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It's Official: News Corp to Buy DirecTV
Guppy06 writes "According to this Washington Post article, the heads at both News Corporation (owners of Fox) and DirecTV have agreed to a $6.6 billion deal to secure the purchase of DirecTV by News, with GM getting a little less than half of that total in cash. All that remains now is the actual exchange. For the record, EchoStar was going to pay $30 billion before the FCC shot them down."
Except for CNN and MSNBC mysteriously vanishing in favor of fox news
slashdot, news for crazed liberal socialist zealots
"For the record, EchoStar was going to pay $30 billion before the FCC shot them down."
The article neglects to mention that Murdoch has offered more (much more) in the past
He had planned a more than $20 billion offer for the company in 2001, and an even larger, $30 billion-plus offer in 2000.
I found the above info in a google search. We do contract work for DTV and I remember kind of scratching our heards when the Echostar bid was the one accepted. Directv accepted the offer from Echostar, even though iirc Newscorp offerd more. No one was confident that the Echostar deal would get approved. The rumor was that the management at Directv was scared that if Murdoch bought the business they were all out of work.
Now Murdoch gets Directv at a much better rate.
"Give a woman two glasses of wine and some pad thai, and they'll agree to just about anything." the Sports Guy
We're heading for a one world government that's not going to be feared but loved by the public because the media monopoly tells it that everything's just great.
BOO! TERRO
It's fair and balanced. They say so themselves. Why is everything a conspiracy with you liberals?
I couldn't help thinkin of the Simpsons on this one:
Lisa: It's wonderful to think for ourselves again.
Bart: You said it, sister!
TV: You are watching Fox.
All: [Zombie-like] We are watching Fox.
Johnkoerner.com
What liberal media?
;-)
Fox, CNN, NBC etc. are all run by corporations and have a strong conservative bias, which can be proven by the number of conservative 'specialists' they bring on their shows, and thus they don't offend their conservative owners/contributors. Works out nicely for Bush, since he's rarely criticized on TV, unlike Clinton.
What's disturbing to me about this is that there's actually a company called 'News Corp'. Talk about population control *shiver*. I'm stickin' with PBS. At least they consider all things
"I only speak the truth"
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I had Telocity DSL. GREAT SERVICE! then Directv buys them to make Directv DSL. I had that service until i had to move, and with 1 month left on the contract, they said i had to pay a $150 early cancel fee, i even offered to just pay the last month, no deal. so, after being kinda pissed about that, i move, find out that directvdsl is the best service i can get, i give them a call up and they give me $40/mo. static ip 1.5/256 connection for 12 months to make up for the $150 they robbed me.
well, that lasted an entire month before the division shut down!
directv does have great sport packages, but no G4 channel, no Fox news, no Cricket. The only thing i like about directv's service now is their menu system. i sure hope that selling the company means that i can break my contract to go with someone else now...
It's great to hear that the world-wide media industry is getting more and more efficient over time. With only a few large players in the industry, billing can be consolidated and redundancy of equipment and programming can be minimized, saving globs of cash.
In the end, this is sure this will bring higher quality service and programming at significantly lower prices!
Alas, the savings and increase in quality will happen only over an extended period of time.
And with inflation and government regulations, we customers might perceive lower quality and higher prices.
But no... it'll be much better than it would've been... just look how radio has improved in the past 20 years!
Could someone explain which coporations on what? Here in the UK its basically the BBC + Sky but not sure about any other major players
Rus
Cheap UK and US VPS
Oh no, people might watch something and agree with it!
Quickly! We must get the government to stop this! Only Vendekkai-approved news sources must be allowed to have audiences!
Of course. Obviously holders of conservative veiwpoints can't be allowed to excercise free speech or press.
Do you somehow think that HBO will come off as "more conservative" over the satellite if Rupert Murdoch owns DirecTV? Will it Janine Garafollo suddenly stop in the middle of a Comedy Special and launch into a Pro-Bush, Pro-War propeganda dialog on the "DirectTV" version of the broadcast?
How about the News... oh wait he already owns FoxNews.
How exactly will this change things again?
I'm not a big fan of the guy, but aren't we being just a wee bit paranoid here?
"Oh my God. This is terrible. This is the end of my Presidency. I'm fucked."; ~ Donald J. Trump
Does this mean that there is less choice in the US over who supplies the news? If it is, it's got to be a bad thing.
You only have to look at the past few months, with camera men being sacked for editing photos for publication in major news papers, and footage of the Iraqi war to show that news groups need to be more honest - and have competition to measure their views.
Views on the push by the US forces ranged from "Hurrah, the people are free", to "Look how the Americans allow people to loot" - with all the channels showing the same footage. One side said it was the whole city rising up, with another saying only a few hundred were celebrating.
So far this morning, the BBC have said both!
I find modern news channels being more political than ever before, and views on the same thing seem to contradict each other.
It all makes it harder to find out the real facts - especially if a company wants to be classed as friends of a political group to get more information - would they really state the facts if it was going to hurt a 'friendly' political group?
Ian.
You are all beneath my contempt..., unless you bribe well
Can it be? A voice of reason within the first 25 comments on slashdot....
No, I disagree - DirecTV should have gone to a small, independent outfit like Clear Channel Communications...
