Frequently Asked Questions

The “Media Ownership Monitor” (MOM) has been developed as a mapping tool in order to create a publicly available, continuously updated database that lists owners of all relevant mass media outlets (press, radio, television sectors and online media).

MOM aims to shed light on the risks to media pluralism caused by media ownership concentration (for more information: Methodology). In order to grasp the national characteristics and detect risk-enhancing or risk-reducing factors for media concentration, MOM also qualitatively assesses the market conditions and legal environment.

Media pluralism is a key aspect of democratic societies as free, independent, and diverse media reflect divergent viewpoints and allow criticism of people in power. Risks to diversity of ideas are caused by media market concentration, when only a few players exert dominant influence on public opinion and raise entrance barriers for other players and perspectives (media ownership concentration). The biggest obstacle to fight it is lack of transparency of media ownership: How can people evaluate the reliability of information, if they don´t know who provides it? How can journalists work properly, if they don´t know who controls the company they work for? And how can media authorities address excessive media concentration, if they don´t know who is behind the media´s steering wheel?

The Media Ownership Monitor thus aims to create transparency and to answer the question “who eventually controls media content?” in order to raise public awareness, to create a fact base for advocacy to hold political and economic players accountable for the existing conditions.

MOM does not make normative statements – it does not suggest how to control media ownership. Which form of media concentration control can work, depends on the country context, the existing legal and market conditions, the ownership landscape.

MOM provides a transparency tool to enforce a democratic discussion on that issue as well as good governance: decisions are likely to be of higher quality and to better reflect the needs and wishes of the people if they have access to adequate information and broad consultations, with views and opinions freely shared.

The main question is: which media outlets influence the opinion-forming process? In order to scan all relevant media, we included all traditional media types (Print, Radio, TV, Online). 

The media were selected according to the following criteria:

The main objective of this research is to identify media outlets influence the opinion-forming process in Ireland. We included all traditional media types (Print, Radio, TV, Online) and our sample of 50 outlets were selected according to the criteria outlined here.

MOM focused mainly on news media with the highest reach or audience share. However, reach and share data is publicly available in Ireland only for Radio and TV.  For television reach and share data is available from TV Audience Measurement Ireland (TAM Ireland).

Audience and revenue data for print news can prove more difficult to find. For instance there is currently no industry wide publicly available data equivalent to the JNLR or TAM Ireland for print. As a result of this we have relied on individually reported audience data for print directly from news publishers. This data comes from a number of sources which vary from publisher to publisher. Generally, they include the Kantar TGI Survey; a bi-annual nationally representative survey of over 4,000 Irish adults; newspaper circulation data from the Audited Bureau of Circulation (ABC) where available,  and individual surveys commissioned by news organisations. We have endeavoured to utilise data that is publicly available as much as possible.

For online platforms we have used the Reuters Digital News Report Ireland 2023 to assess readership levels for sample selection. This is an annual survey of over 2,000 Irish adults on their online news media consumption.

Turning to publicly available data on income, there is an absence of overall revenue data available for the different platforms that make up the Irish media market, meaning that market share is unavailable for this project. We have used reporting from Core and PWC to assess the overall media advertising market and public submissions from industry representative organisations. When examining publicly available financial data from media organisations in Ireland we found that reporting tends to be at a group level with little information available for individual titles or channels.

While audience reach has been a key factor in selecting our sample of media outlets to include, there are a number of publications included which have smaller or more localised reach but have played what could be viewed as a disproportionate role in driving the news agenda in Ireland recently.

Generally speaking the news organisations included in our sample focus on general news coverage with a national focus, we have excluded publications that focus solely on specific topics such as sport, music, lifestyle. For a similar reason social networks and search engines are also excluded.

The final sample based on the selection factors outlined above consists of 18 print publications, 12 radio stations, 6 radio stations and 13 online outlets. Examining these outlets allows us to examine media ownership, media concentration and potential threats to media plurality in the Irish market.

For more details on the selection of the sample and the underlying data, please see FAQs '6. How is Data collected?' and '7. How are the Media Outlets selected?'.

Throughout this process we endeavoured to use official data sources and sources that have become standard metrics for the media industry in Ireland and have a high level of reliability and trust. Our aim was to use publicly available data as much as possible, where this wasn’t available we requested data from media companies, market research companies and industry representative organisations directly. All of our sources are documented and archived.

When looking for TV and Radio audience data we used reports from TV Audience Measurement (TAM) Ireland (2022/2023) and Joint National Listenership Research (JNLR) Ireland (2022/2023). For print we used data available from Kantar TGI Republic of Ireland Survey data (2022/2023) where available, this was sourced from individual publishers, medialive.ie and industry representative organisations. For online readership data we used the Reuters Digital News Report Ireland 2023.

Turning to company information for media groups operating in Ireland. Publicly available data was obtained from the Companies Registration Office (CRO) Ireland where companies must register their interests and, for publicly trading companies, their annual accounts. For UK based entities we accessed company details through the Companies House database. We made extensive use of the FAME UK & Ireland Database (Financial Analysis Made Easy), operated by Bureau Van Dijk which includes details on company ownership, structure and financial returns throughout the UK and Ireland.

