The News Corp crystal method
Robert Thompson in front of the ‘crystal’
And so to last night’s star-studded News Corp upfronts at the Star Casino where Dr mumbo was fortunate enough to rub elbows with the great and the good of Sydney’s media, including Lachlan Murdoch, his wife Sarah, Gerry Harvey and ex-Soceroo Mark Bosnich.
Now, if Dr Mumbo were to be a conspiracy theorist he might be tempted to read too much into the fact the only free-to-air TV boss there was Hamish McLennan, the only obviously discernible ads amongst dozens of images of papers, phone apps and iPad editions were for Ten’s Offspring, or the theme of the event being ‘Come Together’ to hypothesise on a tie-up between News Corp and Ten.
Of course others might point to Hamish being chairman of the News-controlled REA Group, the Offspring ads being a ‘fluke’ of a screenshot according to a News spokesman and the theme relating to the convergence of print and digital ads.
Special mention also goes to News Corp’s global CEO Robert Thompson who flew in for the event, and got the biggest laugh of the night for a joke about crystals.
(L-R) CEO News Corp (US) Julian Clarke, Co- Chairman News Corp, Lachlan Murdoch, Sarah Murdoch, Foxtel Australia Richard Freudenstein, CEO News Corp (Australia) Robert Thomson.
He opened with: “In a sense I am your video pre-roll before the truly substantial editorial content. Of course we’re all still debating the perfect length for the pre-roll, is it 15 seconds, 12 seconds, eight seconds? In my case it will be about six minutes. Unfortunately for you no amount of clicking will get rid of me.”
After talking about how the company is working to roll out global solutions as it looks to engage its audiences he noted the giant crystal, the centrepiece of the set behind him, and quipped: “As you can see behind me, if the strategy goes awry we have a fall-back plan, a giant crystal. We will all hold hands, close our eyes and really concentrate.”
In stark contrast to this News Corporation back slapping and general jollity was yesterday’s Daily Telegraph front page, possible the lowest they have ever been.
The headline “Slackers and Slouch Hats” was a confused piece from journalist ? Geoff Chambers braying that NSW Disability Support Pensioners now outnumber Australia’s total war wounded by more than 44,000.
WTF ? Where’s the relevance? Where’s the lesson? Where’s the solution?
It is little wonder that newspapers are going out backwards if that is the best they can make of the day’s news, there were a few other things of importance.
I’m positive I would not be including too many News Limited newspapers if I was still in the business, the figures speak for themselves.
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They now how to throw a party, I’ll give ’em that.
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@wasa …and today they go front page on the revelation that a government survey on cycling was wrong, (in their eyes). No actual opinion expressed on whether cycling was positive or negative to the city. Is this really the headline story in sydney today and would they run such a non story on the front page just to get a few snide remarks about Clover in – it seems the answer is yes?
On this form, soon their only reader will be Ray Hadley.
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Check your facts. Robert Thomson is the CEO News Corp (US) and Julian Clarke is the CEO of News Corp Australia.
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I can’t stop reading that as ‘The News Corp (does) Crystal Meth’
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