MediaFile

Turmoil in the credit markets has put deals on the backburner across the board – including a number of planned sales of broadcasters. 

Television broadcasting group Nexstar Broadcasting Group Inc. said earlier in August it was suspending talks with prospective buyers because of the difficult conditions in the financing markets. Another broadcaster, LIN TV Corp. had been exploring a sale but indicated on a recent earnings call that a sale may be delayed by the weakness in the debt markets, according to a research report by Bear Stearns analyst Victor Miller. A call to LIN was not immediately returned.

Despite the current turmoil, Bear Stearns thinks those two will be sold in 2008, and also thinks Cox Radio Inc.  should “more agressively repurchase shares or lever itself and go private”.

Clear Channel Communications Inc. is another stock that’s been beaten up a bit lately. Shareholders are due to vote on a $39.20 a share buyout in September while the stock is trading at $34.83. ”We believe … a renegotiation of the price seems unlikely given that that has occurred twice already,” wrote Bear Stearns, which has the company as a one of its three top broadcast stock picks.

Bear Stearns points out that while the Nasdaq has fallen 6 percent from recent peak levels, broadcast stocks have fallen 32 percent with leveraged and/or deal-tinged broadcast stocks particularly hurt.

Maybe the picture for TV won’t be in tune until the finance markets stop trembling? 

Dear WSJ:

I have reached the end of my rope. My old bosses handed me over to an owner feared by many people in my industry. My new boss has ever greater demands that I cannot fathom or satisfy. Dare I walk out the door?

–Fed-up downtown

A hypothetical scenario of course. But when we read today’s well-written and persuasively argued “Cubicle Culture” column in today’s Wall Street Journal, we couldn’t help but wonder what inspired the discussion of when is the right time to quit one’s job with drama and flourish. Maybe it was Karl Rove’s resignation interview with WSJ editorial page arbiter Paul Gigot? Or something else? Below we cite a few favorite anecdotes from the story:

Anne Marie McClaran “had thought about quitting before, but fear had held her back. Still, after 10 years on the job, she had migraines and neck aches and was frequently irritable. ‘It doesn’t do me any good to have a secure future if I don’t have any future,’ she says. So even though she had no savings-account cushion, she walked into her boss’s office and quit.”

“Tim Orr, an ad executive who spent six years in a job he couldn’t stand before ultimately becoming self-employed. ‘I know full well I could always have tried just a little bit harder.’ …  He even read books on psychological disorders in an effort to decode his boss.”

“One of John Westropp’s former managers demanded that he accomplish many tasks under an unrealistic deadline, setting him up for failure. Effectively, he says, he was asked ‘to sequence a DNA sample from my left arm within 24 hours.’”

Simon Dumenco, writing in AdAge, issued a mea culpa on Monday for suggesting that Wall Street Journal Publisher Gordon Crovitz might not be so happy working alongside the likes of Homer Simpson once Fox owner News Corp. buys Dow Jones. Of course he wouldn’t. Homer Simpson is a cartoon character.

But seriously…

Crovitz, as it turns out, is quite the Simpsons fan. Here’s what he wrote to Dumenco:

For many years, I have kept a miniature Homer and son Bart in my desk drawer to call on for management advice and inspiration. Indeed, I must turn to the wisdom of Homer himself to find the right words of response: ‘You couldn’t fool your own mother on the foolingest day of your life with an electrified fooling machine!”

That was Krusty the Crovitz. In the next edition of Mediafile: Montgomery Bancroft?

Tribune Co., owner of newspapers including the Los Angeles Times and baseball team the Chicago Cubs, agreed back in April to be taken private for $34 a share. So why’s the stock currently trading under $26? 

Investors have lately seemed as nervy about this deal as Cubs fans before a big game.  

Monday saw Tribune’s shares sink to the lowest point since the deal got announced — falling 2.7 percent to $25.77.  The company is being taken private is a two-part deal, the first of which was a tender offer completed in May at $34 a share for 52 percent of the shares. The second stage, to buy out the remaining stock, is still to come.

“In general the tug-of-war is between the notion that all of the aspects of the deal were in place and that there would be nothing happening to prevent the remainder (of the deal) happening at $34 on schedule, versus the risk that something happened to change the ultimate closing of the deal,” said Barrington Research analyst James Goss.  ”It’s very possible some one could buy (the stock) right now and be very well rewarded,” Goss said. On the flip side, there’s a risk that terms of the deal could get renegotiated, he said. 

