The Conglomeration of EVERYthing

The current state of the sports world mirrors many of the issues facing popular media in general. There has been a recent gravitation towards super teams (see: Miami Heat, Philadelphia Phillies, New York Knicks), in which many superstar athletes have accepted their lack of ability to carry a full load by themselves, instead surrendering to the newly found concept of unfairly stacked teams controlling the upper portion of most league's standings. From a spectator's perspective this is both glorious and disgusting, as it makes the average game a chance for the ultimate highlight reel, while decrease any sense of parity amongst the two dozen or so teams in the leagues. This is similar to the world we live in, in which many large corporations have bought out others in an effort to dominate a particular portion of society's desires. This exists in the food market, for example McDonald's purchase of the booming Chipotle, along with Clear Channel's control over nearly every possible wavelength available on the radio. Within the music industry this happens daily as the small market independent labels are constantly being bought out (and buying into) the destructive powers of the powers that be. In some ways this has lead to a lack of individuality within these markets, as even our athletes, once portrayed as national heroes, are know acknowledging their own shortcomings in a sell out fashion. We live in a world where the exploits of these corporations are unavoidable, wherever you go there is something impacted by the Coca-Cola Corporation, or Sony, or any of the multibillion dollar companies that are able to essentially monopolize their fields. Take Google for exmaple, what started out as a search engine has blossomed into an enterprise that owns the formerly powerful AOL network along with YouTube, perhaps the most prominent website there is. The true question is what the direction will be for the future, whether or not this trend will continue until a select handful of corporations own everything possible, where the entire all star teams are derived from four teams, and what this means for individuality in general. Has our generation, evidently more focused on insane proportions of money than integrity, lost touch with the desire for the Mom n Pop? - Craig Shepherd