Yes, Murdoch is a good businessman. So was Andrew Carnegie. So was J.P. Morgan. The latter two were also a couple of the biggest S.O.B.’s in business history. Being a good businessman means one thing and one thing only: being good at making money, whether it’s for one’s self or one’s shareholders. Any discussion of ethics doesn’t even enter into the picture.

Fox has gone from being a reputable news source to one of the biggest media ho organizations in history - bringing us such scintillating nitwits as Bill O’Reilly and Sean Hannity. I would like to add that in the area of news reporting, CREDIBILITY is a major factor in what is defined as ‘good business.’ Take away that, as Fox has, and at this point I see little to distinguish it from Britain’s THE SUN, or our own homegrown NATIONAL ENQUIRER: it’s simply become a spin-bay. (As for O’Reilly’s ‘No-Spin Zone,’ let us not forget the very best spin doctor of the last century…Herr Doktor Joseph Goebbels, for whom O’Reilly is a an excellent heir….’tell the lie loud enough, and long enough, and they’ll BELIEVE it…’ ‘…ain’t nobody here but us CHICKENS!’)

If this is what passes as an example of good business, then I look forward to seeing Citizen Murdoch’s Dow Jones employees out on th’ STREET, where they belong. Forward thinking he may be, but it’s quite easy to see this as a potential kiss of DEATH for Dow Jones.

You’re brave, Jeff. I don’t think I would have sat at that table without a FOOD-TASTER at my elbow…

“As I ended my uncharacteristically brief spiel, he held his hands out to applaud, cocked and ready. Then he saw that no one else was going to do likewise, so he dropped them. I took that as an ovation.”

At last, a commoner receives recognition from his King!

When the Rupert Murdoch’s and Michael Dell’s of the world start taking us seriously, seeking one (or more) of us out, whining and dining us!, etc. it shows that we have arrived.

I don’t mean we as in individuals, I mean we in terms of the medium.

I think more focus could occur, if others agree, on what our role currently is (new media, bloggers, etc., and what it could be and should be).

So much of this is in flux. Like many, Politics 2.0 continually does posts looking at the issues across many areas. How do politicians interact with new media (e.g. Joe Anthony MySpace ongoing saga, Politics 2.0 has had a dozen contacts from Joe Anthony recently and broken some news there), how do corporations react to New Media? How does traditional media react to new media (e.g. candidate debates tapes available on Internet?), how do bloggers relate to each other (codes of conduct, Jimmy Wales).

I’d like to see a bit more structure. Here’s why. In the wild wild west, when you had outlaws then you needed to have sheriffs to reign them in. A little better, but the sherriffs could be just as brazen, perhaps, as anybody else (or maybe it was just difficult to control the outlaws), and overall, not having lived there but a sense, the fastest guns or other overt power often ruled the day.

When you have paradigm shift you have great opportunities, but also potential for chaos, abuse and mayhem.

I don’t want to see that at all.

Thank you.