Archie Bland, foreign editor of The Independent, and author of an excellent and prescient piece for CJR on the News of The World phone-hacking scandal, appeared on MSNBC last night to talk about the latest developments in the scandal.
As Bland wrote for CJR’s May/June issue, “one person with knowledge of the discussions inside News International” told him that there was a likely reason that Rebekah Brooks, editor of the News at the time its reporters hacked the voicemail of 11-year-old murder victim Milly Dowd Dowler, refused to make a full apology for any lawless or unethical behavior at the paper:
“The key problem is that it’s got to come from Rebekah,” the person said… “Anything she does that admits guilt on behalf of the company, it brings the tidal wave closer to her door.” … Police are said to be questioning her; if that tidal wave hasn’t quite swept into Brooks’s office yet, the surge is at the very least seeping under the door.
And indeed, The New York Times reports this morning that there is a growing consensus within Rupert Murdoch’s News Corporation that Brooks will be forced out of her current job running the company’s UK print properties. Man the lifeboats.
In addition to explaining the key players and providing a handy recap of the story, Bland’s piece explored why the often-venomous UK press had treated the scandal with such kid gloves. For more on that (and it ain’t pretty), check out this dispiriting essay by Peter Oborne, one of England’s most respected conservative columnists. A sample:
This should have been one of the great stories of all time. It has almost everything—royalty, police corruption, Downing Street complicity, celebrities by the cartload, Fleet Street at its most evil and disgusting….
By minimising these stories, media groups are coming dangerously close to making a very significant statement: they are essentially part of the same bent system as News International and complicit in its criminality.
Correction: This piece originally identified Milly Dowler as Milly Dowd. CJR regrets the error.
Yes, and I find it very curious indeed that virtually nobody cared that these people were hacking and eavesdropping on celebrities and politicians -- evidently everyone knew they were doing it for literally *years.* This woman testified openly that they had bribed the police -- crickets. The royal family -- crickets. Is it more legal or more acceptable to hack into the phones of powerful politicians and celebs than that of a young girl who was murdered (which they did not know at the time, evidently)? The Brits evidently think so.
We see this same kind of apathy in America with respect to the Murdoch empire and its clones hacking into accounts of Democrats, and setting up stings on organizations who support Democrats, and who commit election crimes against Democratic candidates. Fox News takes on Media Matters - Keach Hagey - POLITICO.com
#1 Posted by James, CJR on Thu 7 Jul 2011 at 10:16 PM
Peter Oborne (and the previous commenter) isn't really giving credit where credit is due to the Guardian. I suppose, however, that somebody like Oborne is loathe to give the Guardian credit for anything.
#2 Posted by Peteykins, CJR on Fri 8 Jul 2011 at 05:03 PM
Fox News is the TV version of News of the World.
Everything about Fox News has the same pattern as News International newspapers.
Fill in the blanks about wire-tapping etc. They sure use entrapment, bullying and opinion that borders on systematic lies and propaganda.
The UK newspapers are one small set of a single, global newspaper production system.
140 newspapers share a single production system where all news is shared. So a crime in one newspaper is a crime for all.
The cancer metaphor is important because, like any multinational corporation, it has an integrated production system. In the case of the newspapers at News Corp, roughly 150 newspapers share a single platform. There is very deep intermingling between newspapers brands, within locations such as Wapping, the news factory for News of The World (and The Sun, The Times etc) and between geographic locations.
Economies of scale in newspaper production drove the consolidation of newspaper production on a single platform, and the need to syndicate finished stories and rapidly share leads and editorial processes within the corporation and against competitors means there is a very big chance that the NoTW toxic tabloid journalism contagion will spread. The criminal content did not remain isolated in Wapping, instead it would of been spread throughout the 150 newspaper network.
Cross media would also have ensured the textual content would of been spread into other formats like TV. In Australia FoxTel and Sky, in UK BSkyB, the US Fox.
News International's newspapers are a small set of a single, unified, global, newspaper production system. Its integrated principally by the digital pagination and advertising system, which operates on the same software as airlines or banks. Its a real-time market for matching ads to editorial and selling content. There are 140 newspapers around the world ALL sharing the same production system. The printing presses are also part of the system, and KRM has made massive investments in these news factories over the years.
So, an editor in Australia can see into the news desk of the News of the World and see what is happening! Staff are moved around the empire all the time. Journalists and editors loyal to Murdoch, and prepared to do the dirty work are rewarded and the industrial fuedalism of personal loyalty is very strong.
In this global news factory network, the cheapest form of content is sleaze, then sport. Next is gossip. Then opinion. In the UK its ok to do all of this, there is a market. In the US, the Republican moral majority does not allow titties on television, but Fox News is built on gossip. Research is expensive and often reveals unwelcome truths for the proprietor or his advertisers. Sleaze, sport, gossip and opinion are cheap and can be used to attack enemies.
Fox News is tabloid journalism for the TV age. I hate to think what is being done at MySpace.
It will be hard to contain the criminal liability just to the UK papers when the business and editorial systems are global. 140 newspapers which now includes the WSJ
Just like the financial systems spread contagion in realtime, so too the toxic journalism and criminal content is automatically syndicated worldwide
#3 Posted by Nicholas Roberts, CJR on Sat 16 Jul 2011 at 01:09 AM