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Prince Harry's trial against the publisher of The Sun, which opens Tuesday, follows two decades of legal drama over the cutthroat practices of the British press in the days when newspapers sold millions of copies and shaped the popular conversation. The scandal destroyed a Rupert Murdoch -owned newspaper and cost Murdoch hundreds of millions of dollars to settle lawsuits from the targets of tabloid attention. And it fueled Harry's quest to tame the British press, which he blames for dividing his family, blighting his life and hounding both his late mother Princess Diana and his wife, Meghan Markle. Here are key moments in the saga: November 2005 Murdoch's Sunday tabloid the News of the World reports that Prince William has a knee injury. A Buckingham Palace complaint prompts a police inquiry that reveals information for the story came from a voicemail that was hacked. January 2007 Glenn Mulcaire, a private investigator working for the News of the World, is sentenced to six months
Tsuneo Watanabe, the powerful head of Japan's largest newspaper who had close ties with the country's powerful conservative leaders, has died, his company said Thursday. He was 98. Watanabe, the editor-in-chief of the Yomiuri Shimbun for over 30 years, died of pneumonia at a Tokyo hospital on Thursday, the Yomiuri said. Watanabe joined the newspaper in 1950 and covered politics throughout his career, attending editorial meetings until last month. He was still checking copy in his hospital room days before his death, the newspaper said. Watanabe cultivated close ties with conservative leaders who governed the country across decades, like Yasuhiro Nakasone and Shinzo Abe, and to helped form Japan's conservative public opinion. Abe was also known as a loyal reader and once told reporters all his opinions could be found in the Yomiuri when he was asked a question about a proposed constitutional revision. Watanabe stirred controversy in 1994 when the Yomiuri published a draft revision t
The sale of the Observer, the world's oldest Sunday newspaper and a bastion of liberal values in Britain's media landscape, was approved Friday despite two days of strike action from journalists this week. The Scott Trust, the owner of the Guardian Media Group, which includes the Observer and its sister paper the Guardian, said the sale to Tortoise Media is expected to be signed in the coming days. The Scott Trust said it will invest in Tortoise Media, becoming a key shareholder, and take a seat on both its editorial and commercial boards. Under the terms of the deal, Tortoise will invest 25 million Pounds (USD 32 million) in the Observer, and has committed to continue its Sunday print edition and build up its digital brand. It has also committed to safeguarding journalistic freedom and the editorial independence of the Observer, undertaking to honour the liberal values and journalistic standards of the Scott Trust in its editorial code. Tortoise was launched in 2019 by James Hard
More than 200,000 people have cancelled subscriptions to The Washington Post since the newspaper announced its decision last week not to endorse a candidate for president, a published report said Monday. NPR reported the figure, citing two people at the paper with knowledge of internal matters. The reported loss of subscriptions of that magnitude would be a blow to a news outlet that is already facing financial headwinds. The Post had more than 2.5 million subscribers last year, the bulk of them digital, making it third behind The New York Times and Wall Street Journal in circulation. A Post spokeswoman, Olivia Peterson, would not comment on the report when contacted by The Associated Press. The Post's editorial staff had reportedly prepared an endorsement of Democrat Kamala Harris before announcing instead Friday that it would leave it up for readers to make up their own minds. The timing, less than two weeks before Election Day, led critics to question whether Post owner and Amaz
The New York Times and The Washington Post were awarded three Pulitzer Prizes apiece on Monday for work in 2023 that dealt with everything from the war in Gaza to gun violence, and The Associated Press won in the feature photography category for coverage of global migration to the US. Hamas' October 7 attack on Israel and the aftermath produced work that resulted in two Pulitzers and a special citation. The Times won for text coverage that the Pulitzer board described as "wide-ranging and revelatory," while the Reuters news service won for its photography. The citation went to journalists and other writers covering the war in Gaza. The prestigious public service award went to ProPublica for reporting that pierced the thick wall of secrecy around the US Supreme Court to show how billionaires gave expensive gifts to justices and paid for luxury travel. Reporters Joshua Kaplan, Justin Elliott, Brett Murphy, Alex Mierjeski and Kirsten Berg were honoured for their work. The Pulitzers ...
A group of eight U.S. newspapers is suing ChatGPT-maker OpenAI and Microsoft, alleging that the technology companies have been purloining millions of copyrighted news articles without permission or payment to train their artificial intelligence chatbots. The New York Daily News, Chicago Tribune, Denver Post and other papers filed the lawsuit Tuesday in a New York federal court. We've spent billions of dollars gathering information and reporting news at our publications, and we can't allow OpenAI and Microsoft to expand the Big Tech playbook of stealing our work to build their own businesses at our expense, said a written statement from Frank Pine, executive editor for the MediaNews Group and Tribune Publishing. The other newspapers that are part of the lawsuit are MediaNews Group's Mercury News, Denver Post, Orange County Register and St. Paul Pioneer-Press, and Tribune Publishing's Orlando Sentinel and South Florida Sun Sentinel. All of the newspapers are owned by Alden Global ...
The Press Council of India on Friday cautioned the print media against publication of advertisements promoting betting and gambling platforms. In an advisory, the Press Council of India (PCI) asked the print media to strictly adhere to the directives issued by the Central Consumer Protection Authority on prohibition of advertising/promotion of any unlawful activities prohibited under various laws. The advisory comes in the wake of increasing instances of direct as well as surrogate advertisements and endorsement of activities considered illegal such as betting or gambling.
The UK government said on Wednesday it will back legislation banning foreign state ownership of British newspapers and magazines, a move that could upend a planned takeover by a United Arab Emirates-led consortium of the Telegraph Media Group. The development comes after numerous lawmakers from across the political divide urged for an explicit ban, rather than using a regulatory approach to ensure that publications don't parrot views of state actors. The minister in charge of media, Stephen Parkinson, said the government will table an amendment to the Digital Markets, Competition and Consumers Bill currently making its way through Parliament. The bill, which is expected to pass easily, will prevent the takeover of British publications by foreign governments. However, foreign individuals and firms will continue to be able to own papers and magazines. Freedom of the press is fundamental to a functioning democracy," said Parkinson. What freedom of the press means is freedom from ...