A chink in the Rupert Murdoch Armour

pgabriel · Jul 7, 2011

I really can't believe a thread on this hasn't been stasrted. Rupert has to shut down a British tabloid.

Media mogul Rupert Murdoch has killed off the News of the World in a shock move as a spiralling scandal over phone hacking at the British tabloid threatened to infect the rest of his empire.

In a fittingly sensational finale, the 168-year-old paper will print its last edition on Sunday after claims that it hacked the phones of a murdered girl and the families of dead soldiers, and that it paid police for stories.

"Having consulted senior colleagues, I have decided that we must take further decisive action with respect to the paper," said Murdoch's son James, chairman of News International, the British newspaper wing of Rupert Murdoch's News Corp

This Sunday will be the last issue of the News of the World," he added.

The final edition would be free of advertising and proceeds would go "to causes and charities that wish to expose their good works to our millions of readers", he said in a statement.

"These are strong measures. They are made humbly and out of respect. I am convinced they are the right thing to do.

"While we may never be able to make up for distress that has been caused, the right thing to do is for every penny of the circulation revenue we receive this weekend to go to organisations - many of whom are long-term friends and partners - that improve life in Britain and are devoted to treating others with dignity."

One devastated staff member said the announcement went off like a "nuclear bomb" in the offices of Britain's second biggest selling newspaper, whose diet of kiss-and-tell stories sold 2.7 million copies a week.

Its closure sparked immediate speculation that Rupert Murdoch was offering the paper as a sacrificial victim to save his bid for control of pay-TV giant BSkyB, which is the subject of an upcoming government decision.

The BBC quoted sources as saying Murdoch would replace it with a Sunday version of The Sun, his daily tabloid, which is Britain's biggest selling newspaper.

Prime Minister David Cameron - who had himself faced pressure for his ties to Murdoch - said the closure of the News of the World should not distract from an ongoing police investigation into the hacking.

"What matters is that all wrongdoing is exposed and those responsible for these appalling acts are brought to justice," Cameron's Downing Street office said in a statement.

He repeated his pledge to hold public inquiries into practices at the News of the World and into an earlier botched police probe into the issue.

Cameron's former media chief Andy Coulson was editor of the tabloid at the time of much of the hacking, while the premier has faced scrutiny for his friendship with Rebekah Brooks, News International's chief executive.

The Guardian reported that Coulson will be arrested on Friday over suspicions he knew about the hacking.

James Murdoch repeated his father's earlier defence of Brooks, saying he was confident she was not aware of hacking during her own stint as editor.

"I am satisfied that Rebekah, her leadership of this business and her standard of ethics and her standard of conduct throughout her career, are very good," Murdoch said in a television interview.

Two hundred staff will lose their jobs at the paper and they have been told they can apply for other jobs within News International.

News of the World associate editor David Wooding described the atmosphere in the newsroom when the closure was announced was as "if a nuclear bomb had gone off".

"Everyone was standing around looking dazed. Everyone kept saying - how could it get any worse?" he told the BBC.

In his statement, James Murdoch admitted that the paper had lied to parliament and to the public in its earlier statements on the long-running scandal.

He said that if allegations that a private investigator working for the tabloid hacked the voicemail of Milly Dowler, a 13-year-old girl who was later found murdered, were true, they were "inhuman".

"The News of the World is in the business of holding others to account. But it failed when it came to itself," he added. "Wrongdoers turned a good newsroom bad and this was not fully understood or adequately pursued."

He said the conviction in 2007 for phone hacking of the paper's royal correspondent Clive Goodman and private investigator Glenn Mulcaire had failed to cure the problem.

But the death blow for the News of the World came on Thursday when veterans' charity the Royal British Legion dropped its campaign partnership with the paper over claims in the Daily Telegraph that an investigator hired by the tabloid may have accessed the voicemails of relatives of dead soldiers.

Supermarket giant Sainsbury's, mobile phone operator O2, energy supplier Npower and high street stores Dixons, Boots and Specsavers had joined a growing list of companies to pull advertising from the paper.

Meanwhile, Scotland Yard said up to 4000 people may have had their voicemails accessed by the News of the World and added that it was probing claims that the paper had paid policemen for information.

AFP

Read more: http://www.smh.com.au/world/phone-h...f-the-world-20110708-1h5cm.html#ixzz1RSqF5J00
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dylan · Jul 7, 2011

pgabriel said: ↑

I really can't believe a thread on this hasn't been stasrted. Rupert has to shut down a British tabloid[/URL].
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Eh, I will be surprised if this lasts. He also owns the Sun, which currently runs from Monday to Saturday. The now-defunct WWN ran on Sundays only. Anyone want to take bets on how long it takes for a new Sunday-edition Sun to hit the presses?

mc mark · Jul 7, 2011

Question is...

What other Murdoch news organizations have been involved in the same type of stuff?

glynch · Jul 8, 2011

I doubt if Murdoch will be allowed to fail. The wealthy elite may prefer the WSJ and for some the NYT, but they understand that Murdoch's mindless tabloids and the open propaganda of Fox type media are one of the keys in pacifying folks while trickle up to the top 1% continues.

rocketsjudoka · Jul 8, 2011

"A chink Rupert Murdoch's Armour"

Hey I find this thread title offensive!

