Earlier this year, Paramount Studios made headlines with a deal to acquire studio and competitor, Warner Bros., for roughly $110 billion. If allowed to proceed, this merger would mark one of the largest consolidations in entertainment history, with major implications for how Americans consume news, culture and information. The list of entities controlled by Paramount would include not only Paramount Pictures, CBS Studios and Nickelodeon, but also Warner Bros. Studios, DC Studios, HBO, CNN, TBS, TNT and the Discovery Channel. This deal would cement the owners of Paramount/Skydance, the Ellison family, as perhaps the most influential forces in media.
Through a combination of control over streaming services and various lifestyle outlets and websites, David and Larry Ellison would have a previously unseen degree of influence over which messages Americans receive. Regardless of politics, a single family’s dominance over this much of the media environment poses a real challenge to independent media. With the Ellisons controlling so many major news outlets, we risk losing independent perspectives not only in news but also in entertainment. To fully understand the risk that mergers between companies such as Paramount and Warner Bros. pose to a diverse media landscape, it is first crucial to understand how the Ellisons have risen to prominence and what they have done with their power so far.
While David and Larry Ellison have drawn scrutiny for their media activities, the father-son duo amassed their fortune in a completely different industry. As the co-founder of Oracle Corporation, Larry Ellison invested heavily in database technology before it was a mainstream standard, turning the company into an industry leader. Beyond Oracle, Ellison has been heavily involved in several ventures, including major investments in biomedical technology, Tesla Motors and various forms of real estate (notably owning 98% of the Hawaiian island of Lanai).
His first foray into media, however, arrived through his son, David, who used his father’s capital to found the company Skydance Media. In 2010, the company inked a deal with Paramount Pictures to become a co-producer on films such as True Grit and Star Trek. From this point, the Ellisons were able to embed themselves within a legacy media entity and leverage their capital resources to gain more control. Though they do not control Paramount outright, the Ellisons’ financial stakes in the company give them significant power within it. This soft influence will only grow if the deal with Warner Brothers is approved.
While the rise of the Ellison family is a useful case study in how tech capital can influence entertainment conglomerates, it’s also worth considering the political and cultural implications of their ascent. Throughout American history, we have recognized that media independence and a diversity of perspectives are important to public discourse. There was, at one point, even the Fairness Doctrine — an FCC policy repealed in 1987 — that required broadcasters to present conflicting perspectives on controversial issues. Its elimination helped pave the way for the ideologically siloed media landscape we have today. Part of what allows for a diverse and healthy media ecosystem is a variety of capital sources. By having so many outlets under the control of a single family, we risk never challenging the dominant mainstream narrative.
This level of consolidation may also have significant consequences in the political sphere. The phrase ‘politics is downstream from culture’ — coined by conservative media strategist Andrew Breitbart — holds that whoever controls mass entertainment can steer public sentiment. It is worth noting the irony that this logic now applies to a family with documented ties to right-wing politics, acquiring dominance over the very media landscape Breitbart sought to disrupt. While it is unlikely that media exposure will change core convictions, it is undeniable that, through their influence, the Ellisons have an unprecedented opportunity to shift public attention toward certain issues and away from others.
All of this is to say that, ignoring political considerations, a single family having this much control over the media landscape could dramatically impact the relationship between the American people and the news. Even more troubling is that the Ellisons have thus far demonstrated a partisan tilt in their leadership. Larry Ellison is currently playing a key role in the restructuring of TikTok under the current presidential administration, and in the past, he has been a major contributor to the Trump campaign. While there is no confirmed instance of direct editorial interference, the consolidation of major media institutions under politically active ownership raises concerns about subtle forms of influence, particularly over which stories are prioritized, which perspectives are elevated and how narratives are framed. Even indirect pressure can erode public trust and blur the line between independent journalism and strategic messaging. In an era already defined by polarization and declining faith in existing institutions, the stakes of concentrated media power extend beyond any single family. Regulators should scrutinize this merger not as a routine business transaction, but as a fundamental question about who gets to shape the stories that Americans tell about themselves.
