Rupert Murdoch

YOU MAY KNOW RUPERT MURDOCH FROM FOX NEWS or the News of the World hacking scandal in the U.K., but the media magnate is the helmsman of a vast empire of newspapers, magazines, TV stations and book publishers. * 1953: Leaving Oxford University, Australian-born Murdoch takes over a newspaper in Adelaide, Australia, after death of his father, newspaperman Sir Keith Murdoch, later expanding his holdings into a newspaper chain. * 1968: Begins his British media acquisitions with the purchase of the News of the World . * 1969: Purchases British daily the Sun . * 1973: Buys his first U.S. paper, a daily in San Antonio.

There used to be a sense of kinship between this newspaper and the old New York Post, both born poor but always managing to do more with less. In his book, "Read All About It," journalistic nomad Sid Zion recalled an incident that zanily illustrated the Post's chronic impoverishment. Joe Kahn, a fine investigative reporter, was just finishing his shift when he got a call from a guy who was about to depart this cruel world by diving off the George Washington Bridge. The caller insisted he couldn't be dissuaded, but first he wanted to pour out his reasons to Kahn.

Early in tonight's "Frontline" presentation "Who's Afraid of Rupert Murdoch?" we learn that the subject of the piece has refused to cooperate, telling correspondent Ken Auletta he "distrusted PBS. " Say what you want about the guy, he's not stupid. But as senior producer Michael Sullivan told television critics this summer, "Frontline" has found that it's "quite capable of doing a very good job without the main character interviewing with us. " (The example he cited, Rush Limbaugh, probably doesn't trust PBS, either.

THE RECENT SALE OF Dow Jones, the publisher of the Wall Street Journal, to media shark Rupert Murdoch has raised a lot of questions about media consolidation - questions that, unfortunately, too many news outlets weren't willing to look at until it became clear that they, too, could be chum for News Corp. America's media aren't completely controlled by one person or group, but it is undeniable that we're on that course. Last year, Knight Ridder, the former owner of this paper and publisher of 31 other newspapers, went up for sale, and the growing conglomerate vultures were circling.

THE RECENT SALE OF Dow Jones, the publisher of the Wall Street Journal, to media shark Rupert Murdoch has raised a lot of questions about media consolidation - questions that, unfortunately, too many news outlets weren't willing to look at until it became clear that they, too, could be chum for News Corp. America's media aren't completely controlled by one person or group, but it is undeniable that we're on that course. Last year, Knight Ridder, the former owner of this paper and publisher of 31 other newspapers, went up for sale, and the growing conglomerate vultures were circling.

TODAY, the eye of the Rupert Murdoch phone-hacking storm in the United Kingdom moves directly over recently elected Prime Minister David Cameron. Cameron will address a special session of Parliament as officials try to unravel a phone-hacking and bribery scandal at Murdoch's now-defunct tabloid, News of the World . Also, Cameron is expected to face tough questions over his ties to Murdoch and Cameron's hiring of former News of the World editor Andy Coulson as a communications chief.

After saying he no longer wanted to buy the impoverished, strikebound New York Post, Rupert Murdoch changed his mind and reached agreement yesterday with eight craft unions, which agreed to come back to work today. The Post has not published since the Newspaper Guild, which represents editorial workers, struck Monday and the craft unions refused to cross the picket line. The Guild was not included in yesterday's agreement. Barry Lipton, president of the Guild's New York chapter, said he still did not believe the other unions' rank-and-file members would cross the Guild's picket line.

LONDON - The successor to Rupert Murdoch's scandal-tarnished News of the World newspaper will start publication in a week, a senior News Corp. executive said yesterday. In an email to staff, News International CEO Tom Mockridge said that Murdoch himself would be staying in the British capital to oversee the launch of the Sun on Sunday . The Sun on Sunday will replace the top-selling News of the World , which was closed in July after revelations that members of its staff had routinely hacked into phones and paid bribes to score exclusives.

LONDON - Scotland Yard's assistant commissioner resigned Monday, a day after his boss also quit, and fresh investigations of possible police wrongdoing were launched in the phone-hacking scandal that has spread from Rupert Murdoch's media empire to the British prime minister's office. Prime Minister David Cameron called an emergency session of Parliament on the scandal and cut short his visit to Africa to try to contain the widening crisis. Lawmakers on Tuesday are to question Murdoch, his son James, and Rebekah Brooks, the former chief executive of Murdoch's U.K. newspaper arm. In a further twist, Sean Hoare, a former News of the World reporter who helped blow the whistle on the scandal was found dead Monday in his home, but the death was not believed to be suspicious.

