The Tele‘s terrible touting. The Daily Telegraph has given up on the job of actually reporting and analysing current events in favour of shamelessly spruiking the merry gathering of the superstitious in Sydney, but even by its abysmal standards there have been two low points. One was Morris Iemma’s column on Tuesday boasting of how his religion directly influences Government policy. Iemma, the worst premier in NSW history and a man who is systematically trashing the ALP brand in that state, apparently can’t even maintain a basic separation between church and state. And then there’s today’s boast of “1 billion to see city greet pope” which probably sent a momentary shiver through transport organisers. The “1 billion” figure is (like much of what fills the pages in the Tele) unsourced and unexplained and of a piece with the wholly invented claims about the economic benefit of the event (for which the Government has yet to release modelling). Perhaps the Tele borrowed FIFA’s TV audience magic formula — the soccer adherents regularly boast of the “tens of billions” of people who watch the World Cup. — Bernard Keane
Cadel Evans: you can’t touch this . What we’ve learnt from this year’s Tour De France — never make a man wearing a yellow jersey angry…
Microsoft raises alarm over Google/Yahoo market domination. Spurned suitor Microsoft painted an alarmist portrait of Yahoo’s outsourcing deal with Google during congressional antitrust hearings on Tuesday. Google and Yahoo execs, on the other hand, described the alliance as good for consumers. Execs from the three companies presented very different pictures of the deal during testimony before the Senate and House judiciary committees. Yahoo inked the Google deal on June 12 after failing to reignite acquisition talks with its former suitor. Microsoft senior VP-general counsel Brad Smith spoke darkly about rising prices and reduced competition resulting from the alliance of the two search companies, noting that Google already controls at least 70% of the market for search advertising. He said Google will control up to another 20% of this market with the Yahoo deal. — Variety
Wall Street Journal to raise cover price, again. Rupert Murdoch must think highly of the changes he’s made to The Wall Street Journal : He expects readers to pay one-third more for it. Starting on July 28, the Journal will raise its cover price from $1.50 to $2.00, putting it on a par with the Financial Times. Interestingly, the hike comes as the paper’s editors are being urged to think more about how they can use the front page to boost newsstand sales — not something that has traditionally been a major focus. — Portfolio
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