Interestingly, Fox News is about the only outlet he’s got that’s doing okay business wise. I think its safe to say that while he may be a good carny-barker tabloid mogul, Rupert Murdoch is not a good businessman. His ventures rarely make money and he has used leverage time and time again to get into new businesses that don’t make profits. Look at what a waste his millions invested into MySpace have turned out to be? And iGuide, and TV Guide, etc.
I prefer News Corp income down 100%, but -30% is also good.
Myspace cost Rupert $500 million
And now it’s the Detroit of the internet, a waste land of spammers, junk ads, and crappy bands who couldn’t cut it anywhere else. The thrill is gone, baby.
I think its safe to say that while he may be a good carny-barker tabloid mogul, Rupert Murdoch is not a good businessman.
Uhh…no. It is not safe to say. Once again your biases are affecting your judgment. How is a man who started with one newspaper and now one of the richest men in the entire world NOT a good businessman?
His ventures rarely make money
Sorry, but that is either a very ignorant statement and I will write it off as a statement of ignorance or one of extreme stupidity.
You don’t like Fox News. You don’t like Rupert Murdoch. We get it. But it’s just silly to say that he’s not a good businessman. It’s like saying Steve Jobs doesn’t know anything about computers.
No, Jay, I’ve followed News Corp’s biz dealings pretty closely. Murdoch makes horrible business decisions. News Corp is highly leveraged. Apple, on the other hand, makes assloads of profit and doesnt have its life leveraged away time and again.
No, Jay, I’ve followed News Corp’s biz dealings pretty closely.
No, you apparently have not. I would suggest you take a look at News Corps stock price from 1990 when he Murdoch went in a whole different direction with News Corp.
Oh and then you can sit here and tell everybody how DirecTV, BSkyB, Star TV and 20th Century Fox are such failures.
But since you seem to know so much, exactly what “horrible business decisions” has Murdoch made? Oh and please direct me to some kind of evidence that Murdoch’s ventures “rarely make money.” Their recent losses are an overall reflection of the worldwide economy, not any lack of business acumen on the part of Murdoch so please stop being stupid about the issue.
exactly what “horrible business decisions” has Murdoch made?
iGuide. TV Guide. MySpace is a disaster. The NY Post still doesn’t make any money. The Weekly Standard was still bleeding red ink when he recently sold it to Anschutz. Fox Sports Net failed when it tried to challenge ESPN (which is why they hired Olbermann). And Fox Business seems like a clunker so far, it hasn’t challenged CNBC or Bloomberg anything like how FNC challenged and overtook CNN.
Murdoch sold DirecTV.
Murdoch is a great showman, but when you compare him to someone like Ted Turner who was also a bit of a carny, Turner was a far better businessman.
Can we stop pretending Rupert Murdoch is some kind of biz genius?
Fox News a bright spot, though. Operating income up 50% YOY.
…And Fox News continues on a ratings tear this week. On Monday night and again last night, FNC beat the combined prime time averages, in both Total Viewers & A25-54 viewers, of MSNBC and CNN.
In fact last night, “The O’Reilly Factor” (on cable TV) averaged 3.67 million Total Viewers at 8pmET topping the 8pm average of 2.91M on ABC (on broadcast TV), with “Superstars.”"
Unbelievable. That’s a boatload of far too well-dressed mobster hooligans that watch Fox News.
FOX is a joke and so is Murdoch. Some other news outlets may follow his lead, but the majority won’t, because even if only one continues to offer their information without a surcharge, that’s the one people will flock to. The idea that news is free is idiotic; anyone who is online is paying for the ability to access information, which is why blogs like this are so incredibly popular.
Murdoch is kidding himself if he thinks people will pay additionally for accessing websites; that’s the whole purpose of the web. You’d think a guy who has TV stations would understand that. I already pay for access to TV via my cable provider, which offers a package that grants me broadcast and cable stations; other packages offer more cable and pay per use channels. Using Murdoch’s logic, I should be paying an additonal fee to watch MSM news on top of the fee I’m already paying to get those stations in the first place; does this make any sense? I would simply watch another station that isn’t crazy enough to charge me another fee to watch their news broadcasts, and that’s exactly what other viewers would do.
Ok, so Oliver, you listed about 6-7 things. Do you realize how many business ventures Murdoch has been involved in over the last 40 years? NOBODY in business is immune from making blunders from time to time. But your examples are hardly evidence of your contention that Murdoch’s deals “rarely” make money.
This debate is completely idiotic. This is what you’re saying: Unless EVERY SINGLE BUSINESS DECISION a person makes is a success, then he’s a failure.
And Eric Boehlert’s piece is total strawman nonsense. Just because somebody does a profile of Murdoch doesn’t mean they are calling him a “business genius.” I have hardly seen Murdoch referred to as one so telling people to stop doing something nobody is doing is absurd.
So you’ve kicked the can from Murdoch doesn’t make mistakes to now, please ignore the multimillion dollar mistakes he’s made? Come on.
I can’t wait for Murdoch to start charging for online content. That will be his ‘all in’ moment, and it will be a massive failure.
Murdoch sold DirecTV.
BOY, I’m glad to hear that.
Rescue Me is still the best thing on cable, however. So there’s that.