Rupert Murdoch Craps His Pants

H/t Calculated Risk for the vid which puts everything in context nicely

In response to revalations that his one of Newscorp's paper, News of the World, had hacked voice mails of dead soldiers' families and a missing girl (later found to be murdered), Rupert Murdoch has decided to shutter the 168 year old tabloid:

Beset by a widening phone-hacking scandal, media mogul Rupert Murdoch pulled the plug Thursday on his News of the World, Britain’s best-selling weekly tabloid newspaper, which will shut down after publishing Sunday’s issue.

In a surprise announcement to the paper’s staff, James Murdoch, a top executive of the tabloid’s parent company and son of Rupert Murdoch, said the July 10 paper “will be the last issue of the News of the World.”

The feisty, hugely profitable paper, which has been continuously published for 168 years, “has a proud history of fighting crime, exposing wrong-doing and regularly setting the news agenda for the nation,” James Murdoch said. But those attributes “have been sullied by behavior that was wrong,” he said. “Indeed, if recent allegations are true, it was inhuman and has no place in our company. The News of the World is in the business of holding others to account. But it failed when it came to itself.”

Referring to the phone-hacking scandal, the younger Murdoch, deputy chief operating officer of his father’s News Corp., said the newspaper “failed to get to the bottom of repeated wrongdoing that occurred without conscience or legitimate purpose.” He added, “Wrongdoers turned a good newsroom bad and this was not fully understood or adequately pursued.” He pledged that “those who acted wrongly will have to face the consequences.”

BTW, it's not just 1 dead girl, it appears that they hacked the phones of parents of some other missing girls.

People have already been arrested, specifically Andy Coulson, former editor in chief of News of the World, and former communications director for British Prime Minister David Cameron, as well as Clive Goodman, their former royal editor, who has been arrested on this matter before.

Additionally, it appears that this scandal has queered the deal that Murdoch had to buy satellite TV provider BSkyB, for the near term at least.

Pass the Popcorn

That being said I don't think that it's the business repercussions that have Murdoch running scared, it's the possibility that he finds it likely that he, son James, could shortly be working in the prison laundry next to Conrad Black.

Heh.