It is difficult not to supress a satisfying shiver of schadenfreude as one watches the saga of the self-immolating Murdoch Empire play itself out. The latest episode – breath-taking in its sheer chutzpah…
Murdoch and Rinehart could soon own almost all the significant newspapers in Australia.
EPA/Michael Reynolds/AAP/Tony McDonough
Australia’s wealthiest person, Gina Rinehart has bought shares in Fairfax Media. Should we be worried if she buys a controlling interest in the company that publishes the Age, Sydney Morning Herald and…
There’s no turning the tide when it comes to Twitter.
Rosaura Ochoa
The release of Sky News UK’s Twitter guidelines for its journalists – or rather, the Guardian‘s not entirely disinterested commentary on those guidelines – has caused a bit of a stir across social media…
It can be hard to sort fact from fiction in the modern media environment.
Mike Bailey-Gates
A growing cohort of commentators has bemoaned the descent of contemporary political “debate” into a largely fact-free zone. People used to be entitled to their own opinions, but not their own set of facts…
When jobs are disappearing, why are we training more journalists?
flickr
It usually begins mid-way through their university career. My office begins to fill with panicked journalism students who have seen the dismal job vacancies in their field and are starting to think their…
Journalist or blogger? It’s a thin line.
See-ming Lee æŽæ€æ˜Ž SML
Citizen journalists everywhere should be checking the fine print of media shield laws, after a US District Court judge in Oregon ruled that self-styled investigative blogger Crystal Cox was not a journalist…
The Age could find itself at the centre of a test case for a brand new law.
AAP/Elaine To
Victoria Police e-crime squad members yesterday raided the offices of The Age newspaper as part of their ongoing investigation into allegations that reporters from the paper illegally hacked into an ALP…
It seems that despite their sometimes bitter commercial rivalry, the Fairfax and News Limited empires agree on one thing: the Finkelstein Media Inquiry has been a giant waste of time and money. Both have…
John Hartigan would prefer to increase funding to the Press Council rather than face a new regulator.
AAP/Alan Porritt
Departing News Limited CEO John Hartigan has agreed in principle to support increased industry funding for the Australian Press Council but with a caveat. On day four of the Independent Media Inquiry…
Murdoch is taking more control of his Australian interests now John Hartigan is gone.
AAP/Rob Hutchison
Was John Hartigan pushed or did he leave his position as CEO of News Limited just in time? It’s likely that only a handful of people know the real answer to this question; among them will be “Harto” and…
Letting readers comment can direct journalism and make accountability a reality.
Flickr/Cayusa
On day two of the Media Inquiry, unconstrained online speech figured as a danger to democracy, rather than a new avenue for discussing media ethics and journalistic transparency. Justice Finkelstein opened…
Communications Minister Stephen Conroy announces the media inquiry in September.
AAP/Lucas Coch
As journalists and academics got ready to outline a new media order at the Finkelstein inquiry yesterday, anti-regulationists lined up to dismiss the process with bipartisan relish. On day one of the inquiry…
Andrew Bolt has a presence across a variety of media platforms.
AAP
Already the Libertarian Right have begun to marshal their traditional arguments to cover Andrew Bolt’s disgrace by the Federal Court. Bolt himself has screeched freedom of speech in the wake of his ascerbic…
Political activists and bad legislation have combined to create the extraordinary situation where eligibility for awards and prizes can’t be questioned. Not all prizes and awards – we can still mock Wayne…
Andrew Bolt outside court in Melbourne during an earlier appearance in the case decided today.
AAP
Columnist and commentator Andrew Bolt has lost his racial discrimination case in the Federal Court. The action under the Racial Discrimination Act had been brought by nine Aboriginal people including high…
The Murdoch crisis in the UK raises many questions about media ownership in Australia.
AAP/William West
The Gillard Government’s media inquiry is to disregard the crucial issues of bias and concentration of media ownership, despite Bob Brown’s demands for wider terms of reference. This is, at best, misled…
Have we seen the last of the hard-nosed investigative reporters who break news through months of painstaking research and contact-building? The internet has badly hurt the publishing business model that…
Tony Blair pulled back the curtain on the relationship between journalists and politicians..
AAP/Julian Smith
MEDIA & DEMOCRACY: On the final day of The Conversation’s series on how the media influences the way our representatives develop policy, John Keane examines how the relationships between politicians…
The Australian’s coverage of climate changed is seriously warped.
AFP PHOTO/ NASA - CXC/ A. HOBART
MEDIA & DEMOCRACY - Michael Ashley investigates the national paper’s op-ed policy. The “event horizon” of a black hole is one of the most mind-boggling concepts in astrophysics. The black hole’s stupendous…