
Cap saga's sorry end
Thinking of putting an ad in any of Rupert Murdoch's mastheads
around Australia?
Well, you might need to think again, because we now may have proof
that the selling power of The Courier-Mail, the Daily
Telegraph and the Sun Herald et al, et all, could be
bugger all.
And we have the ABC's Media Watch program to thank.
Do you remember News Limited's attempts to get the Australian
public to help buy Donnie Bradman's 1948 baggy green? How Murdopch's
papers around Oz extolled readers to dip into their hard-earned
to make sure the cap came home?
It's the story we lampooned in the last issue of The Bug
and didn't it need sending up? Especially as News Limited could
have bought the cap for a scrap if they had just bid anonimously
auction instead of big-noting themselves beforehand.
Media Watch donated $10 to the campaign and claimed a helpful
teller (who's probably now out of a job) revealed how much had
been donated to the News Limited cause before they were gazumped.
How much do you reckon - $250,000? $195,000? No, it was somewhere
between $8000 and $9000.
So, thinking of selling your car through Rupert? Maybe you need
to think again.