• BusinessWeek, Monday, December 1, 2008 10:15 AM

Michael Wolff's new book "The Man Who Owns the News" explores the mumbling, ferociously competitive News Corp. chairman Rupert Murdoch. Wolff writes that last summer, some News Corp. executives were drily calling Murdoch's famous acquisition of The Wall Street Journal a $25 billion deal -- the purchase price of $5.6 billion plus the $20 billion the market subsequently lopped off the News Corp.'s market cap.

Wolff says he has more admiration for Murdoch's independence than for his successes: "I just like the idea of the guy who essentially pays attention to no one else."

Murdoch invented Fox News Channel and has done well with 20th Century Fox studio because, Wolff writes, he runs them "not for glamor but for cash flow." The book claims that Murdoch invented the modern media conglomerate in the 1980s in order to generate more cash to buy more newspapers, the properties he best understands. "There was no grand strategy.... He was just an avaricious guy."

Read the whole story at BusinessWeek »