eSports firm Gfinity teams up with Rupert Murdoch’s News UK April 17, 2015 Rupert Murdoch's News UK has recognised the booming appeal of eSports by agreeing a two-year commercial partnership with professional video gaming firm Gfinity. Aim-listed Gfinity has a rapidly expanding online user base in excess of 300,000 and boasts of the UK's first eSports-dedicated arena which hosts weekly professional competitions of games such as Fifa '15, Counter-Strike: [...]
Amazon and HarperCollins agree publishing deal settling ebook pricing row April 14, 2015 Amazon and publisher HarperCollins have settled a long-running battle over the pricing of digital editions of its books. The NewsCorp-owned publisher and online retailing giant have agreed that HarperCollins can set its own prices for ebooks sold through Amazon although there will be incentives for it to set lower prices for consumers, the Wall Street [...]
General Election 2015 manifestos: Labour prepares to take aim at Rupert Murdoch April 13, 2015 A Labour government would rein in the influence of media tycoons like Rupert Murdoch, the party said yesterday. Its 86-page manifesto, now published in full, said: “No media owner should have so much power that those who run it believe themselves above the rule of law.” The pre-election document also said the party is [...]
Kelvin MacKenzie gets Rupert Murdoch push for A Spokesman Said customer complaints website January 12, 2015 Media entrepreneur Kelvin MacKenzie has won backing from media tycoon Rupert Murdoch for a new website aimed at giving disgruntled consumers a chance to name and shame companies offering them poor service. A Spokesman Said, which was officially launched yesterday, will be funded by MacKenzie and a group of private investors, including Murdoch and entrepreneur [...]
James Murdoch steps down as Sky Deutschland chairman after pension fund questions “conflicts of interests and suitability” November 19, 2014 James Murdoch has stepped down from his role as chairman of Sky Deutschland following today's AGM. Murdoch will remain on the supervisory board, with Sky's chief executive Jeremy Darroch taking on the chairmanship role. Andrew Griffith has also joined the board as a member. The move comes two days after the Local Authority [...]
News Corp buys Move to boost its real estate September 30, 2014 Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp yesterday stepped further into the digital age with the announcement it would spend $950m (£586m) buying Move, the US company which owns property websites such as realtor.com. News Corp said it would pay $21 per share, a premium of 37 per cent to Move’s closing price on Monday. Australian real estate [...]
Google picks apart News Corp attack in open letter September 25, 2014 THE SPAT between Google and Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp escalated yesterday as the search giant responded to scathing claims made by the publisher last Thursday that it was a “platform for piracy”. In a blog post sarcastically titled “Dear Rupert”, referring to the billionaire chairman, Google’s comms chief Rachel Whetstone hit back at claims made [...]
Google Vs News Corp: Internet giant refutes piracy claims made by Rupert Murdoch-owned publisher September 25, 2014 Google has responded to scathing claims made by News Corp that it’s a “platform for piracy” run by “cynical management” in a blog post titled “Dear Rupert”. The piece, penned by Google's global head of communications Rachel Whetstone, outlines a point by point response to claims made by News Corp’s Robert Thomson last week in [...]
Is News Corp right that Google’s internet dominance is damaging? September 18, 2014 Carl Miller, research director at the Centre for the Analysis of Social Media at Demos, says Yes. Google: Gmail, Chrome, Google+, Search, all free. It gives us a suite of brilliantly useful products that almost all of us use daily. What’s not to like? That’s the problem. Day-to-day, everything is convenient and free. We treat [...]
News Corp chief Robert Thompson calls Google a “platform for piracy” run by “cynical management” in letter to EU commissioner Joaquin Almunia September 18, 2014 News Corp has told the EU it believes Google is stifling competition and undermining the business model of “content creators” in its dominance of internet search. The Rupert Murdoch-owned company, which publishes the the Times, the Sun, the Wall Street Journal and book publisher Harpercollins lambasted Google in a letter to the EU’s competition commission [...]