German media scholar Martin Andree shares a pressing warning about the media: they have only a short window of approximately five years before major American tech giants like Google and Meta seize full control. This crucial shift could have devastating consequences for our democratic societies. In his book Big Tech muss weg!, he discusses the repercussions of Big Tech on the future of conventional media, emphasizing, "We will all be swallowed up by the large American tech companies if we do not take action quickly."
As a professor of media studies at the University of Cologne, Andree warns that the increasing dependence on algorithms and the digital monopolies shape ever larger parts of our lives. The platforms are increasingly controlling the public formation of political opinion and, at the same time, undermining our free market economy. He shows in detail how far the hostile takeover of our society by the tech giants has already progressed—and how we could reclaim the Internet.
Join Stichting Democratie en Media director Nienke Venema as she engages Andree in a compelling exchange about media's uncertain future and concrete strategies for keeping our democracies viable through good, reliable, and factual journalism and information provision.
Organised in association with Stichting Democratie en Media.