Stop by my site where I write about ERP systems & more
Funny how Murdock is the Republican party's largest donator, Fox is promoting the war 24/7 in the typical fashion of "all the way with GWB", and who would have guessed it, regulators "suddenly" allow the buy out with no questions asked.
Funny how on one hand we have GWB scream about the terrible and corrupt regeme of Iraq, yet, something like this just slips through and worst still, the US isn't like most countries. Most countries have a publicly funded television network that allows a voice of opinion to be broadcasted that isn't always "politically acceptable". Just look at Fox and the pro-war stance and the number of suckers sucked into the vacuum.
What the US needs first is a publicly funded broadcasting corporation that is at an arms length of government and receives no funding from the private sector. This is the only way to ensure media independence as the number of "media outlets" strink.
Earlier this year, a group of anti-war protesters put together a television advertisement. The major networks refused to run it because it was "too controversial". In order to get air-time, they had to go to cable companies and buy local advertisements.
With newscorp controlling DirectTV, one more advertising venue becomes consolidated under the same management structure.
You're missing the point if you think the purpose of News Corp is to advance any political position
Politics comes a distant second to business in News Corporation. In the UK, Murdoch is seen as the very definition of a dangerous monopolist, controlling all satellite TV (which is more popular than cable) as well as several of the most popular newspapers (The Sun, The News of the World, The Times, The Sunday Times). The Murdoch media are generally populist right-wing, but they pretty soon slotted in behind Blair when they saw which way the wind was blowing. They are populist right-wing because it sells, that's all.
Uh...Do you have any evidence to back that up? A link to a survey? An exit poll? Anything? I know plenty of conservative journalists... (Having been, at one point, a journalism student in the state of Indiana.)
Sorry, but you must have been asleep during those controversies. There was widespread press criticism of the president in that scandal. Also, the "focus" on cigars and stained dresses should be traced back to a witch-hunt launched by Clinton's political adversaries. Is it a coincidence that the first democrat to be elected and serve TWO FULL TERMS (since...what, FDR?) was "investigated" endlessly by conservative political appointees who, after many years and $40 million of tax money could only "get" him on the technicality that he didn't wish to disclose an extra-marital affair when the investigation was supposedly focused on a real estate deal?
The biggest white elephant ever from the conservatives is the "liberal media" one. If the widespread "liberal" bias really existed, I would expect to see widespread outright opposition to President Bush's policies, since he is a Republican.
Yet the opposite is true. The networks are giving us non-stop, nearly pornographic (positive) coverage of this war and there are very few dissenting voices on the airwaves right now.
Again, you'd think if the media was so "liberal" they would show civillian casualty numbers which (once again) it appears will end up in the multiple thousands. I haven't heard even ONE PEEP on American television about civillian casualties... Except for when they hit a busload of civiliians with a missile, we heard about THAT "accident." But after the bombing of a residential area where potentially hundreds of civilians could have been affected... nothing. Not one peep.
Who did what now?
What the US needs first is a publicly funded broadcasting corporation
I agree. We need something like Iraq TV. Baghdad Bob, come back, we need you for the 5 O'Clock Eyewitness News.
Freedom Is Universal
Linux-Universe
CNN leans left? Tell that to Wolf Blitzer and Aaron Brown. I'm certain they would be surprised to find that out.
As a DirecTV customer, I'm very happy to see this happening. Any media service owned by News Corp. is one not owned by Microsoft. This is not a troll/flamebait -- I was truly worried about someday having to either switch or cancel because a company I refuse to give my money to takes over a service I use. It would be better if there were room for lots of small players, but at least the big players keep each other in check. It's best when they hate each other, too -- when they don't, they start cooperating, and that tends to screw any small/free players that are still around.
Tired of FB/Google censorship? Visit UNCENSORED!
AFAIK, Murdoch's Fox News is the only news outlet ever to win a lawsuit by insisting they are under no obligation to report truthfully. Try a Google search for "fox news lawsuit jane monsanto" for more info.
Here's a unbiased report on the civilian casualties
More likely there are more deaths that can't be reported, and not to mention the tens of thousands of Iraqis defending their homes with WWII style guns, but who cares about them right?
Saddam wasn't a mass murderer when it came to his own people excluding the Kurds after the first gulf war of course, but then you don't have the facts, and really, neither do I, on how bad he was.
"I only speak the truth"
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If you want to find out how well the US is doing in the war, you watch Fox News.
If you want to find out how badly the US is doing in the war, you watch CNN.
If you want to find out how evil the US is, you watch Al Jazeera.
By combining all 3, maybe the opposing waveforms cancel out leaving a small speck of truth. But in reality, I suppose you just have to be there.
Views on the push by the US forces ranged from "Hurrah, the people are free", to "Look how the Americans allow people to loot" - with all the channels showing the same footage.
I want to make one thing clear, the Military is NOT trained as a police force. They are trained as a killing machine to go out there and DESTROY the enemy, not police it.
That doesn't mean they can't get the job done, but when they aren't even fully deployed in Baghdad or Basra and the chaos of war is still ensuing can you honestly expect them to be able to police an entire society that numbers in the millions?
I know you didn't originally state this, but for those out there who did, let's be reasonable here. The military will get things under control and remove the power vacuum, but like all other things in life it's not going to happen over night.
Bryan