Stop Murdoch’s Empire Spreading

I totally support this, but I think there's nothing anyone can do. It's well known that Murdoch was initially hesitant about having The Sun et al back the Tories, but was persuaded by the promise of a more “hands-off” approach to regulation over his media empire-building.

Like most elections, this was bought by business interests taking advantage of a corrupt political class.

I don't really get this… it feels like a bit of a knee-jerk reaction: “oh no, rupert murdoch, he's a right wing baddie, let's try and put a spanner in his works”… where's the evidence that his takeover of sky news would give him any kind of monopoly power? not saying there isnt any, just that i need to see some, or at least a cogent argument, before i start making demands from my government.

also, look at the wording of the petition itself “dear vince, please make sure the deal is *properly investigated*”. Well, if you give me no coherent reason why i need to investigate, then “properly” means “minimally”. Just pointing at Fox News and saying Fox News is bad, Rupe owns Fox News, therefore Rupe wants to make Sky into Fox News…. it doesn't follow!.

And even if it did – people get the media they deserve. there's plenty of choice of what news to watch in america, and lots of americans choose to watch fox because they prefer it to the other channels. now you and i may think they're morons, but they still have the right to choose.

in this country we already have the BBC, and any number of independent news outlets. If Rupe wants to make Sky more right-wing then good luck to him. I won't watch it (except for entertainment value), i've got plenty of other choices, so i don't see why i need to interfere with his plans.

if anything, your petition has some vaguely snobbish undercurrents of '”the great unwashed public can't be trusted not to watch and believe rupe's right-wing propaganda, so let's prevent him from doing so, and only feed the public from nice approved centre-left news sources like auntie”

Support this 100%

I too don't buy the assumption that RM is the devil incarnate and it is automatically bad but nonetheless don't feel it is a healthy situation to have one person with so much influence.

I have signed the petition, but think that the wording is inadequate. We should be calling on the takeover to be prevented, THAT is what is in the public interest, not just that the purchase has been thoroughly investigated.

Well I guess if you think the BBC is centre left you wouldn't see anything wrong with Rupert Murdoch controlling more of what we see and hear. The BBC main priority is to be neutral, and if you see it as centre left it belies your prejudice.

Personally, I think it's a huge threat to democracy that a man can use his financial clout to give himself a voice millions of times louder than the average man.

Just look at the disgusting propaganda he spews out to whip up the right in America so they support his agenda. If you haven't seen it, I would suggest you do so and understand that the harm it does to American political discourse.

I say we need to regulate the corporate media to break up propagandist behemoths like News Corp.

It's not about liking or disliking murdoch's politics, it's about one individual/corporation having a disproportionate amount of influence. It's not about the great unwashed being unable to make a rational decision either. If u read the article referenced on the action page it sets out a very coherent argument for how this buy out contributes to a broader attempt at a take over of as much news media as possible. Murdoch clearly has past form on this too, for instance in the way he manipulated u.s. Law on this. U may have plenty of choice now, but u might have significantly less in future.

If Rupert Murdoch is the largest existing shareholder of BSkyB, doesn't he already control the company de facto anyway?

To be quite frank, I'll eat my hat if a petition on a website had any effect on what Vince Cable does (if anything).

“But together, we can help stop Murdoch’s plans from going ahead.”
Er, no you can't.

This is business. If he wants to buy 100% control of BSkyB, then who are the Government to say:

“Our populace are too inept or dumb to understand that your presentation of the news *might* have a slant, therefore you cannot proceed with an otherwise simple business deal.”

To be quite frank, I'll eat my hat if a petition on a website had any effect on what Vince Cable does (if anything).

“But together, we can help stop Murdoch’s plans from going ahead.”
Er, no you can't.

This is business. If he wants to buy 100% control of BSkyB, then who are the Government to say:

“Our populace are too inept or dumb to understand that your presentation of the news *might* have a slant, therefore you cannot proceed with an otherwise simple business deal.”