After 11 years in the media, the one thing that i have realised is that there is this mythical thing called Freedom of the Press. The Values attributed to it are impartiality, truth, and a crusade for what is right correct and in greater public interest.
what crap.

Freedom of the Press is dead the moment you have large oligarchies owning and controlling the media.
Freedom of the Press is dead the moment those who own or run the media have very strong political/economic interests.
Freedom of the Press is dead the moment you have papers like the ToI charging money (Medianet) to publish articles.
It is compromised the moment editors and journalists hob nob with the glitterati getting on to their good side.
It is biased the moment owners of media turn up at political rallies as part of one political party or the other
It is dead the moment the mast head is sold, or the editorial is sponsored.

for example, if the editor of a newspaper was an ardent hater of the BJP or the Congress – do you honestly think that they are going to be able to distinguish personal from professional and print unadultrated truth. So is this what we are defending?

or for example if an editor of an newspaper decided to rummage through your garbage can, violating your privacy, to find gore aout you that helps him/her sell more papers – is that freedom of press! And is this what we are angsting about?

I think the time has come to redefine the role of media in society. And have a rethink about the accountability that the media has. Such power without any form of accountability is positively scary. The media has gone from being the champion of freedom and individual rights – a role that it performed extremely well in the first 70 odd years of the last century – to being something that ends up compromising individual privacy and freedom, in an attempt to attract more eyeballs.

If the choice is between the right of the individual and the right of a conglomerate, I know which one I will choose. Which one will you?