默多克的杂牌王国（《财富》经典回顾，1984年）

    《波士顿环球报》的编辑汤姆斯•温希普对默多克也是既仰慕又蔑视：“他确实为报纸注入了活力，使报纸更具娱乐性和可读性。但与他竞争的感觉，与其说是感到威胁，不如说是沮丧。他们所做的并不是新闻，而是全然不同的另外一种艺术门类。”

    在纽约，默多克寄望于论坛报业集团（Tribune Co.）终将厌倦发行量之争，最终关闭旗下的小报——《每日新闻报》（Daily News）。尽管1982年，《每日新闻报》亏损了1，500万美元，但去年，该报纸却宣布当年利润达到惊人的1，500万美元。报社之所以能够实现扭亏为盈，主要归功于煞费苦心的成本削减方案。默多克依然认为自己是最犀利的成本削减专家，他吹嘘道：“他们只是在苟延残喘而已。在进行类似的消耗战时，只有低成本运营商才能笑到最后。”但其他人却并不赞同他的说法。经纪公司Paine Webber Mitchell Hutchins的出版业分析师J•肯德里克•诺贝尔便把赌注押在了《每日新闻报》身上。

    上个月，默多克从Field Enterprises收购《芝加哥太阳报》后，便开始施展自己的影响力。他为这份报纸投入了9，650万美元，击败了试图阻止他的当地商人。《芝加哥太阳报》始终保持了盈利（1983年，收入约为600万美元），但默多克认为他能获得更高的回报。

    来自纽约和伦敦的一组编辑对报纸的标题进行了润色， 重新定位了新闻报道的角度，将原先相对自由的编辑立场转变为反映默多克的政治理念，也就是他所谓的激进保守主义。默多克说：“我们将使报纸更多地回归中间路线，而不是偏执和狭隘——我们将更多关注小企业和小人物。”

    默多克的改革引发的怒火则为芝加哥的报纸读者带来了一整年的娱乐素材。《芝加哥太阳报》的专栏作家麦克•罗伊克言辞尖锐，颇受读者欢迎。他公开表示，“有自尊的人都不会乐意出现” 在默多克的报纸中。罗伊克从《芝加哥太阳报》辞职后，去了竞争对手《论坛报》（Tribune）。而作为反击，《芝加哥太阳报》引用了一家亚利桑那州报纸关于罗伊克的评论专栏文章，文章的标题是：思雷斯判决：背叛者罗伊克，令人不齿的谄媚者。（SLATS' VERDICT: TURNCOAT ROYKO DISGUSTING CREEP）。（“思雷斯”是指思雷斯•格罗布尼克，是罗伊克虚构的人物。）此外，《芝加哥太阳报》还转载了《福布斯》（Forbes）杂志刊登的默多克的一篇人物专访，笔调颇多奉承。

    默多克凭借《芝加哥太阳报》一飞冲天，他为处理这家报纸引发的怒火采取了赤裸裸的手段，这正折射了他在生意场上的冷血性格，一些竞争对手甚至认为这种冷静近于冷酷。默多克安坐位于下曼哈顿区的《纽约邮报》，从六楼宽敞、舒适的办公室中指挥他的公司。他的主要管理工具是每一项业务详细的周利润报告。每一项重大的决策都需要获得他的首肯。

    虽然默多克魅力十足，但他却没有几个朋友和知己。他极少动情，甚至有些冷酷，但对待家人却是例外。他的妻子安娜（1999年，默多克与第二任妻子安娜离婚，同年与邓文迪结婚——译注）曾经是他旗下悉尼一家小报的记者，两人有四个孩子，其中一个是与前妻所生。他们住在曼哈顿东区的一栋两层公寓，而周末则前往位于伯克希尔山的豪华别墅。如果默多克在办公室熬夜时间过长，他会变得暴躁易怒，但毫无疑问，他总是能纵情工作，并用惊人的热情实现自己的目标。

    尽管默多克依然渴望拥有大城市的报纸，但他深信，新闻集团的更大发展必须依赖广播、电影制作和卫星通信。但到目前为止，他在这些领域并无建树。三年前，他与澳大利亚人罗伯特•史提格伍德合作出品了一部广受好评的电影——《加里波利》（Gallipoli），该影片描写了澳大利亚士兵在一战中的经历。他的两个澳大利亚电视台每周有四个小时播出非热门戏剧节目。去年六月，他收购了由广告商支持的伦敦有线电视网络——卫星电视台（Satellite Television）69%的股份。之后，他引进了大量节目，每晚五个小时在电视台重播美国节目，并为英国和欧洲大陆的有线网络带来了其他收入。（更多信息，请阅读下列内容。）

