Some dickhead crony of the PAP attempts to buy over SCMP in attempt to blackout news

Re: Some dickhead crony of the PAP attempts to buy over SCMP in attempt to blackout n

THIS dick head is alibaba jack ma

Re: Some dickhead crony of the PAP attempts to buy over SCMP in attempt to blackout n

gingerlyn said:

THIS dick head is alibaba jack ma

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Temasick or SPH not involved?

Re: Some dickhead crony of the PAP attempts to buy over SCMP in attempt to blackout n

winnipegjets said:

Temasick or SPH not involved?

Click to expand...

maybe involved because temasick owns some alibaba shares

Re: Some dickhead crony of the PAP attempts to buy over SCMP in attempt to blackout n


Alibaba dismisses claims over press freedom arising from SCMP purchase as Hong Kong lawmaker pickets Post office

‘Long Hair’ Leung Kwok-hung barricades Post offices in wildcat rally

PUBLISHED : Sunday, 20 December, 2015, 3:45pm
UPDATED : Sunday, 20 December, 2015, 5:20pm

Phila Siu
[email protected]

Members of Socialist Action and lawmaker Leung Kwok-hung ‘Long Hair’ (right) picket SCMP’s Leighton Road office against Alibaba’s purchase of the Post. Photo: Edward Wong

The South China Morning Post and its incoming new owner, Alibaba Group, dismissed concerns about the newspaper’s editorial independence, as a small group of demonstrators protested at the impending takeover yesterday.

About 10 protesters, from the League of Social Democrats and concern group Socialist Action, held up banners and shouted slogans outside the Post’s Causeway Bay office, claiming press freedom in Hong Kong was under threat with China’s e-commerce giant buying into the local media.

An Alibaba spokesman responded: “We will let our readers decide.”

He referred to a letter written by Alibaba executive vice-chairman Joseph Tsai to Post readers earlier. “In reporting the news, the SCMP will be objective, accurate and fair,” Tsai promised in the letter, adding that “day-to-day editorial decisions will be driven by editors in the newsroom, not in the corporate boardroom”.

The Post also issued a statement yesterday citing Alibaba’s aim to marry its digital expertise with the paper’srich editorial heritage to continue delivering quality news that readers could trust.

“With this commitment to uphold editorial independence, and the injection of technology and resources, the South China Morning Post will continue our unwavering mission to uphold our 112-year tradition of editorial excellence,” it said.

But Socialist Action chairwoman Sally Tang Mei-ching said Alibaba would “inevitably force the SCMP to engage in self-censorship in order to stay online” on the mainland.

She was joined by League of Social Democrats lawmaker “Long Hair” Leung Kwok-hung.

Alibaba has agreed to pay HK$2.06 billion for the Post and all other media assets owned by the SCMP Group.

Re: Some dickhead crony of the PAP attempts to buy over SCMP in attempt to blackout n

last week another scumbag bought a newspaper.

Billionaire Sheldon Adelson secretly bought newspaper, ordered all hands to investigate judges he hated

No one knew who the mystery buyer of the Las Vegas Review-Journal was, just that $140m had changed hands under mysterious circumstances. But every reporter on the paper was ordered to drop everything and try to dig up dirt on three Clark County judges.

The judges had all had run-ins with Sheldon Adelson, the billionaire behind the secret purchase. Previously, another Adelson paper, in Florida, had been ordered to investigate the judges.

Adelson's animus against District Judge Elizabeth Gonzalez seems to stem from his interactions with her when she presided over Jacobs v. Sands, in which one of Adelson's former employees has sued for wrongful dismissal after he blew the whistle on the business's links to Chinese organized crime. When Adelson took the stand in that case, he refused to answer routine questions and argued with the judge who told him, basically, to shut up and do as he was told.

Subsequently, Adelson offered to back the campaign of anyone who could credibly run against the judge in upcoming elections.

The newspaper's management objected to the assignment to snoop on the three judges, which came down without explanation from Gatehouse Media, the newspaper's parent company. No major stories came of the all-hands project.

However, another paper, a tiny Connecticut paper called The New Britain Herald, ran a huge story on Gonzales and criticized her for her dealings with Adelson. The story was bylined by "Edward Clarkin" -- a mysterious figure whose byline only appears one other time in the paper's archives, for a review of a Polish restaurant. No one has been able to locate Clarkin, and the Herald refuses to discuss who he might be.

The Herald isn't owned by Gatehouse, the company that Adelson bought. But Michael Schroeder, who owns Central Connecticut Communications, which owns the Herald, is the manager the Delware company that Adelson owns, through which he bought Gatehouse.

No one in management at any of the newspapers would admit that anything fishy was going on to the reporters who broke this story, James DeHaven, Jennifer Robison and Eric Hartley, who all write for the Review-Journal and were therefore investigating corruption on the part of their new bosses, which is a ballsy fucking move, given that the paper seems to have been purchased for the purpose of pursuing a personal vendetta against a local judge.

The quotes from the papers' management are priceless stonewalling: "I don't know why you're trying to create a story where there isn't one. I would be focusing on the positive, not the negative" (from Michael Reed, CEO of New Media Investment Corp., the parent company of GateHouse Media).

Michael Reed, CEO of New Media Investment Corp., the parent company of GateHouse Media, declined to comment when asked whether Adelson was involved in the court monitoring directive. He said the effort was part of a "multistate, multinewsroom" investigative effort initiated by GateHouse, but said he did not know who started it or how it was approved.

"I don't know why you're trying to create a story where there isn't one," Reed told an RJ reporter on Wednesday. "I would be focusing on the positive, not the negative."

In a later interview with The Associated Press, Reed rejected the notion that the Review-Journal's integrity had been challenged by the secrecy surrounding its sale. He said the public didn't care about the buyer and that reporters pushed the story with the intention of creating controversy.

"I just wish reporters had better hearts and better intentions than just trying to slam media companies trying to do good," he said.