Every culture has its myths. One that's prevalent in ours is the myth of the cuddly mobster. It probably goes back beyond Robin Hood, but the modern equivalent may spring from Damon ("Guys and Dolls") Runyon's short stories. Whatever the origin, thanks to movies and TV and especially (we must admit) the mass media, most Americans see the Mob as simpatico guys who are rough-hewn but have hearts of gold, living glamorous - if a tad dangerous - lives. Not so. No matter how cute we get in our news columns and editorials about the funny nicknames and Uncle Rocco's advice to nephew Louis ("Don't throw grenades, someone else might get hurt; use a double-barreled shotgun instead")

LONDON - One of Rupert Murdoch's most trusted lieutenants and five people close to her were charged Tuesday with conspiring to hide evidence of phone hacking, bringing the scandal that has raged across Britain's media and political elite uncomfortably close to Prime Minister David Cameron. The charges against former tabloid editor Rebekah Brooks, her husband, Charlie, and four aides are the first prosecutions since police reopened inquiries 18 months ago into wrongdoing by the country's scandal-hungry press.

LONDON - Rupert Murdoch apologized Thursday for the phone-hacking scandal that has tarnished his global media empire, declaring: "The buck stops with me. " But he also blamed underlings at News Corp. for keeping him in the dark and trying to keep a lid on evidence of widespread hacking at the News of the World tabloid, which he shut down in July when the scandal broke wide open. On his second day testifying before a British judicial inquiry on media ethics, the Australian-born tycoon said he had spent "hundreds of millions of dollars" on the legal fallout of the hacking allegations and on cleaning up his newspapers.

Student arrested in online threats COLLEGE PARK, Md. - A University of Maryland honor student who warned on websites that he was going to "kill enough people to make it to national news" was arrested after several people reported the threat to police, perhaps thwarting a campus rampage apparently planned for Monday, authorities said. While the threat was dismissed by some online as harmless, a former student who used to work with campus police took it seriously and first called authorities Saturday night.

LONDON - The successor to Rupert Murdoch's scandal-tarnished News of the World newspaper will start publication in a week, a senior News Corp. executive said yesterday. In an email to staff, News International CEO Tom Mockridge said that Murdoch himself would be staying in the British capital to oversee the launch of the Sun on Sunday . The Sun on Sunday will replace the top-selling News of the World , which was closed in July after revelations that members of its staff had routinely hacked into phones and paid bribes to score exclusives.

LONDON - Britain's biggest-selling newspaper was fighting to contain the damage after five employees at The Sun tabloid were arrested Saturday in an inquiry into the alleged payment of bribes to police and other officials. Rupert Murdoch's News Corp., which owns the newspaper, said police had searched their homes and the group's London offices, potentially deepening the scandal over British tabloid wrongdoing. The Sun's deputy editor Geoff Webster, picture editor John Edwards, chief reporter John Kay, chief foreign correspondent Nick Parker and reporter John Sturgis were those arrested, News International CEO Tom Mockridge said in a message emailed to staff.

In the Region W. Conshy office building sold MIM-Hayden Real Estate Funds bought Five Tower Bridge, an eight-story office building in West Conshohocken, from KBS Real Estate Investment Trust of Newport Beach, Calif., in a deal worth $70 million, including the assumption of a $40 million mortgage. The sales price is a little less than the $73 million that KBS paid for the 226,000-square-foot tower in October 2008. - Joseph N. DiStefano   Murdoch to leave Glaxo board GlaxoSmithKline P.L.C.

LONDON - Rupert Murdoch's media empire apologized and agreed to cash payouts Thursday to 37 people - including a movie star, a soccer player, a top British politician, and the son of a serial killer - who were harassed and phone-hacked by his tabloid press. The four - Jude Law, Ashley Cole, John Prescott, and Chris Shipman - were among three dozen victims who received financial damages from Murdoch's British newspaper company for illegal eavesdropping and other intrusions, including e-mail snooping.

LONDON - A dominatrix's sensational story of sex, cocaine and tabloid wrongdoing has revived questions over the relationship between Rupert Murdoch's scandal-hungry News of the World and Britain's Treasury chief, George Osborne. Former escort boss Natalie Rowe says the tabloid deliberately twisted her claims that she and the Conservative Party politician used to snort cocaine together years ago so that Osborne was not tainted in the scandal. The idea that Osborne - now one of the country's most powerful politicians - could have been deliberately cast in a sympathetic light by a Murdoch paper has raised new questions about whether the now-defunct tabloid was playing favorites.

Perhaps, like me, you've become a devoted fan of the season's most gripping entertainment, not the final installment of astigmatic wizard H. Potter but the byzantine machinations of Rupert Murdoch, his empire's tentacles seeming to grasp and taint every aspect of British power. The phone-hacking scandal is riveting, but not exactly shocking, like much of what is happening this summer. Murdoch, long a mythic figure wielding extraordinary political influence on both sides of the Atlantic as well as in other countries, has long been viewed as a ruthless titan, willing to do and spend whatever it takes to get what he wants.

This used to be a noble profession. Still is, to tell you the truth. To hear an editor debate whether a story is fair to some deplorable individual most would consider unworthy of the effort or to watch a reporter rush toward danger to tell a story that needs telling is to be unalterably convinced of the honor in this work. But even in the saying, you brace for the derision and scorn - according to Gallup, the public ranks journalists between auto mechanics and lawyers in terms of ethics - that will surely follow.