Hurdles still to vault include a shareholder vote next week and Federal Communications Commission approval.

Some analysts also have wondered whether Tribune will generate enough cash flow to meet a leverage-test detailed in its deal agreement, although the company has the flexibility to do more asset disposals on top of its planned sale of the Cubs.

Seems like Wal-Mart attracts controversy all over the place — even on social networking web sites.
 
Last week, the world’s largest retailer set up the “Roommate Style Match” group on Facebook, a social networking site that has millions of college age users.
 
Wal-Mart hoped the group would help it attract a larger chunk of back-to-school shopping dollars.  (Click here for a Reuters story. For a take by a Forrester blogger, click here.)

But the group has also attracted a share of Wal-Mart detractors.  (The names of the posters are the ones they use on Facebook and the excerpts were copied directly from Facebook.)
 
“Small business was hurting our economy for too long!” wrote Daniel Waddington. “I only wish I could super-size the trade deficit along with my fries! No Job? De-valued dollar can’t cover my rising interest rates? At least I saved a nickel on a picture frame!!”
 
A post by Dave Haack said, “Unionize Wal Mart Give wal mart workers a Union and save america. Then every one can shop there and people who work there can earn enough to live !”

Wal-Mart did have some defenders on the site. For example,  Connie Bensen lauded Wal-Mart for its charitable contributions. 
“Wal-Mart just opened a store last week in my community. They donated $33,000 to community organizations. $5,000 of that came to my library for literacy! We welcome the new store & the shopping opportunities!”
 
A Wal-Mart spokeswoman said the company was happy so many of its customers were visiting the Facebook site. 
 
“We recognize that we are facilitating a live conversation, and we know that in any conversation, especially one happening online, there will be both supporters and detractors,” spokeswoman Jami Arms said in an email message to Reuters.

– Reuters photo from Wal-Mart 2007 annual shareholder meeting

Rupert Murdoch’s musings on the future of Dow Jones dominated media coverage this week as it has so often over the past three months during his pursuit of one of the world’s most respected newspapers.

He’s coveted the paper for more than a decade. “That’s why we put such a premium on its value and why I spent the better part of the past three months enduring criticism normally leveled at some sort of genocidal tyrant,” he told reporters on Wednesday.  

By August 1, Murdoch’s News Corp. secured a more than $5 billion deal to buy the publisher of the Wall Street Journal. Barry Diller busted out his yacht to celebrate Murdoch’s victory, while WSJ reporters lamented their “Headless body in topless bar” future.

Murdoch dropped clues this week on how he planned to rekindle the once thriving business. He told reporters there were serious talks to make WSJ.com available for free and advertising supported during a conference call after News Corp. reported fiscal fourth quarter financial results. It would be an expensive gambit in the short term. WSJ.com has held the reputation as one of the Web’s most successful subscription businesses with close to a million paying customers. But longer term, “it may be a great thing to do,” he said.  Murdoch also planned to bulk up the Journal’s Europe and Asia operations as soon as he could.

Asked if Dow’s expansion in Europe and specifically in the United Kingdom, could hurt Murdoch’s own Times of London, Murdoch told the Financial Times reporter he had other targets in mind:
“I think more likely on the FT, but we already have complete dominance, or very, very strong leadership, should we say, in seeing management really shift business news in The Times over all other papers.”

Who’s worried? Well, everyone, including my employer.

In other Media/Tech news this week:

Not a great week for Nasdaq-listed British cable operator Virgin Media, whose auction to sell itself fell victim to ongoing debt market woes. It said on Tuesday it would extend its review of its strategic options, including a possible sale of the company. Then it reported that an ongoing channel pricing row with BSkyB has cost it 40,000 customers, many of them higher-paying viewers taking combined broadband, phone and cable services. 
    
U.S. movie rental chain Blockbuster Inc bought download service Movielink, its latest step into the Web as it wages a fierce battle for subscribers with rival Netflix.

Japanese telecoms and Internet group Softbank Corp.’s quarterly profit jumped 45 percent as new low-cost price plans wooed mobile phone subscribers away from bigger rivals. 
    
