I'll just offer you a few links on a common theme -- further research is of course up to you. The theme today is the news market in Australia.
In mid June, Fairfax Media announced what it called a restructuring -- a retrenchment might be a more apt term.
Gina Rinehart, a businesswoman whose fortune was made in mining, owns a large stake in Fairfax (close to 19 percent) and she wants to have a seat on the board of directors, presumably because she can help guide the company's future in a value-maximizing way. Or simply as a matter of traditional greenmail.
Either way, the Fairfax chairman isn't seeing things her way.
Fairfax media is a quite diversified company. Its chief publications are The Sydney Morning Herald and The Age. Jonathan Green, a fellow who worked for The Age for 15 years, sees things this way.
The above corporate news has become intertwined with a political scandal. Peter Slipper, the Speaker of Australia's House of Representatives, has become of late the target of allegations of sexual harassment. The allegedly harassed staffer is an openly gay man named James Ashby. Here's an article from April on that general subject.
News Ltd., not Fairfax, took a leading role in bringing Ashby's accusations to the attention of the Aussie public. Indeed, Fairfax, especially the SMH, seems to have sided with Slipper, portraying the Ashby accusations as non-credible and part of a political vendetta.
If that is what it was, it was successful. Slipper has stepped aside. But that hasn't been the end of the matter. Ashby may have been on the dishing-out side of harassment himself, and is now on the 'taking' side of accusations.
Appropriately, on June 20 News Ltd, too, announced a restructuring/retrenchment. It had decided to lay off 1,900 employees and downsizing of two of its best-known titles.
On July 2d, an (understandably anonymous) Fairfax journalist had a piece in Mumbrella, saying: "The atmosphere in Fairfax right now is awful. Fear can be explained, resolved and dispelled. Anger and hatred to the organisation and towards your colleagues – those who want to try something new, who dare to contemplate producing a different paper to the one we put out ten, twenty or thirty years ago, those who still want to have pride in writing for The Age or The Herald whatever form it comes in – that anger is the sign that your time has come."
In mid June, Fairfax Media announced what it called a restructuring -- a retrenchment might be a more apt term.
Gina Rinehart, a businesswoman whose fortune was made in mining, owns a large stake in Fairfax (close to 19 percent) and she wants to have a seat on the board of directors, presumably because she can help guide the company's future in a value-maximizing way. Or simply as a matter of traditional greenmail.
Either way, the Fairfax chairman isn't seeing things her way.
Fairfax media is a quite diversified company. Its chief publications are The Sydney Morning Herald and The Age. Jonathan Green, a fellow who worked for The Age for 15 years, sees things this way.
The above corporate news has become intertwined with a political scandal. Peter Slipper, the Speaker of Australia's House of Representatives, has become of late the target of allegations of sexual harassment. The allegedly harassed staffer is an openly gay man named James Ashby. Here's an article from April on that general subject.
News Ltd., not Fairfax, took a leading role in bringing Ashby's accusations to the attention of the Aussie public. Indeed, Fairfax, especially the SMH, seems to have sided with Slipper, portraying the Ashby accusations as non-credible and part of a political vendetta.
If that is what it was, it was successful. Slipper has stepped aside. But that hasn't been the end of the matter. Ashby may have been on the dishing-out side of harassment himself, and is now on the 'taking' side of accusations.
Appropriately, on June 20 News Ltd, too, announced a restructuring/retrenchment. It had decided to lay off 1,900 employees and downsizing of two of its best-known titles.
On July 2d, an (understandably anonymous) Fairfax journalist had a piece in Mumbrella, saying: "The atmosphere in Fairfax right now is awful. Fear can be explained, resolved and dispelled. Anger and hatred to the organisation and towards your colleagues – those who want to try something new, who dare to contemplate producing a different paper to the one we put out ten, twenty or thirty years ago, those who still want to have pride in writing for The Age or The Herald whatever form it comes in – that anger is the sign that your time has come."
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