KingCheetah · Jul 8, 2011

Bat Boy falls in a faint.

gwayneco · Jul 8, 2011

Murdoch has much bigger fish to fry.

SamFisher · Jul 8, 2011

rocketsjudoka said: ↑

"A chink Rupert Murdoch's Armour"

Hey I find this thread title offensive!
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*heh*

DonkeyMagic · Jul 8, 2011

Dairy Ashford · Jul 10, 2011

Probably no choice here. Maybe I'm misreading the use of the term tabloid here, but I have no idea why these types of papers would need to wiretap anyone for anything, wouldn't "unnamed sources" pretty much allow them to write whatever they want?

In any case I say good for Murdoch. Whatever his political views, anyone who owns The Times and the Journal, founds a (currently) top-rated TV and cable news network gets my respect, hopefully he tires of tabloids and offloads or shutters them altogether.

KingCheetah · Jul 10, 2011

More like a ******* **** **** in Rupert's Armour.

pgabriel · Jul 18, 2011

at the risk of insluting judoka, i'm bumping this thread. newscorp has lost over 10% of its market cap value since this scandal broke. some analysts are saying he's going to have to give up almost all print media. the new york post is a money loser and they are saying he paid too much for the wall street journal anyway. meanwhile the head of scotland yard has resigned.

i think some of you who though this wouldn't hurt murdoch were too cynical.

pirc1 · Jul 18, 2011

pgabriel said: ↑

at the risk of insluting judoka, i'm bumping this thread. newscorp has lost over 10% of its market cap value since this scandal broke. some analysts are saying he's going to have to give up almost all print media. the new york post is a money loser and they are saying he paid too much for the wall street journal anyway. meanwhile the head of scotland yard has resigned.

i think some of you who though this wouldn't hurt murdoch were too cynical.
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Oh he still have FOX.

mc mark · Jul 18, 2011

pgabriel said: ↑

the new york post is a money loser and they are saying he paid too much for the wall street journal anyway. meanwhile the head of scotland yard has resigned.
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There’s rumors floating around that the Post did what the News did to 911 families; tapped into victim’s cell phones

pgabriel · Jul 18, 2011

mc mark said: ↑

There’s rumors floating around that the Post did what the News did to 911 families; tapped into victim’s cell phones
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yep, and they maybe investigated. that's just despicable

REEKO_HTOWN · Jul 18, 2011

This is a HUGE story in the UK.

Funny how quite it is here...oh that's right, Murdoch owns half the media here.

Pipe · Jul 18, 2011

pgabriel said: ↑

at the risk of insluting judoka ...
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Rumor has it judoka secretly enjoys being insluted. Not that there is anything wrong with that.

REEKO_HTOWN · Jul 18, 2011

This is a HUGE story in the UK.

Funny how quite it is here...oh that's right, Murdoch owns half the media here.

justtxyank · Jul 18, 2011

REEKO_HTOWN said: ↑

This is a HUGE story in the UK.

Funny how quite it is here...oh that's right, Murdoch owns half the media here.
Click to expand...

Unfair. It's on the main header for CNN.com and has been on the front page in some form since the scandal broke. It's been covered on Fox News every day (I watch Brett Baier's show daily to see the Panel) as well. It's not a big story here because people don't really care. They will once more drama gets involved.

Breaking news on Fox News: Whistleblower in the UK phone hacking scandal found dead.

percicles · Jul 18, 2011

Holy Sh-t! Murdoch is going Michael Corleone now.

News of the World journalist who claimed Coulson encouraged phone hacking is found dead at home
By DAILY MAIL REPORTER
Last updated at 6:57 PM on 18th July 2011

A former News of the World reporter who was the first named journalist to stand up and make allegations that Andy Coulson knew phone hacking was taking place at the paper was today found dead at home.

Sean Hoare was found at 10.40am at his home in Watford, Hertfordshire.
Police were tonight probing the possibility that he had killed himself and said that his death was 'not thought to be suspicious'.

Found dead: Former News of the World journalist Sean Hoare
Mr Hoare blew the whistle on the phone hacking scandal during an investigation by The New York Times last September.

He then told the BBC that he was personally asked by Mr Coulson to hack into phones and branded the former editor's claim that he was unaware of the practice as 'simply a lie'.

Mr Hoare, a former showbusiness reporter at the newspaper, claimed that Mr Coulson asked him to hack into phone messages in pursuit of stories.

Mr Hoare was sacked over drink and drug problems, and the paper at the time said his claims should be treated with 'extreme scepticism'.

It said: 'The News of the World repeatedly asked the New York Times to provide evidence to support their allegations and they were unable to do so.
'Indeed, the story they published contained no new credible evidence and relied heavily on anonymous sources, contrary to the paper's own editorial guidelines.

'In so doing, they have undermined their own reputation and confirmed our suspicion their story was motivated by commercial rivalry.
'We reject absolutely any suggestion there was a widespread culture of wrongdoing at the News of the World.'

In his claims to The New York Times, Mr Hoare said that he had played messages obtained through phone hacking to Mr Coulson, the Guardian reported.

He told investigators that he had been 'actively encouraged' to obtain information through the practice.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2016132/News-World-journalist-claimed-Coulson-encouraged-phone-hacking-dead-home.html?ITO=1490
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