Merge ahead?

Last Thursday, the Chronicle of Higher Education reported that Florida State University's student newspaper the FSView & Florida Flambeau has been bought out by the Tallahassee Democrat -- a local paper, itself owned by the multi-paper conglomerate Gannett (publisher of USA Today, the Indy Star, the Detroit Free Press, etc.). In an interview with the Associated Press, newspaper analyst John Morton said "the purchase represents the first of its kind in the industry" and suggested that the deal was the result of the Democrat "trying to reach college-age students in a more effective way and profitable manner."\nNow, in its own story on the deal, the Democrat pledged that the FSView & Florida Flambeau would remain student-run and quoted its president and publisher as saying that it would be "independent of the day-to-day Tallahassee Democrat news operations" (Aug. 2). And, in the same article, the Democrat also suggested that the arrangement would expand employment opportunities for FSU students with both itself and Gannett. \nSounds nice, but I can't shake a bad feeling about this development -- like Pandora's box has been opened. \nJust the day before posting the FSU story, the Chronicle had also reported that mtvU -- MTV's 24-hour university network, as you probably know -- bought Y2M: Youth Media & Marketing Networks. Y2M, in turn, owns College Publisher, a network of 450 online college newspapers. MTV, meanwhile, is owned by the global media company, Viacom, which owns Comedy Central, Paramount Studios, Nickelodeon and more. For the sake of disclosure: The Indiana Daily Student works with Y2M to help us sell advertising on a national basis. But don't worry, it doesn't own us or anything -- we're independent.\nIt may be a little early to jump to conclusions (not that that's ever stopped me before) -- but these two news stories give the distinct impression that Big Media has finally noticed that the humble campus newspaper offers a direct feed to the vaunted 18-to-25-year-old marketing demographic. This could be a good thing. Larger-scale awareness about student papers' audience could bring more demand for advertising, which could mean higher revenues for student papers and, thus, better papers (come on advertisers -- papa needs a raise!). But, I can't help but get a little nervous that increased opportunities will lead to increased temptation to follow in the footsteps of the FSView & Florida Flambeau -- that other school papers will decide that it's worth trading in their freedom for access to greater resources, that we'll become yet another branch of someone's empire in the already highly consolidated media industry.\nIn 1969, the IDS gained its financial and editorial independence from IU -- the result being that we can report honestly on University doings without fearing that the administration will pull the plug on our presses. Many papers, still funded by their university, don't have that liberty. It's hard, then, to watch other papers -- unbound by university control -- happily submit themselves to the direction of another master. That seems like the type of lesson a student newspaper should avoid.