    为进入电子通信行业，默多克采取的最大胆的冒险行为是，草率推出了一个全国付费电视网络计划，该计划通过卫星向美国家庭直接发送节目，而不是通过电缆。用户可以通过天花板或院子中的四英尺碟形天线收看节目。

    默多克的点子来源于去年的一项计划。当时，加利福尼亚州的许多企业家计划销售标准有线节目，包括一些与商业相关的数据，比如向农民提供粮食价格期货信息。（包括农业信息，农民可以把服务价格作为商业开支进行勾销。）默多克与他的下属很快就得出结论，这个点子非常有潜力。通过提供五个频道的编制节目，并以城市和郊区观众为目标，他们希望能建立美国第一个卫星-家庭网络。他把这一网络称为Skyband。

    Editor Thomas Winship of the Globe is equally admiring -- and disdainful -- of Murdoch: "He does put energy into a paper and make it more entertaining to read. But competing• with him is more depressing than threatening. What he does just isn't journalism – it's a different art form."

    In New York, Murdoch is hoping the Tribune Co. will weary of circulation wars and simply close its tabloid, the Daily News. But the News, which lost some $15 million in 1982, is about to report a surprising profit of more than $15 million for last year. The turnaround is the reward of some painful cost-cutting. Blusters Murdoch, who still considers himself the sharpest cost-cutter: "They bought some time on their decline. When you get in a war of attrition like this one, the low-cost operator wins in the end." Others aren't so sure. J. Kendrick Noble, a publishing analyst at the brokerage firm of Paine Webber Mitchell Hutchins, has switched his bet to the News.

    Murdoch began applying his same brighteners to the Chicago Sun-Times as soon as he took possession of it from Field Enterprises last month. He paid $96.5 million for the paper, beating out local businessmen who wanted to keep it from his grasp. The Sun Times has been profitable (it earned about $6 million in 1983), but Murdoch thinks he can push returns higher.

    A team of editors from New York and London has spiced the headlines, redirected the news coverage, and is turning the editorial voice from moderately liberal to reflect Murdoch's politics, which he calls radical conservatism. "We'll bring it back more to center," says Murdoch. "It won't be totally illiberal -- we'll be very much for small business and the small man."

    The furor over Murdoch's changes has already provided a year's worth of entertainment for Chicago readers. Mike Royko, a popular, acerbic columnist at the Sun-Times, announced that "no self-respecting fish would be wrapped" in a Murdoch newspaper. Royko resigned and went over to the competing Tribune. The Sun-Times retaliated by reprinting a critical column about Royko from an Arizona paper under the headline: SLATS' VERDICT: TURNCOAT ROYKO DISGUSTING CREEP. ("Slats" refers to Slats Grobnik, a mythical Royko character.) The Sun-Times also reprinted a fawning profile of Murdoch that appeared in Forbes magazine.

    Murdoch's bare-fisted handling of the furor over his ascension at the Sun-Times reflects a coldness in his approach to business that some competitors say borders on ruthlessness. Murdoch commands his company from a large, comfortable office on the sixth floor of the New York Post building in lower Manhattan. His principal management tool is a detailed, weekly profit report on every operation. Any decision of consequence requires his imprimatur.

    Though he can be charming at will, Murdoch has few friends and no cronies. He is entirely unsentimental, even cold, except about his family. He and his wife, Anna, a former reporter on one of his Sydney tabloids, have four children, one from his previous marriage, which ended in divorce. They live in an East Side Manhattan duplex and weekend at a spacious house in the Berkshire Mountains. Murdoch can turn irritable when he is stuck late at the office, but there is no doubt that he revels in work and seeks his goals with ferocious zeal.

    While still hungry for big-city papers, he has become convinced that more and more of News Corp.'s growth must come from broadcasting, movie production, and satellite communications. He has only trifled in these areas so far. He co-produced Gallipoli, a highly regarded film about Australian soldiers in World War I, with fellow Aussie Robert Stigwood three years ago. His two Australian TV stations turn out four hours a week of undistinguished dramas. Since acquiring a 69% interest in Satellite Television, a London advertiser-supported cable network, last June, he's bought enough programming to beam five hours a night of American reruns and other fare to cable systems in Britain and on the continent. (For more on that undertaking, see following story.)

    Murdoch's most serious venture into the world of electronic communications was a slapdash plan for a nationwide pay TV network beamed directly from satellites to U.S. households that aren't served by cable. Subscribers were to pick up the signal with four-foot dish antennas on their roofs or in their yards.

    Murdoch's version of the idea evolved last year from a scheme of a California entrepreneur to sell standard cable fare, along with a smattering of business-related data, such as grain price futures to farmers. (Including farm information would allow farmers to write off the price of the service as a business expense.) Murdoch and his men quickly concluded the idea had bigger potential. By offering five channels of programming and going after urban as well as rural viewers, they hoped to build the first national satellite-to-home network. He called it Skyband.