It was billed as a struggling sector's chance to twist the arms of cross-bench Senators into passing new ownership laws, but instead senior media executives just ended up just shaking hands with the government.
As the summit was taking place in Canberra on Wednesday night, the crucial vote holder – Pauline Hanson – was thousands of kilometres north watching her home state get thrashed in the State of Origin rugby league match.
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Media reform in limbo
Communications minister Mitch Fifield wants the media reform bill to pass as is, including abolishing the reach rule, but will have trouble getting it through the Senate. Courtesy ABC RN.
Hanson's vote is crucial because of opposition from the Greens and Labor to the changes.
Other Senators were otherwise engaged too, in estimates grilling bureaucrats over the running of defence, education and social security.
Insiders say the entire event had a strange edge because these same chief executives regularly talk to any politicians whose vote is needed to pass historic changes to Australia's cross-media ownership laws.
So why the need for a high-powered powwow talking to an audience of the converted, held before the proposed legislation is even drafted?
One theory is a summit would allow politicians to talk to every company without betraying any editorial biases or grievances.
The two-hour event on Wednesday evening was too late for the 6pm news bulletins as well as many print deadlines, and despite an open invitation to all politicians, only a handful of Labor and mostly supportive cross-benchers turned up.
During the day Opposition leader Bill Shorten met with chief executives, but there were no special visits to the Greens, Nick Xenophon Team, or Pauline Hanson's One Nation party. However, One Nation's newest Senator, Peter Georgiou, did attend the evening summit.
The proposed changes include scrapping ownership restrictions known as the "reach rule" and the two-out-of-three rule, banning gambling ads during live sport, cutting licence fees and tinkering with the sports anti-siphoning list. Removing the ownership restrictions would allow media companies to merge and consolidate.
Shares in media companies rallied on Wednesday ahead of the summit, but were flat on Thursday. Shares in Seven West Media were at a nine-week low of 69.75¢, while Ten's shares were back down to 18¢.
The troupe of chief executives and industry leaders, including Seven's Tim Worner, Nine's Hugh Marks, Fairfax Media's Greg Hywood, NewsCorp's Michael Miller and Foxtel's Peter Tonagh, all spoke at a gathering that included Communications Minister Mitch Fifield and Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull.
Mr Hywood acknowledged opponents' concerns about short-term consequences of lifting ownership rules, but said the existing rules will "slowly strangle" the industry. (Fairfax Media publishes BusinessDay.)
"To the opponents of this package of reforms I say – beware – the failure to act now is likely to have long-term and adverse consequences for Australian journalism and for this industry," Mr Hywood said.
"The sectional interests you may think you are protecting will in fact all benefit in the long run from a stronger, modern and more outwardly-looking Australian media industry."
Go Queensland! #StateOfOrigin #Queenslander pic.twitter.com/IUUmgn19xr
— Pauline Hanson (@PaulineHansonOz) May 31, 2017
Meanwhile a Galaxy Poll commissioned by Red Agency has found Australians value quality journalism, but less than 20 per cent are willing to pay for it. And audiences would be happy to see more collaboration between news outlets if it made journalism more efficient.
Nearly 100 per cent of the 1000 respondents to the online survey want access to independent journalism and a majority are wary of fake news, but trust established outlets and journalists.
About 57 per cent agree good-quality investigative journalism is the way to "get to the truth" and half see it as a way to keep politicians accountable, or playing a watchdog role over institutions. Slightly less, 43 per cent, agreed strong media "is a foundation of our democratic society".
But when it comes to paying for news, while 19 per cent are willing to pay for it, 44 per cent believe it should be funded by someone else – such as government, academia, industry or public donations – or providers should create a single pool of news stories that everyone draws from.