There is something of a row brewing between BSkyB and the liberal current affairs station CurrentTV, which was founded by former vice president Al Gore, after Sky said it was to pull the station from its pay TV line-up.
BSkyB says it is pulling the station due to persistently low ratings, but Current has hit back and said the move is politically motivated. Read more »
UPDATE – The FT’s Ben Fenton has tweeted that James Murdoch will remain as chairman of BSkyB after its board decided this afternoon. He won unanimous support. So much for a fresh start.
From 0850 – Christopher Bland in the FT has strong words for the board of BSkyB as it meets today. He says James Murdoch should go and that News Corporation’s stake in the pay TV giant should be reduced from its current 39% to 29%.
There seems absolutely no chance of James Murdoch resigning today, control of the Sky movies and sport money pot is hugely important to News Corp even if it doesn’t own the company, but clearly Bland is right. James Murdoch is toast. His reputation is shredded and he is not the right person to lead Britain’s biggest TV company. Read more »
Chancellor George Osborne has had 16 separate meetings with executives working for Rupert Murdoch since coming to office in the 2010 general election.
The details of the chancellor’s media activity was published today by the government, which is releasing full details of ministerial meetings with media executives in the wake of the hacking scandal and News Corporation’s failed bid to take over BSkyB.
The Chancellor’s dealings with News International comes a week after former chief executive, Rebekah Brooks, last week told the select committee that it had been Osborne’s suggestion to hire Andy Coulson at No 10. Read more »
17:55 – Sky News is quoting sources saying that the IPCC is investigating Yates for allegedly “inappropriately” giving a job to Neil Wallis’s daughter
This adds to the growing web of links between the Met, NotW and News International.
Met Police Commissioner Sir Paul Stephenson is the latest to resign in the phone hacking scandal
Britain’s most senior police officer resigned after he faced criticism for hiring former News of the World journalist, Neil Wallis, who was also questioned by police, as an adviser. Earlier today the Sunday Mirror reported that Sir Paul had accepted a ”freebie” at a top health farm where Wallis was a PR man (see below).
17:30 – As the NotW story becomes a much wider News International story it seems worth revisiting the post earlier today from (14:05) that this scandal could lead to the sell-off or break up of News International.
US media commentator Michael Wolff tweets that Murdoch selling all of News International is being discussed. It would be the nuclear option.
“@MichaelWolffNYC #MURDOCHGATE Get out of Dodge strategy being discussed at News Corp: Sell all of News Int,” Wolff tweets.
A sell-off of News International in UK would see the Murdoch empire say good-bye to newspapers in the UK and focus on BSkyB. That would mean new owners for The Sun, The Times and the Sunday Times. Also for any new Sun on Sunday launch. Read more »
We’ve recently been hearing about BSkyB’s commitment to creating fabulous new content and its deal with HBO, but today my geeky heart has taken a hit with the news that Sky1 is dropping plans to commission a re-imagined Blake’s 7 that early 80s British sci-fi gem that isn’t ‘Doctor Who’.
Sky One signed a deal to bring back ‘Blake’s 7′ more than two years ago, by the firm that had already produced some well received audio dramas (no idea what they’re like) but a troubled development that saw the plan show move from a sequel to a more ‘Battlestar Galactica’ like re-working/re-imagining of the original story, means it was slow going and now it is being dropped altogether.
It is a real shame. The American ‘Battlestar Galactica’ with its dark themes and gritty story lines has been a big hit and a critical success. As I blogged the other week that show is still breaking new ground with a planned new (initially web) based series.
Doctor Who is alright, but it would be nice to have a British sc-fi alternative. This is one the BBC should be picking up – it was after all the creator of the original series that like ‘Doctor Who’ was dreamed up by the late Terry Nation. The BBC has done well with reviving ‘The Day of the Triffids’ and ‘Survivors’, which I thought particularly good.Survivors also managed good audience numbers.
Have you seen the TV trailer for BBC Radio 4′s Science Fiction series? It is a fine piece of scary advertising. The complaints are bound to rack up thick and fast for this cardiac arrest inducing trailer.
Ofcom’s proposals published today on public service broadcasting seem largely sensible, but its research claiming that people are willing to pay to see public service TV on a network other than the BBC holds no water. I don’t buy it. No one is going to pay anything.
The TV presenter and general figure of derision that is Noel Edmonds should be behind bars. There are many reasons for this most of which relate to crimes committed during his television career. He should have been there long ago and now there is a real chance he might go as having been paid by the BBC for years he has now decided like the grande fromage he is that he will not pay his licence fee.
I’m sorry, but he makes me really angry he is a grade A Muppet, but so much worse.
Just to think of ‘Noel’s House Party’ makes me nauseous. I can barely type. His snake oil pseudo mystical cosmic gifting crappola is worse. He asks and therefore his blond highlightednesss gets. Grrrgh. Don’t even get me started on his Sky One Channel 4 crap ‘Are You Smarter Than A Ten Year Old?’ and ‘Deal or No Deal’ respectively. Trash, trash and more trash.
Noel has decided that having happily taken great piles of cash from the BBC and the licence payer for his services he doesn’t have to pay as he doesn’t like the fact that he finds the ads “hectoring and threatening”.
On that basis he is withholding his £139.50 licence fee. This is, of course, a criminal offence and he could now be stripped of his ceremonial title of Deputy Lieutenant of Devon. See what I mean he is the type of ninkinpoop who covets such a title in the first place. He should definitely lose it.
He says he is prepared to be prosecuted for evading the tax which he owned up to grandly not paying on the Breakfast show on BBC One on Saturday. Great what are we waiting for it seems an open and shut case.
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