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Articles by Dean Starkman | Email the Author

What the Bancrofts Owe Dow Jones

In return for a century of dividends, a “no” and a graceful exit

It's on the Bancrofts now. That hard-bargaining Dow Jones & Co. board has agreed to sell the Bancroft's patrimony for... More

The Right Prescription in the Journal

The Wall Street Journal gives Big Pharma’s state house lobbying an MRI

Kudos and a smart salute to Sarah Rubenstein and the WSJ for a tough and intelligent story on Big Pharma... More

Parsing the Anonymice at Dow Jones and the Journal

The Times lets unnamed “senior editors” and a “person close to Dow Jones management” nudge the Murdoch sale along

This New York Times piece from Monday says an unnamed person connected to Dow Jones management and unnamed senior editors... More

Independence Day

No time for sunshine patriots at Dow Jones

Yet we have this consolation with us, that the harder the conflict, the more glorious the triumph. —Tom Paine, The... More

Why News Corp. Can’t Cover the U.S. Business Story

It is the story

The business press, I have to say, has done a terrific job vetting News Corp. and Rupert Murdoch as potential... More

Pitiful

Murdoch in the sewer

This News Corp. statement speaks for itself. It comes near the beginning of the second day of The New York... More

Don’t Miss The Post Cheney Series

“The Angler” is great and a pleasure to read.

The Washington Post series, by Bart Gellman (The Audit's onetime officemate, I'm proud to say) and Jo Becker, so far... More

The Audit Recommends…

The Times on Murdoch; The New Yorker on Murdoch; The WSJ on Murdoch and the Bear Stearns bailout;Lawrence Summers’s Op-Ed in the FT.

Business-press readers get even more reasons to oppose a Dow Jones sale to News Corp. from The New Yorker's rundown... More

Agency Problems at Dow Jones and the WSJ

Unusual job guarantees would put top Journal editors in a tight spot.

You can't tell the players without a scorecard, and today The Audit will spell out where the economic interests of... More

Secular vs. Cyclical

Shafer is wrong about Times piece

Jack Shafer finds a page one piece in Sunday's New York Times about a slowdown in online retail sales to... More

Changes at the Journal

The Audit’s interpretation

The Wall Street Journal's new managing editor, Marcus Brauchli, made some changes in the newsroom that are bold if nothing... More

The WSJ Story is Fine, But…

What’s missing from coverage of the insurance “industry”

The WSJ did a story last week on the explosive growth of state-owned insurers of last resort. This is a... More

Samuelson says there’s nothing to be done

Warns to avoid “class warfare”

The Washington Post's Robert Samuelson today weighs in with an informed column on cultural changes affecting income inequality. His conclusion:... More

Loss of Wartzman column reveals LAT’s biz coverage priorities

The Reader Speaks

One of The Audit's numerous sources in the business press passes along the following letter by Peter Dreier, a politics... More

How to Kill a Story

Murdoch would kill the Journal’s journalism

How do you kill a story? It must be hard, right? All reporters know the truth: any monkey can do... More

Great story; a concern and a thought

The Bancrofts’ lawyer is clearly conflicted; spell out where the CEO stands

Business-press readers and family therapy buffs alike will get a kick out The Wall Street Journal's Saturday story on discussions... More

Financial Times Bears Down

The British Peach combines sophistication and street smarts in a nice Page One piece.

The Audit can't resist the two-column, paper-leading story (badly underplayed on the Web) by Saskia Scholtes, who got hold of... More

DJ’s unsuitable suitors

Bancrofts in a tight spot

The news that Dow Jones & Co.'s controlling Bancroft family will consider selling the company, including to Rupert Murdoch's News... More

A word about leadership

And one reason Dow Jones lost the war

Warren H. Phillips, a former longtime CEO of Dow Jones & Co., wrote a letter to the New York Times's... More

Barack Obama: ‘those old times aren’t coming back’

“It used to be there were local newspapers everywhere. If you wanted to be a journalist, you could really make a good living working for your hometown paper”

The Guardian’s editor opens up on Reddit

Alan Rusbridger, editor of The Guardian, answered questions in an Ask Me Anything

The (almost) lost speech of Justice Anthony Kennedy

How his insightful remarks about the Constitution inadvertently make the case for a Supreme Court “media pool”

Fox News sues TVEyes for copyright infringement

Says subscription service sells access to its content without permission nor compensation

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