Murdoch’s Fatal Flaw
By JOE NOCERA
NYT
It’s often been noted — especially of late — that Rupert Murdoch’s entree into British newspapering took place in 1969, when, as a brash young Australian publisher, he bought The News of the World, a spicy Sunday paper that he turned into an even spicier tabloid, a cross between The New York Post and The National Enquirer.
But that’s never been quite right. Murdoch’s real introduction to British journalism came in the early 1950s, when he was fresh out of college. His father, an editor and publisher in Australia, had died the year before. Murdoch headed to Fleet Street — “the mecca of competitive journalism,” as he would describe it many years later — to learn the ropes so he could take over his father’s paper in Adelaide.
“I sat in on The Daily Express,” he told Esquire magazine in 2008, “and I enjoyed it so much, I thought, I gotta have a job here, just to learn.” He remained there for the next five or six months, staying at a friend’s apartment. “It was one of the happiest experiences of my life,” he said.
Though World War II was long over, a lingering paper shortage meant that all the London newspapers were limited to eight pages a day. “Everything was boiled down to two paragraphs or so,” he recalled in the Esquire interview. “Brevity was important. Facts had to be right. And it was exciting.”
(More here.)
NYT
It’s often been noted — especially of late — that Rupert Murdoch’s entree into British newspapering took place in 1969, when, as a brash young Australian publisher, he bought The News of the World, a spicy Sunday paper that he turned into an even spicier tabloid, a cross between The New York Post and The National Enquirer.
But that’s never been quite right. Murdoch’s real introduction to British journalism came in the early 1950s, when he was fresh out of college. His father, an editor and publisher in Australia, had died the year before. Murdoch headed to Fleet Street — “the mecca of competitive journalism,” as he would describe it many years later — to learn the ropes so he could take over his father’s paper in Adelaide.
“I sat in on The Daily Express,” he told Esquire magazine in 2008, “and I enjoyed it so much, I thought, I gotta have a job here, just to learn.” He remained there for the next five or six months, staying at a friend’s apartment. “It was one of the happiest experiences of my life,” he said.
Though World War II was long over, a lingering paper shortage meant that all the London newspapers were limited to eight pages a day. “Everything was boiled down to two paragraphs or so,” he recalled in the Esquire interview. “Brevity was important. Facts had to be right. And it was exciting.”
(More here.)
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