Wall Street Journal Independent
Has Ties to News Corp

STEPHEN FOLEY / The Independent (UK) 4aug2007

New York — The Wall Street Journal moved ostentatiously to shore up its editorial credibility yesterday, reporting that an executive chosen for its independent editorial board - designed to protect it from interference from its new owner, Rupert Murdoch - has "ties" to News Corp.

Rupert Murdoch

Journal reporters and readers have reacted with anger to the $5bn (£2.5bn) sale of the newspaper's parent company, Dow Jones, to Mr Murdoch's News Corp earlier this week, amid concerns that the media mogul will bend the Journal's news coverage to suit his business interests.

In yesterday's edition, only the second since Mr Murdoch secured his prize, the Journal reported that a charitable foundation run by Nicholas Negroponte has received donations from News Corp. Mr Negroponte, the founding chairman of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology's Media Lab, was one of five people chosen for the independent editorial board being set up as a buffer between Mr Murdoch and the Journal. It is charged with protecting the newspaper's editorial integrity by arbitrating disputes and approving the hiring and firing of top editors.

However, he is also chairman of the One Laptop per Child charity project, which is trying to design a $100 computer and whose corporate sponsors include Google and Adavanced Micro Devices. News Corp has given upwards of $2m to the project and one of its directors sits on the charity's board. Spokesmen for News Corp and Dow Jones, and the Journal's editor , Marcus Brauchli, said they considered Mr Negroponte independent.

The detailed scrutiny of the members of the editorial board reflects the sensitivities surrounding the takeover of the Journal. The political fall-out from Mr Murdoch's takeover continued to spread yesterday.

John Edwards, who is running third in the race for the Democratic Party's presidential nomination, called on the frontrunner Hillary Clinton to return campaign donations from Mr Murdoch, who has held a fundraising event for her in New York. He and other candidates called on Democrats to fight the takeover.

Michael Copps, a Democrat member of the Federal Communications Commission, said that the media industry watchdog should examine whether the deal can be blocked on the grounds that it concentrates too much power in the hands of Mr Murdoch, who also owns the right-wing news channel Fox News and the tabloid New York Post.

source: 3aug2007