I'm curious about the contractual guarantee of editorial freedom.
In other acquisitions I have read about, such guarantees have been part of the deal. The two companies -- the buying company and the selling company -- incorporate the guarantee into the contract. Once the transaction is complete, however, the selling company is absorbed and it ceases to exist. There are no longer two parties to the contract, and its independence provisions are void. (This exact circumstance stung the editors of the New Yorker, I believe, after Fleischman and Ross sold to Rupert Murdoch.)
The bottom line is that such guarantees are usually merely symbolic. They may be sincerely meant, but they are rarely binding or enforceable.
Slashdot Mirror
I'm curious about the contractual guarantee of editorial freedom.
In other acquisitions I have read about, such guarantees have been part of the deal. The two companies -- the buying company and the selling company -- incorporate the guarantee into the contract. Once the transaction is complete, however, the selling company is absorbed and it ceases to exist. There are no longer two parties to the contract, and its independence provisions are void. (This exact circumstance stung the editors of the New Yorker, I believe, after Fleischman and Ross sold to Rupert Murdoch.)
The bottom line is that such guarantees are usually merely symbolic. They may be sincerely meant, but they are rarely binding or enforceable.