VOLDEMORT TAKES HOGWARTS!

Despite the valiant attempts of Gryffindor's army, led by Harry Otter-way, the evil VoldeMurd today took over the beloved castle of journalism, aka Dow-warts." Yeah, that's right, we said "Dow-warts." If you don't like it, talk to VoldeMurd.

Don't bother talking with the Bancrofts, though. In the end, they managed to perfect the artful equivocations of Cornelius Fudge: "The process of thoroughly reviewing a broad range of possible alternatives for Dow Jones has been long, complex and arduous." So, they felt our pain after all! That said, they get to mitigate their suffering with millions of dollars (or Galleons, as the case may be. Gringotts, ho!).

At the end of the day, you'd think that after these many weeks, no one in the media world would have anything left to say about the Murdoch deal, and we would be done linking current events tenuously to Harry Potter. But you'd be wrong!

• From his collection, "Things I've Already Made Abundantly Clear," Jack Shafer: "Murdoch loves to make promises but loves even more to break them. The day will come that Murdoch decides that the newspaper and its parent company no longer fit in the colossus' ever-shifting plan to straddle all the world's media. After extracting a bit of the Journal's prestige value for his forthcoming cable business news channel, I predict he'll grow tired of the criticisms and sell it off...Will he have permanently crippled it? I suspect so. It takes decades for a newspaper to establish its good reputation. Murdoch will show the world how little time it takes to trash it." OMG a prophecy! Paging Sybil Trelawney!
• Yeah, especially the "veterans" who came away with job guarantees! Jon Friedman: "Many Dow Jones veterans secretly feel pleased that Murdoch, an aggressive, highly ambitious global businessman, will be running the company now." Effin' Slytherins. BUT: "The spotlight will be on. If there is even a whiff of Murdoch's presence in the newsroom, pundits and others will savage him for messing with the Journal's independence."
Yes, and he is sure to REALLY CARE.
• Advertisers to the rescue? La Monica: "Advertisers may not care that much about 'editorial integrity' but they do care about eyeballs. If News Corp. alienates the core readers of the Journal, whom I suspect care more about stocks and bonds and less about politics and celebrity gossip, then Murdoch will have lots of angry News Corp. shareholders to deal with."
Upshot: Don't turn the Daily Prophet into the Quibbler. If you know what's good for you, Mudblood.
• Needs some Fine tuning: Jon Fine: "He has shown tremendous patience with eight-figure losses at papers ranging from The Times of London to the New York Post." Yeah, well, "patience" is easy when you're making up those losses by using those floundering papers to uncritically boost other financial interests. And also when your soul is split into seven and safely locked away in far-flung magical objects.

And, we may as well conclude with some classic Ottaway: "It's a bad thing for Dow Jones and American journalism that the Bancroft Family could not resist Rupert Murdoch's generous offer." Too bad that doesn't fit on a baseball cap, eh, James? Or, you know, a crest.

Related in Recycled Jokes:

Rupert Murdoch=Voldemort [HP on HP]