With Rupert Murdoch talking about taking The Wall Street Journals Web site free, Financial Times is girding its loins for battle.

The newspaper announced yesterday that later this month it will initiate a program that allows online readers to access 30 articles a month without registering as paying members of the site.

Presently most of its content requires a subscription.  read more »

Just days after Rupert Murdoch started hanging around the Wall Street Journal offices, the New York Post reported that assistant managing editor Tunku Varadarajan was leaving.

The Observer noted that the Murdoch-owned Post neglected to mention Mr. Varadarajan’s harsh criticism of the News Corp. chief while Mr. Varadarajan wrote for the editorial page. In addition to lashing out at Mr. Murdoch and his son James, Mr. Varadarajan had also taken The Post to task for their coverage of China.

At the time, Mr. Varadarajan was contacted by The Observer, and has now responded via email: “This is NOT—although people have jumped to the conclusion that it is—Murdoch-related.”

Mr. Varadarajan also wrote that he is excited to return to academia, and will be starting at NYU’s Stern School in mid-October. His last day at the Journal will be September 30th.

As for the impending Murdoch takeover?

“I'm inclined to believe that Rupert Murdoch will be a force for positive change and general non-pomposity at the Journal,” he wrote.

When Rupert Murdoch’s visited the Wall Street Journal’s headquarters on Tuesday, not only were union flyers torn down in his honor, but there was another welcome surprise.

The flat-panel televisions on the 11th floor, where executives (and perhaps soon Mr. Murdoch) have offices, were tuned to Fox News.

“I had this sickening in my stomach,” said the staffer, “that the work we do would be attached to the work that they do.”

Typically, a Journal staffer said, the screens display either rotating shots from WSJ.com or the type of info-network (with news, weather, etc.) found in many Manhattan office buildings.

And while the televisions in the newsroom may still be airing CNBC, the launch of the Fox Business Channel is just over a month away.  read more »

When Michael Wolff started shopping his biography of Rupert Murdoch, he opted to go with a "high six-figure" offer from Doubleday instead of taking the risk of having his previous publisher, Harper Collins, put out the book. (Mr. Murdoch's News Corp. owns Harper Collins.)

But these days Mr. Wolff has emerged as something of a sympathizer—at least with Mr. Murdoch's ambition to own The Wall Street Journal.

In The Times:  read more »

Karl Rove’s resignation is easily the biggest news story today, and it broke first in the pages of the Wall Street Journal.

Typically, such news might appear on A1, in the right hand column. Instead, Mr. Rove’s anticipated date of departure—by the end of August—was reported on A15, in the sixth paragraph of an interview with editorial page editor Paul Gigot.

On the Journal’s front page, there is only a stock photograph of Mr. Rove waving and smiling, with the following teaser: “Why Karl Rove Plans to Leave The White House.”

At 6:46 a.m., The Journal published a news story that essentially reiterated what Mr. Gigot discovered in his exclusive interview, with the byline, “Wall Street Journal Staff Reporter.”

It wasn’t until the next hour that The Journal’s White House correspondent John D. McKinnon filed a news story. (Now, that piece includes a video interview with Mr. Gigot discussing his scoop).

So where was the Washington bureau on this story?

“We don’t talk about our internal news decisions,” said David Wessel, the Journal’s deputy Washington bureau chief.

He added: “As you know, the editorial page and the news department are separate.”

Of course, the Chinese Wall between editorial and news is a vital part of The Journal’s legacy.

But does that preclude Mr. Gigot from informing the news side of a huge breaking story, which he learned two days earlier?

Mr. Wessel declined to answer whether he was aware of Mr. Rove’s resignation before today.

Regardless, this scoop allowed Mr. Gigot the prime opportunity to show off the editorial page’s Washington clout to his future boss, Rupert Murdoch, said one Journal staffer. Mr. Murdoch, in recent interviews, has made no secret his intention to beef up the paper’s political coverage in the nation’s capital.

That said, would the New York Post’s editorial page hold such nugget—or, more likely, would the White House news be splashed across the tabloid’s wood?

A Journal spokesperson declined to comment on internal news decisions. Managing editor Marcus Brauchli is away, and could not be reached for comment. Page One editor Mike Williams could not be reached for comment. Mr. Gigot declined to comment.

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You might think that a family journalism dynasty would be more conscious of deadlines—but alas, the Bancrofts have already blown News Corp.’s 5 p.m. cutoff. Family advisors and Dow Jones board members tried convincing holdout family members to accept Rupert Murdoch’s $5 billion bid, according to the Wall Street Journal.  read more »

At around noon on Tuesday, Geoffrey V. Raymond, a New York based portrait artist, showed up at One World Financial Center, the offices of Dow Jones, Inc., with a four-foot-tall painting of Rupert Murdoch's face.

Security officers clapped on their headsets, unsure of the building's regulations for unexpected art exhibitions. After some deliberation they sent him curbside, where he remained for the rest of the afternoon.

"I have carved a niche out of painting controversial Wall Street figures," Mr. Raymond said, standing proudly next to his latest, “The Annotated Murdoch.” With the face centered on the canvas, passersby stopped to write their thoughts around the border with magic markers that Mr. Raymond provided. A red marker was reserved for Dow Jones employees.

A self-described cross between Jackson Pollack and Chuck Close, Mr. Raymond has created images of former New York Stock Exchange chairman Richard Grasso and Goldman Sachs chief Lloyd Blankfein. He said he is currently working on a portrait of CNBC reporter Maria Bartiromo (nickname, “Money Honey”) as the Virgin Mary.
He said he chose to paint Mr. Murdoch because of his internal anxiety about the potential Dow Jones take over.

"The acquisition of The Wall Street Journal by somebody like Rupert Murdoch is certainly cause for concern,” he said. “I find it ratifying that people want to write on my painting.”

By mid-afternoon around 30 commenters ratified Mr. Raymond’s reconstitution of Mr. Murdoch.

“I don't care,” scrawled one strangely apathetic passerby. “Keep the WSJ out of this scumbag's hands” wrote a more opinionated signatory.

“We want truth liberty and the American way," one Dow Jones employee wrote, while another complained, "Fox News is no news."

On the center of the canvas in red ink were written the words, "news is sacred."

Joshua Prager, a senior special writer at The Wall Street Journal, approached the canvas to write the legend: “Unfair and Imbalanced, stay away.”

“I think people have a lot to say and a lot of thoughts to express,” Mr. Prager said. “This is just another outlet for them to do so.”

Mr. Raymond said that lots of Dow Jones employees had looked at the painting, but only five had actually written on it by mid-afternoon.

He said one employee had begun writing but stopped when he saw his editor walking by.

"I think there's a degree of corporate paranoia," Mr. Raymond said.

Mr. Raymond plans to stand outside of Dow Jones everyday this week, weather permitting, and will measure his success in graffiti.

And then he’ll put the painting up for sale on Ebay, starting the bidding at $3,500.

"It only takes two rich guys to make the action a success," Mr. Raymond said with a smile.

Once renovation on Rupert Murdoch’s triplex penthouse is completed, he’ll have an extra-large room for beefing up those willowy 76-year-old muscles.  read more »

Since the day Rupert Murdoch's bid to buy Dow Jones, Inc. became public, The Wall Street Journal, a Dow Jones property, has been reporting assiduously on the reactions of the Bancroft family, which controls the company.

Slightly buried in today's Wall Street Journal piece about a statement from the Bancrofts released last night indicating their willingness to talk to Mr. Murdoch about a sale:  read more »