George A. Donohue

TL;DR: Tichenor et al. as discussed by the authors found that increasing the flow of news on a topic leads to greater acquisition of knowledge about that topic among the more highly educated segments of society, and whether the resulting knowledge gap closes may depend partly on whether the stimulus intensity of mass media publicity is maintained at a high level, or is reduced or eliminated at a point when only the more active persons have gained that knowledge.

TL;DR: The guard dog metaphor suggests that media perform as a sentry not for the community as a whole, but for groups having sufficient power and influence to create and control their own security systems.

TL;DR: For instance, this paper found that as level of conflict about local issues increases, the knowledge gap actually tends to decline, while the level of interpersonal communication about the issue appears to be a major intervening variable.

TL;DR: In this article, the authors present an exploratory study of some of these constraints as they are perceived by a sample of Minnesota community newspaper editors, including professional values which serve as standards for use, nonuse, modification and layout of news, including (a) the major priorities of gatekeepers and their professional ethics; (b) Constraints arising from implementation of standards in the routines of news selection, including pressures of time and space; and

TL;DR: The importance of knowledge as a basis for social power has been noted by a number of scholars, but less well appreciated is the fact that control of knowledge is central to development and maintenance of power.