Minister calls Sýn news shutdown a deep disappointment

Logi Einarsson, Iceland’s minister of culture, innovation and higher education, has described the closure of Sýn’s television news operation as a setback and a deep disappointment, mbl.is reported. The move leaves only one television news outlet in the country, the state broadcaster RÚV.

“Yes, of course it is, to a certain extent, a setback and at least a deep disappointment,” Logi said when asked whether the development had affected him.

He recalled growing up and reaching adulthood when the state held a monopoly over both radio and television media.

“Now the situation is that there is only one television news outlet, and that is of course a return to a time that one had hoped not to experience again,” he said.

Logi said the government was seeking to improve the difficult operating environment for media through legislation, a new service agreement with RÚV and changes to the law governing the broadcaster.

The proposed measures would at least double or triple the support provided to the media sector, he said. However, he added that the government would need to assess whether that would be sufficient and remain open to other ideas, including discussions with media organisations.

Logi said previous governments should have taken much stronger action before the problems facing the media sector intensified. He said traditional media were now facing competition that was developing faster than the environment in which his generation had grown up.

The competition was no longer limited to domestic media, he said. All media outlets were losing ground to new online media.

He stressed that he was not referring to news distributed in digital form, but primarily to obtaining news through social media and artificial intelligence, which he described as generating spin and, at best, being a highly unreliable source.

Asked whether anything could be done to counter the rapid expansion of companies such as Meta and Google, Logi said the issue was difficult. The government was nevertheless in talks with the Ministry of Finance about possible measures, including whether the revenue stream could be taxed.

Work had begun at the OECD, the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, to coordinate rules between countries, he said. The United States president later withdrew from the process, weakening its momentum.