Rupert Murdoch & New Media

Have recently heard a lot of really bad stuff about a man called Rupert Murdoch. An old man in his 70's who once owned a small newspaper in Australia in the early 1950s and how he set about creating a huge, large media empire.

He is lambasted for his lack of respect for journalistic commandments like informed, unbiased and factual reporting. He is demonised for his manipulation of people through media and providing an inaccurate, opinionated view across all that he controls. He is despised also because it is unfair for one man to achieve so much in such a short time.

This media empire (still largely in control of this one man) owns a plethora of newspapers in Australia, South east Asia, the US and the UK. Its television ownerships include the Fox network in the US, the Sky & ITV networks in the UK and Star TV in Asia. Thats not all, this corporation also owns myspace & photobucket, two very popular networking websites. Thats not all, it also owns publishing giants like harper collins. It also owns a large number of magazines.

In India, News corp has stakes in radiocity, via star tv; indya.com and tata sky. Not content with just the channels, it also owns the distributor - a 26% stake Hathway Cable & Datacom (26%), India's 2nd largest cable network through 7 cities including Bangalore, Chennai, Delhi, Mumbai & Pune.

Suffice to say that the aim here is to own both the channel (or content aggregator in media parlance) and the distribution of those channels.

But hang on, not only do they control the "content aggregators" & "content distributors", they also own the content. News Corp owns 20th Century Fox and a 50% stake in the National Rugby League. They also own "content creators"!!!

Now thinking more about content, which are the two most universally popular content platforms in the world? Films, music & sport. News Corp has ownership (but not domination) in each of these two pots.

The bottomline? One company, owned and run largely by one man owns content creators, content aggregators and content distributors. A classic case of vertical integration. So what is wrong about that? Well, this is the media business we are talking about. And media directs public opinion and thinking. In short, because News Corp has substantial stakes in content creation, aggregation & distribution it can direct, influence & manipulate content consumption. In simpler words, it can also OWN content consumption i.e. you and me and what we think.

And that is why the company and the man is in the news these days because of his recent acquisition of the Wall street journal. The bigger question here is not whether Mr Murdoch respects journalistic skills or not. The key question is whether one man should be allowed to control all the aces of such an influential pack of cards as media. And thats the bottomline...