News Corp. Chair RUPERT MURDOCH was the subject of
ABC's "Nightline" last night. ABC's Ted Koppel: "Rupert
Murdoch is to the world of communications what John D.
Rockefeller used to be to the world of oil and gas."
"Nightline" said one of Murdoch's "Ten Commandments" is
"Sports is the Gatekeeper." ABC/ESPN Sports President STEVE
BORNSTEIN, commenting on the "commandment," said sports "is
programming that you can own exclusively that no other
distributor can have, it's programming you can't rent at the
VCR store, so in that way it's very unique and it's been
very valuable in building distribution platforms."
SPIN MASTER: Montgomery Securities' John Tinker: "News
Corp.'s mantra [is] sports is tribal. They've figured out
that that audience would really pay to watch their teams."
ABC's Bornstein: "[Murdoch] has two things going for him.
In the first instance, his acquisition of Premiere League
[soccer] made his business, made that platform in the U.K.
It's been incredibly good spin control that his other sports
programming acquisitions have been successful. I believe
the acquisition of the NFL, which originally was going to be
key for upgrading his affiliate distribution system in the
U.S., did not do that. Essentially, only two affiliates
that I'm aware of actually changed once he acquired the NFL.
He actually had to buy New World ... to get the real change.
.... His interest in acquiring rugby internationally has not
gone anywhere to date, and he paid a lot of money for that.
... But he has incredible spin control, in that everything
he touches is pure genius. And in the end, you know, it's
almost like the big lie: if you say it enough, people will
believe it. And there's a little bit of that going on with
some of Rupert's acquisitions" ("Nightline," ABC, 6/12).
