BBC's Director General Mark Thompson takes aim at Murdoch empire in MacTaggart lecture

[Turborama]

Source: The Guardian

Mark Thompson, the BBC director general, launched a scathing attack on Rupert Murdoch's media empire tonight, warning that BSkyB is too powerful and threatens to "dwarf" the BBC and its competitors.

Delivering the annual MacTaggart lecture at the Mediaguardian Edinburgh television festival, Thompson rounded on Sky's chairman, James Murdoch, who used the same speech last year to attack the corporation. "A year ago, James Murdoch fretted aloud about the lamentable dominance of the BBC," he said. "He was able to do that only by leaving Sky out of the equation."

Thompson said Sky was "well on its way to being the most dominant force in broadcast media in this country". He said that News Corp, in effect controlled by the Murdoch family, now enjoys unprecedented industry power in the UK. News Corp owns 39% of Sky and is in the process of buying the part of the broadcaster it does not already own.

"If Sky's proposal to acquire all of the remaining share in Sky goes through, Sky will not just be Britain's biggest broadcaster, but a full part of a company which is also dominant in national newspapers as well as one of Britain's biggest publishers," Thompson said. That would be "a concentration of cross-media ownership that would not be allowed in the United States or Australia".

Read more: http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2010/aug/27/bbc-mark-thompson-murdoch-mactaggart

[sabrina 1]

1. I'm not sure he's right about it not being allowed in the U.S.

In the past maybe, but since Clinton basically allowed the conglomeration of all these Corps, I think the media here can be owned by a monopoly.

How on earth did Rupert Murdoch get all this power? Is there someone else behind him? He's everywhere and his influence is so destructive to democracies everywhere ... at least people should be made aware that when they watch any of his media outlets they should not expect to get facts. Some kind of warning like they have on cigarettes.

[Rosa Luxemburg]

2. The Tories would gladly kill the BBC and take Murdoch instead

[go west young man]

3. Hopefully the Brits are smarter than we are and can see what

Murdoch and Fox have done to this country. Faux is the head of the hydra when it
comes to the problems in this country.