A Look Inside News Corp.’s “Business Conduct” Manual!
On Tuesday, Parliament published a heap of correspondence related to the News of the World phone-hacking investigation. Included in the document haul was News Corp.’s “Standards of Business Conduct” manual, which the Murdoch camp had dutifully forwarded to the Culture, Media and Sport Committee upon request.
When James Murdoch testified before Parliament back in July, he mentioned the “Standards” manual several times, saying that it explained the company’s ethics guidelines in a fairly detailed way, but “not too much, so that people read it.” The manual (which, it turns out, was available online the whole time) was last updated in May 2011, right when the current installment of the hacking saga was getting its start. The pamphlet is an editorialtour de force, with imagery drawn from all corners of the Murdochs’ excellently diversified media empire—children’s books, sports shows, tabloid newspapers, Hindi-language soap operas and James Cameron movies. The often startling contrast between the copy and the accompanying graphics would be enough to make the manual a fun read—but it’s enjoyable to browse through for other reasons, too.
Always report to the appropriate persons (and to the persons they consider appropriate).
MP Jim Sheridan: “Mr. Murdoch, do you accept that ultimately you are responsible for this whole fiasco?”
Rupert Murdoch: “Nope.”
Sheridan: “Who is responsible?”
Murdoch: “The people that I trusted to run it, and then maybe the people they trusted.”
Oh, don’t bring the moon into this.
Fox News anchor: “Does it go anywhere close to the climate-change debate that’s underway here on Earth? I mean, if the moon had erupting volcanoes… it’s not like we’ve been up there burning fossil fuels.”
Bill Nye: “No, volcanoes are not connected to the burning of fossil fuels.”
Then they watched several episodes of “Sons of Anarchy.”
“Paul V. Carlucci takes no prisoners. The head of a marketing division of Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp., Carlucci once rallied his sales force by showing a film clip from The Untouchables in which Al Capone beats a man to death with a baseball bat.”
A safe & healthy environment in which some are predators, others, prey.
Roger Ailes, chairman of Fox News: “I only understand friendship or scorched earth.”
Nothing says credibility like these guys.
Rupert Murdoch: “I’m not talking about that issue at all today. Sorry.”
Fox Business anchor Stuart Varney: “Okay, no worries, Mr. Chairman, that’s fine with me.”
Murdoch: “I’m too far removed out here. Sorry.”
Varney: “That’s all right, sir.”
Her pie will go on.
Pie-thrower Jonnie Marbles: “As I got close to him, Wendi Deng got up and lunged at me. […] I remember the rage in her eyes.”
Anthony Lydgate lives in Brooklyn and would Wendi Deng for you.
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