Lipstick On A Fox, The Bill Shine Shake-Up and Myth Of The Sons

Can you put lipstick on a Fox? That’s just one of our immediate questions as time caught up with Bill Shine, long-time Roger Ailes lieutenant. Shine followed Bill O’Reilly out the door on Monday, just two weeks after the cascade of women’s harassment claims made him more of a ...

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Newsonomics: Don’t Be Fooled Into Expecting a New Fox News

O’Reilly’s banished. Ailes is plotting something somewhere. And Megyn Kelly and Gretchen Carlson enjoy, or plan to, the air elsewhere. It must be time to reposition Fox News, right? Why, it only makes sense. When an 86-year-old still commands the channel that commands the oldest ...

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Trump, Murdoch, Ailes: A Trifecta of Woe, By The Numbers

They’ve built their business lives on numbers, and this week’s numbers measure the collective, interwoven fates of Donald Trump, Roger Ailes and Rupert Murdoch. Toting up those woes, the trio’s many critics may feel – this week at least – like they’ve won the Schadenfreude Olympics. For two ...

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Fox News, 2017, Post-Election, What Will the Murdochs Do?

Is it too early to move on 2017? While the number 24 – as in 24%, the odds of Donald Trump winning the Presidency according to The New York Times’ Upshot forecasters — sent a chill down the spine of many, it still looks like the likelihood is that Hillary Clinton will move into the... Read More

Newsonomics: As Fox’s Dr. Frankenstein Exits Right, the Murdochs Are Left to Reboot Their Wounded Cable News Leader.

If the ascendance of Donald Trump is showbiz, the descent of Roger Ailes can only be described as opera. Trump and Ailes should go down into history together, and July 21, 2016 will mark it. Just hours before Trump formally accepted the Republican nomination for President, the Dr. Frankenstein ...

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The Newsonomics of Rupert Murdoch, American Publisher

Tribune’s own market assessment of all its eight newspaper properties, part of the bankruptcy proceeding, came in at $623 million, compared to $2.85 billion for the broadcast business. Without competitive bidders, that amount may be optimistic. With competitive bidders — especially in L.A. and ...

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The Newsonomics of a New York Times/CNN Combination

Both CNN and The New York Times fill in numerous of the other’s weaknesses. At this digital moment when “mobile” and the tablet are tossing old habits up in the air and forcing consumers to re-form new ones, it’s a great time for both the Times and CNN to double down on their native advantages, ...

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The Newsonomics of Signature Content

Forget “content wants to be free.” Now content wants a fee. And everyone from Time Inc to The New York Times to the Memphis Commercial Appeal to Hulu’s co-owners (Fox, Disney, and Comcast) see gold. They see another digital revenue stream, in addition to advertising or to cable subscription ...

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Fox Trumps Sammon Confession….with The Donald

For anyone following Murdoch's long-standing campaign against the BBC, and its public funding -- a campaign now having an effect as Britain suffers through terrible economic times -- Fox's drumbeat of anti-NPR coverage is no surprise. Public radio, and public media, are a counterweight to Fox; ...

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The Problem with CNN: Conventional News Network

CNN’s ratings slides is beginning to look like daily newspaper’s long circ slide.  The hot cable media — Fox, especially, and less so, MSNBC as well as CNN’s own HLN, with its screaming, tabloidy, violence-centered coverage — all are beating it, and ever more ...

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