL.
Google co-founder Sergey Brin and Larry Page own Youtube which has over 2.5 billion users. They also have a lot of control over websites with Google ads that provide revenue to many websites. They also control traffic via search and google news.
Bill Gates now has diversified holdings. Microsoft owns Linkedin.
Jeff Bezos has Amazon and the Washington Post. Amazon has Prime Video. Bezos also owns live-streaming website Twitch and movie and tv program database IMDb.
Most billionaires end up owning a lot of a media company or multiple companies, even if they did not accumulate their wealth by starting a media or tech company.
Some History of Wealth and Media
The Spanish-American War is often referred to as the first “media war.” During the 1890s, journalism that sensationalized—and sometimes even manufactured—dramatic events was a powerful force that helped propel the United States into war with Spain.
William Randolph Hearst abd the Spanish-American War. Hearst has a quoted statement—’You furnish the pictures, I’ll provide the war’. Yellow journalism showed the media could capture attention and influence public reaction.
In 1895, William Hearst purchased the New York Morning Journal and entered into a head-to-head circulation war with his former mentor, Joseph Pulitzer, owner of the New York World. To increase circulation both started to include articles about the Cuban Insurrection.
At age 25, Pulitzer became a publisher and made a series of business deals. In 1878, he became owner of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch.
Other History on Wealth and Media
Ted Turner founded CNN, TNT and TBS. CNN has gone through various ownership changes. ATT recently divested WarnerMedia. Warner Media subsequently merge with Discovery Inc. to form Warner Bros. Discovery, Ted Turner has had dementia since 2018.
John Malone is a billionaire media mogul who is a longtime stakeholder in Discovery. John Malone is worth about $7 billion.
Brian L. Roberts (born June 28, 1959) is an American billionaire businessman and the chairman and CEO of Comcast. Comcast provides cable, entertainment, and communications products and services. Comcast was founded by Brian L Robert’s father, Ralph J. Roberts.
Brian Wang is a Futurist Thought Leader and a popular Science blogger with 1 million readers per month. His blog Nextbigfuture.com is ranked #1 Science News Blog. It covers many disruptive technology and trends including Space, Robotics, Artificial Intelligence, Medicine, Anti-aging Biotechnology, and Nanotechnology.
Known for identifying cutting edge technologies, he is currently a Co-Founder of a startup and fundraiser for high potential early-stage companies. He is the Head of Research for Allocations for deep technology investments and an Angel Investor at Space Angels.
A frequent speaker at corporations, he has been a TEDx speaker, a Singularity University speaker and guest at numerous interviews for radio and podcasts. He is open to public speaking and advising engagements.
