News Ltd gags its online critics

Frank and open online debate is to be welcomed - unless it criticises the website's owners, it would seem.

The Melbourne Age is reporting today that rival media company News Ltd has muzzled Melbourne Storm fans critical of its role in the club's salary cap debacle.

The official Storm website has a Fan Zone section, where readers are encouraged to post their views in a forum.

Of late, plenty of those messages have been highly critical of the Storm's owners, News Ltd, who have refused to publish their messages.

News Ltd owns Melbourne Storm and its website, and controls the content on the site.

Storm supporters told The Age that "hundreds" of messages critical of News Ltd have been excised, forcing disgruntled fans to seek alternative online forums to debate the ownership of the club by News Ltd.

These include Facebook and www.madfan.com.au, which have become de facto discussion sites for Storm fans.

Yesterday club officials said that all posts were vetted and admitted to The Age that anti-News Ltd posts were not published.

Asked why such censorship took place at a News-owned website, a club staff member said: "Because I am not going to publish criticism of my employer and I would be out of a job if I did."

Melbourne Storm's communications manager, Chris Appleford, denied that a culture of censorship existed on the website, and blamed foul language for the mysterious absence of posts relating to News Ltd.

- NZHERALD STAFF