Murdoch Relies More on Impulse Than Vision

News mogul attacks biography's depiction of rival Murdoch

(NEWSER) - Convicted felon Conrad Black has skipped time in the exercise yard to pen a review from prison of the new biography of his old rival Rupert Murdoch. Black complains that biographer Michael Wolff is at once too deferential and takes "extreme psychological liberties" in The Man Who Owns the News. In reality, Murdoch “is quite pleasant,” Black writes for the Daily Beast, “though he is also one of the very few completely ruthless and totally cynical people I have known.” More»

Bio says he'd love to acquire it, make Sulzberger his 'puppet'

(NEWSER) - First the Journal and next the New York Times? The Economist takes a look at Rupert Murdoch's "ever-stronger" ambition to acquire the Times, as laid out in a new biography, The Man Who Owns the News, by Newser founder Michael Wolff. Murdoch views the Times as his "favorite train wreck," the book says. More»

NY Post coverage trumpets president-elect

(NEWSER) - Media watchers have been tracking the post-election New York Post with particular interest: Instead of being dyspeptic over the Democratic presidential win, Rupert Murdoch's gleefully right-wing tabloid has treated Barack Obama to coverage ranging, as the New York Times puts it, "from warm and fuzzy to downright heroic." Which fuels speculation, first raised by biographer Michael Wolff in a book excerpt in Vanity Fair, that the 77-year-old media magnate (and owner of Fox News) is veering leftward. More»

6 children compete for affection and business, writes Wolff

(NEWSER) - In an age of MBA-holding executives and shareholder revolts, Rupert Murdoch's News Corp. is that rarest thing: a business dynasty. The media mogul's six children, by three different wives, have conducted their power plays in public and private. But as Michael Wolff writes in Vanity Fair, while the elder Murdochs have accepted their young siblings' claim to Rupert's fortune, they're keeping News Corp. for themselves. More»

(NEWSER) - It won't surprise anyone that Rupert Murdoch managed to get his hands on an advance copy of Michael Wolff's upcoming biography of him, despite a strict embargo, or that he complained to the publisher over some of the contents. Murdoch gave Wolff more than 50 hours of interviews and access to everyone from his top execs to his 99-year-old mother, and he told them to be candid. The New York Times chronicles the ensuing brouhaha. More»