So the nightmare is becoming a reality, and within a week -- barring some late and unlikely development -- Rupert Murdoch will own the Wall Street Journal. Here is hoping a good portion of Journal's more than 2 million subscribers start reading the Financial Times instead (which, I would argue, is the better of two good newspapers without even considering the Murdoch Factor).
Some thoughts from media critics around the web:
"So Murdoch is on the threshold of getting the Journal, here. This is bad news for everyone in the world who is not related to, or a well-paid employee of, Rupert Murdoch."
---Eric Alterman -- Media Matters
"I don't mean to be too nostalgic. Obviously the news business is falling apart, and we're going to witness all kinds of unimaginable events before someone figures out how to put together a new, very different model ... this is a sad day for journalism. At the very least, if managing editor Marcus Brauchli has any tough stories on China in the can, he'd better run them in the next day or two."
---Dan Kennedy -- Media Nation
“Rupert Murdoch’s takeover of the Wall Street Journal may not be illegal, but it’s certainly wrong. The cost of giving one company — and one man — this much media power is simply too high.”
-- Robert McChesney -- Free Press
"Well, it appears almost wrapped up. Rupert took his position, offered his price, and alternated between petulance and bonhomie in playing the DJ board and Bancrofts like the fine fiddler he is."
--- Ken Doctor -- Content Bridges
