shades fills you in

From 2005 to 2020, over 2 thousand newspapers closed shop. More followed in the COVID years. Now, the ten biggest owners control half the daily papers

What happened? Pen.org says blame the internet. TV and print ads stopped making money. Local TV and newspapers became easy prey

Brookings agrees: Blame the internet -- and social media in particular. From 2008 to 2018, local news ad revenue dropped 68%, while profits for big tech soared

Politico blames readers: Not enough of them want to pay for local news

Billmoyers.com says this is a threat to democracy: When media consolidates, national news reigns, special interests control, and real journalism dies

Agreed, says 538. Communities are more corrupt, their are less competitive, local finances worse, and polarization worse too

So how do we save local news? Pen.org says there are three things we could do: More money, more FCC oversight, and a digital ad tax

Freepress.net says we need to go after big tech directly. It also wants to tax digital ads -- then use the money to fund independent news outlets