Mobile phone giant Vodafone Group Plc said on Wednesday it had decided not to sell part of its 45 percent stake in fast-growing U.S. cell phone joint venture Verizon Wireless. 
     
Cablevision Systems Corp reported a higher-than-expected quarterly profit on Wednesday, boosted by gains on asset sales, as well as digital video and telephone subscriber additions. 

Gannett CEO Craig Dubow shot down Wall Street and blogosphere speculation it was prepping for a sale after it made changes to its employee compensation plan.

We were struck by the survey of 2,000 executives in BusinessWeek’s latest double edition featuring a 55-page spread (including ads) about the future of work.  

The survey yielded some intriguing insights into the human condition while chained to the cubicle:

- Men and women, when answering what scares them most, picked China (46%). That’s right. The whole country. Runners-up for both genders were “Wall Street”(35%), “My spouse”(5%), “My boss”(7%) and “My computer”(7%).  At least they know their ways around computers.

- 90 percent of managers think they’re among the top 10 percent of performers in their workplace.

- The places where people want to work, in descending order, are “The place I’m working now,” “Google,” “the government” and “Goldman Sachs.” In other words, the survey revealed that the least popular option was the one with the quickest path toward becoming a millionaire.

- More than 25 percent of workers aged 55 and up said they expect never to retire. We know the feeling.

- And our favorite: 6 percent of respondents under age 30 said they’ve accidentally called their boss “Mom” or “Dad.”

We also know that feeling.

(Graphic courtesy of BusinessWeek)

Whatever you ask Qualcomm chief Paul Jacobs about the iPhone, he won’t talk about it. Known for swearing partners, potential partners and even prospective cleaning staff to complete and utter secrecy about its technology plans, Apple must have gotten to Jacobs too somehow. We just don’t know in what way, since Jacobs wouldn’t tell us during an interview today. 

Here’s how he didn’t talk about whether wireless chip supplier Qualcomm might work with Apple on the next iterations of the Web-browsing and music-playing iPhone: 
     

“So the thing with Apple is that if I told you anything they would get mad at me. So I can’t tell you whether I’m working with them or I’m not working with them, whether I’m talking to them or I’m not talking to them.”
    
“The problem I always have is somehow I say something and it makes a headline that I said something about Apple. So I just gave up talking about Apple.”
    
“We try and work with everybody … and we’d like to work with them. I think one of the things that people have talked about with the iPhone is that having 3G would make it have a better Internet experience.  We’d be interested in having that phone have 3G in it and if it had 3G with our chips, we’d be even happier.“

Dow Jones: It’s a brand, not a branding exercise.

News Corp. chief Rupert Murdoch got plenty of Wall Street Journal staff fuming with nightmares that he would take the venerable newspaper’s identity after buying parent company Dow Jones and plastering it wherever he could — including on his more spicy news Web sites like the New York Post and The Sun.

Fear not, Murdoch said on a conference call with financial analysts and reporters on Wednesday to discuss News Corp.’s quarterly results.

“It’s too valuable,” he said. “We want to use it in every way ourselves that is going to make money. But you’re not going to see Dow Jones shirts.”

Too late. There already ARE Wall Street Journal T-shirts… and coffee mugs, baby bibs, knit caps, golf shirts, business card holders, blankets, cardigans, flashlights, glass alarm clocks, turtlenecks (men’s and women’s), travel mugs, notebooks, ponchos, bathrobes, toddler T-shirts, umbrellas, wine kits, and sweatshirts.

Sorry Rupert, looks like the Bancrofts were way ahead of you.

It’s another round of executive musical chairs for Microsoft and Electronic Arts.
    
John Schappert, an executive vice president at EA, is leaving the world’s biggest video game publisher to take a position with Microsoft as vice president of its Live online gaming service and casual games efforts.
    
His boss will be Don Mattrick, a former top EA executive who is taking over the Xbox business. Microsoft announced in July that Mattrick will replace Peter Moore, who is heading to EA to run its sports label.

In a rare announcement not involving Microsoft, EA said on Wednesday that Barry Cottle will head up its EA Mobile division that makes cell phone games. Cottle will report to Kathy Vrabeck, a former Activision executive whom EA hired in June to head its casual games label.