EUGENIO “Gabby” Lopez III, chairman emeritus and director of ABS-CBN, has just resigned his post during the organizational board meeting of the company after being reelected to the seat in the Annual Stockholders meeting of the company barely an hour earlier.

Citing personal reasons, he put an end to his nearly 35 year’s involvement with the management of the media organization, which up to recently was literally a giant of the industry.

It was in 2005, I believe, during the second MediaNation conference when Gabby Lopez was among the head honchos of news media organizations, whose power and privilege in the industry gave us a glimpse of the way their mind works and how these would impact the lives of the viewers and readers they touched.

It was organized by a mixed group of reform-minded individuals who felt that those who ran news media should be engaged and gathered together in a discussion of their profession and practices, among peers and industry competitors. It was a forum for audience, newsmakers and news deliverers to understand each other better.

Its conception was actually simple. It started with a situation where headlines of major dailies and TV airtime was taken over by one issue – Kris Aquino’s man troubles with Joey Marquez – which was so baffling because they bumped off major legitimate news to devote an unusual amount of airtime and newspaper space to it.

So when the first MediaNation summit was launched the question that confronted editors and broadcast news heads was whether the dumbing down of news and the commercial concerns of news companies were the primary concerns of these agencies. The end of that long weekend in 2004 pointed to the owners of the news agencies and that pursuit for a balance for ratings and readership for the ad revenues versus the allocation of scarce airtime or print space was needed in defining the need and delivery of news.

At the second conference in 2005, MediaNation had its wish as its speakers and panelists were Gabby Lopez, Chief Executive of ABS-CBN, and Felipe Gozon, CEO of GMA7. And it was fortuitous that one of the key issues – or touchy subjects – of news organization developments at that time was the removal of Mel Tiangco (among others) from the ABS-CBN roster and her transfer to GMA7.

There lay the difference. Lopez pointed out that ABS-CBN had a very clear policy that their news people – journalists, news readers – were contractually barred from product placements or endorsements as it may lead to conflicts of interest in their handling and delivery of news. As an example, if a product they were endorsing was to have a case filed against it – whether through a regulatory controversy or a consumer complaint – then it would put the news organization in an awkward position. This practice is extended to their radio broadcasters not having broadcast spots as part of their compensation package and get paid straight talent fees, again to avoid such conflicts between their advertisers’ and the news organizations’ interests.

Gozon, on the other hand, said that GMA7’s practice was the contrary. It did not see anything wrong with its news anchors and broadcasters endorsing products. He plainly pointed out that his company will not begrudge anyone from making an extra buck out of the popularity, fame, credibility or celebrity that they had personally built and worked hard in attaining over the years. In fact, even its radio personalities are assigned personal premiums or ad spots within their shows which they can market as part of their compensation.

The main case study here, of course, was Mel Tiangco, whose product endorsements led to her leaving as a top anchor of ABS-CBN News and transferring to GMA News.

We do not venture any judgement on which agency or media company management was right or wrong. This is merely an illustration of the operational, business and even moral issues that these news media organizations face strategically and in their day-to-day existence.

In the closing address of that MediaNation2 summit, Eugenia Duran Apostol, then recently retired Founding Chairman and Chief Executive of the Philippine Daily Inquirer, brushed off concerns of news organizations and their owners and their pursuit of the coveted ad revenues. News companies will always need money to run, she said. And these owners will do what they have to keep afloat – keep the ratings readership coming in.

Then Apostol, the visionary that she is, let loose the grand plan that rings true to this day: what is essential is to have the right media education.

She pointed out that her Foundation of Worldwide People Power has concentrated its efforts on media education – especially for school children – to teach them discernment, train them to have analytical minds, and equip them to separate the chaff from the grain, accept the truth and reject the lies.

Fifteen years later, we have fake news, trolls, and political propagandists flooding our news feeds. The problems remain the same, but so does the solution.