For this research, MOM worked with a national advisory panel throughout the research process. This panel was composed of national experts with substantial knowledge of media and communications in Ireland

Radio:
Radio stations were selected according to their market share using the IPSOS MRBI Joint National Listenership Research (JNLR). This research provides bi-annual reporting on radio listenership across Ireland based on surveys of c16,800 Irish people aged 15+ each year. For this research we used the January to December 2022 and the July 2022 to June 2023 reports.

Television:
There are three main TV providers in Ireland who provide Irish facing news content, for the purposes of this study we have included all three and any of their stations that broadcast news content. Television ratings for each channel were sourced from the TV Audience Measurement Ireland (TAM Ireland) TV Ratings 2022. TAM Ireland provide rolling TV ratings data to the market throughout the year as well as monthly and annual reporting. This data is gathered by Nielsen and based on the viewing habits of a nationally representative panel of over 1,000 households. 

Print:
For print readership we used data available on daily readership to select the national daily titles included in our sample. For these titles readership data was gathered from medialive.ie and individual publications. Unlike TV, radio and online there is no dedicated publicly available audience research source on the Irish print market at present. However, the bi-annual Kantar TGI Republic of Ireland Survey has become the main source in the Irish media market for readership data. This has become the defacto replacement for the Joint National Readership Survey (JNRS) Ireland which ran from 1974 to the mid 2010s. Up to date circulation data is not available publicly for most print publications. The scope of the bi-annual Audited Bureau of Circulation (ABC) reports has diminished in recent years as major media groups have withdrew from this research since 2018/19.

In the print category we have also included two local media groups and two news magazines. Media Concierge and the Celtic Media Group own multiple local newspapers across Ireland. While individually each title reaches a relatively small local audience; these are included due to the significant scale of their combined reach. Within the Irish electoral system of Proportional Representation by Single Transferable Vote (PR-STV), local politics play a significant role in elections, with seats won by small margins. Local issues and campaigns can have a considerable impact on the outcome of national and EU elections in Ireland. The Phoenix and The Village are also included in our print sample as these news magazines have played an important role in holding the government to account and investigative journalism.

Online:
For online news outlets our sample includes the online platform for national daily print newspapers and online only news outlets. In the majority of cases, titles were selected due to their reach as reported in the Reuters Digital News Report Ireland 2023. We have also included a number of online outlets who have smaller reach in the Irish market. We chose to include these outlets due to their role in driving the news agenda in Ireland recently through investigative journalism into specific topics such as health and housing.

In 2023, Ireland ranks 2nd out of 180 countries in the Press Freedom Index published by Reporters Without Borders. This means that the climate of press freedom in Ireland is relatively positive, attacks on or censorship of journalists is rare.

However, in line with global trends, shrinking commercial revenues define the Irish media market. This increases the risk of mergers of domestic companies, acquisitions by foreign investors, and with that concentration of content and ownership. The Media Ownership Monitor serves as a transparency tool to enforce a democratic discussion on those issues as well as good governance.

Ireland is the first country in the European Union to implement the Media Ownership Monitor. It builds on the existing database mediaownership.ie, by adding more detailed, carefully researched and documented context, as well as comparable indicators of risk to media pluralism.

MOM was developed as a generic methodology that can be applied globally. Notwithstanding that media concentration trends are can be observed in virtually all markets, the first rounds of implementation of the Media Ownership Monitor focussed on countries eligible for official development assistance (OAD).

In a second round of implementation, the focus is widened to include all countries. Notably those countries that are not considered to be problematic in the classical sense of press freedom, but might well have challenges due to media concentration.

MOM has been implemented in nearly 30 countries so far. All country projects can be found on the Global MOM Website.

The selection of the sample and the subsequent analysis in the risk indicators and findings articles rely on publicly available data - audience and economic data. In Ireland, as in many other countries, not all of the data was readily available, comparable, or reliable.

• No reliable audience data: Audience and revenue data for print news is difficult to find. For instance there is currently no industry wide publicly available data equivalent to the JNLR or TAM Ireland for print. As a result of this we have relied on individually reported audience data for print directly from news publishers. This data comes from a number of sources which vary from publisher to publisher. Generally, they include the Kantar TGI Survey; a bi-annual nationally representative survey of over 4,000 Irish adults; newspaper circulation data from the Audited Bureau of Circulation (ABC) where available,  and individual surveys commissioned by news organisations. We have endeavoured to utilise data that is publicly available as much as possible.
  For online platforms we have used the Reuters Digital News Report Ireland 2023 to assess readership levels for sample selection. This is an annual survey of over 2,000 Irish adults on their online news media consumption.

• No financial data: Turning to publicly available data on income, there is an absence of overall revenue data available for the different platforms that make up the Irish media market, meaning that market share is unavailable for this project. We have used reporting from Core and PWC to assess the overall media advertising market and public submissions from industry representative organisations. When examining publicly available financial data from media organisations in Ireland we found that reporting tends to be at a group level with little information available for individual titles or channels.

The database is a snapshot of the current situation, contextualized by historical facts. We aim at updating the website, depending on the situation. New country editions are being added frequently.

The Media Ownership Monitor is mainly inspired by two similar projects. Especially the indicators for a later ranking rely heavily on the EU-funded Media Pluralism Monitor of the Centre for Media Pluralism and Media Freedom (CMPF) at the European University Institute (EUI, Florence). Moreover, Media Pedia, an ownership database developed by investigative journalists in Macedonia served as inspiration for the Media Ownership Monitor. An overview over other similar projects can be found in the table below.