KEY POINTS:
Rupert Murdoch's acquisition of The Wall Street Journal dramatically redraws the media industry landscape in the US - and publications of all hues had strong reaction.
The Journal itself moved swiftly to reassure readers that its editors "intend to stand for the same beliefs tomorrow and into the future as we have for a century".
In a long leader, it wrote: "Business success is vital to editorial independence, precisely because it provides the resources to report and comment in ways that might offend advertisers or governments.
"We also believe the reverse is true: Editorial independence enhances the prospects for business success. No sane businessman pays a premium of 67 per cent over the market price for an asset he intends to ruin."
David Carr, the veteran media commentator writing in the New York Times, said that Mr Murdoch has bought the Journal because he is a "sentimentalist", not because he has shown a deft touch in US newspapers before.
"Yes, owning a pivot point in financial news will create some tidy synergies - content for a new Fox business channel to compete with CNBC on cable television, a global foothold for financial data, coverage of all of his competitors in the Journal ... Note to other media moguls keeping track at home: Mr Murdoch just bought the scorecard."
In BusinessWeek, Jon Fine asked if News Corp was really the best candidate to revitalise the Journal.
"I'm not among those who believe Murdoch is a fanged beast who eats baby journalists for breakfast, but the answer is still simple: No. None of Murdoch's major papers has been reinvented for the Digital Age."
The left-leaning Huffington Post news website declared that media consolidation was eroding the foundations of democracy.
"America's founders understood that a truly free press is the keystone to a flourishing democracy. With the purchase of the Dow Jones, another vital voice is brought under the umbrella of one conglomerate - and one man - that already controls too much of what Americans see, hear and read every day."
Finally, the New York Post - the feisty tabloid already owned by News Corp - was uncharacteristically refusing to editorialise.
Unlike the other New York papers, it buried the story inside under a straightforward headline: "Dow Deal Done".
- INDEPENDENT
