I’ve been following this story — “News Corp. Makes a Bid for Dow Jones” — with a bit of trepidation, partly for personal reasons and partly because of what a Rupert Murdoch-owned Wall Street Journal might mean for the industry and the Journal itself.
On the personal side, my wife works for Dow Jones on the business side and any sale could have major ramifications for the workforce. Basically, I have no idea of a sale would mean layoffs or what it would do to her benefit package — the uncertainty is a bit scary.
As for the industry, the bigger Murdoch gets, the more his brand of tabloid-style journalism spreads. Right now, the Journal news pages are among the finest in the business, offering a level of in-depth reporting found few other places.
Just as important, as Ari Berman points out in The Nation’s Notion blog, a sale to Murdoch could mean the end of the Journal’s impressive separation of news and opinion — the extremely conservative editorial page has no bearing on the reporting elsewhere in the paper.
Murdoch is known for pushing his publications, such as the once-liberal New York Post, to the right. Under Murdoch’s purview, would the news pages of the Wall Street Journal become more like its conservative editorial section?
I am hopeful that the announcement that the announcement by the Bancroft family at 4:30 today that the family, which owns a controlling interest in the company, “will vote shares constituting slightly more than 50 percent of the outstanding voting power of Dow Jones … against the proposal submitted by News Corporation.”
The Journal and Dow Jones have their problems. I just don’t see how Murdoch is the solution.
Jeff Jarvis isn’t so sure. Here is his BuzzMachine item on the potential sale.
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Hank Kalet 