Opinion: British tabloid’s closure not about righting its wrongs
By JIM BROOKS
Nelson County Gazette
Colin Myler, editor of the News of The World, holds a copy of the last edition of the paper published on Sunday, July 10, 2011.
Monday, July 11, 2011, 12:15 p.m. – As someone who still considers himself to be a “print journalist.” I have been closely following the recent decision by News Corp. to shutter The News of the World, its popular Sunday British tabloid newspaper.
I also read a column yesterday written by Lisa Tolliver, editor of the Kentucky Standard, who opined that the voice mail hacking scandal that hit The News of the World shouldn’t taint the credibility of all newspapers.
While I personally don’t believe U.S. readers equate British tabloid journalism with their “regular” weekly/semi-weekly/daily newspaper, I found it interesting that Ms. Tolliver placed part of the blame of the “alleged” fall of newspaper advertising and circulation on the media itself for hyping a story that she suggests was a non-story – at least for smaller newspapers like the Standard.
While I realize she was using the closure of The News of the World to launch her “newspapers are doing fine” column, she fails to mention the true reasons why the tabloid was shuttered.
The closure of The News of the World was a calculated business decision by James Murdoch and his father, Rupert Murdoch, and nothing more. The closure had little – if anything – to do with righting the wrongs committed by the British tabloid’s staff members. The paper’s closure had everything to do with salvaging News Corp.’s multi-billion dollar bid for British satellite broadcaster BSkyB.
The Murdochs chose the “nuclear option” of closing the newspaper in an attempt to stem the tide of negative publicity about the paper’s voice mail hacking scandal, which seriously threatens the BSkyB deal. For the Murdochs, it was a no-brainer decision to sacrifice their profitable newspaper for a far more lucrative business investment.
The closure had nothing to do with the paper’s circulation (though it continued a decades-long slow decline, it was still hitting 2.8 million copies per week) or its advertising lineage (the paper was still very profitable). But the Murdochs understood that the loss of The News was a necessary business move.
The closure doesn’t mean the $14 billion BSkyB deal is going to be an easy one for News Corp. to complete. Britain’s deputy prime minister has already asked the Murdochs to “do the right thing” and abandon their bid for the satellite broadcaster. Members of the Liberal Democratic party say they will back a vote to block the deal – at least until official investigations of wrongdoing by The News of the World staff are completed.
According to other British press, the investigations are including some of Murdoch’s inner circle of trusted managers, which may make getting the BSkyB deal completed a much tougher row to hoe. As easily as the Murdochs shuttered a profitable newspaper, I expect to see them quickly distance themselves from any of their inner circle who might taint the deal.
Newspapers like to suggest they are a public service; it is more accurate to state they perform a service to the public for a fee – a fee that is paid for by readers who purchase the newspaper and subsidized by businesses that buy advertising. A newspaper is first and foremost a business, charged with making a profit. And it’s the desire to make more profit that ultimately prompted News Corp. to close The News of the World.
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