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The wider picture to the Murdoch scandal: Killing off the craft of journalism

Each day sees a new revelation about the shenanigans of the Murdoch media group, especially its newspapers. Lost in all the reporting about who did what, etc. etc. is the issue of what the Murdoch newspapers have "done" to the one-time craft of journalism.

"With guilty pleasure, the mainstream media have been serving us a virtual buffet of reasons to despise Rupert Murdoch's evil media empire. Amid this fetid mess, however, it shouldn't be forgotten that beneath every media mogul, however rotten, is an enterprise of real people—a culture of workers who represent the embattled and tragic state of journalism today.

The ethical breaches at issue clearly reflect top-to-bottom corruption. Yet more importantly, the underlying criminality lies in a vulgar laissez faire corporate culture in which honesty and critical thought are dismissed as an impediment to commercial success.

The alleged hacking and bribery are just extreme symptoms of an ailment metastasizing throughout the media. Listen to the former employees who talked to Reuters about News Corp's inner sanctum, directly linking the cutthroat newsroom climate with the wholesale abandonment of ethics:

A fifth former News International employee who worked with News Of the World journalists at this time said its reporters were under "unbelievable, phenomenal pressure," treated harshly by bosses who would shout abuse in their faces and keep a running total of their bylines. Journalists were driven by a terror of failing. If they didn't regularly get stories, they feared, they would be fired. That meant they competed ruthlessly with each other....

Reporters say they lived in constant fear of byline counts which weeded out those who had filed the fewest stories. "They were always seeking to get rid of people because it was a burn-out job. Their ideal situation was you work your nuts off for six months and they let you work there another six months," said the general news reporter.

"Every minute you spent there you felt that your employer hated you.”

Even more disturbing is the acknowledgment that “Eavesdropping on voicemail or obtaining call logs was initially a money-saving measure” to get the scoop fast and cheap. That is, pressure to maximize profits contributed directly to the corruption of reporting practices."

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