Hopefully you have heard or know about Oracle, it has been a software company since the founding in 1977 and by the 1990’s. Oracle success allowed its founder Larry Ellison to have large homes, many have been featured and he owns the island of Lani in Hawaii. Mr. Ellison’s wealth has been in the top 20 richest people in the world and for a little while last month the richest person in the world as Oracle embraced AI.

In an article by David Steitfeld and Theodore Schleifer of the New York Times News Service, the 81 year old Larry Ellison is using some of his wealth to own media companies. Mr. Ellison fronted the money for his son David’s company Skydance to buy Paramount and CBS for $8 billion. Skydance is expected to buy Warner Bros Discovery and President Trump has said Mr. Ellison will be a shareholder of TikTok along with Michael Dell of Dell Computers and Lachlan Murdoch of Fox Communications. Most of us at 81 expect to clip coupons, Mr. Ellison buys companies.

Powerful families have owned influential chunks of American media in the past century, but their reach was often limited by geography or other factors. The Chandler family, owner of Los Angeles Times held sway in Southern California for decades but little power across the US. If you ever seen the movie Citizen Kane staring Orson Wells and asking the question Rosebud? that movie was about William Randolph Hearst and the Hearst chain of newspapers and magazines which is still in operations and going strong.

The difference according to Michael Socolow, a media historian at the University of Maine, in our digital age, the deals are consolidating power. The deals are across multiple platforms, and it is possible to establish an editorial line across TikTok- CBS News and CNN – that is a new world.

It is also different because until SkyDance, Mr. Ellison did not own or control any media properties.

Linking to dividend paying stocks, on one hand it is good Mr. Ellison has developed a new interest in media properties as it shows on average we all living longer and as we live longer, we can have new interests. Mr. Ellison was worth $367 billion which means the proportion of assets he is using for the media buyouts is not high, that is a good thing, and he may do a terrific job with them. It used to be at 65, we retire and clip coupons, perhaps taking new challenges will be the theme of years to come.

There are more questions than answers, till the next time – to raising questions.