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Hari's Game...the conclusion?... Friday, April 18, 2003 - 02:34 p.m.

We here @ TVN have been following the career of one Johann Hari with some interest. Since discovering that Johann is, shall we say, 'economical with the actualite', we have been most skeptical of Johanns belief in his own writings. We must, to our shame, confess that we are now operating on the theory that young Johann will scribble 'any old tripe', as long as he receives his 30-pieces-of-silver.

Johann has the dubious distinction of being billed as 'Johann Hari, Young Journalist of the Year' whenever his musings are published in the Independent.

Having read his latest offering entitled 'There will never be a better time to go for the euro' we were left feeling a little mean-spirited. Perhaps, we pondered, we had been far too harsh on young Johann, a chap has to earn a crust after all. He is, we can assure you, considered to be the cream of the crop; 'Johann Hari, Young Journalist of the Year' and his musings are much discussed by other 'bright young things' as a simple search of Google, using the term 'johann hari', will demonstrate :)

We here @ TVN are rather cynical, as you may by now have noticed. So we couldn't help but dig a little deeper and try to discover the grounds for young Johann's strident championing of the Euro.

Let us firstly examine the Independent. This is a British Daily with few 'stars' in its stable , most people online know it as the home of Robert Fisk, decidedly anti-war war-correspondent.

According to this excellent article by Roy Greenslade in the Guardian,

''Are readers of the anti-war Independent overwhelmingly opposed to the war? Is the bulk of the Daily Telegraph's readership standing four-square behind the coalition? What about the people who read the Daily Mirror: do they support its consistent criticism of the Bush-Blair war?
In an attempt to answer these questions, the polling company ICM asked people whether they approved or disapproved of the war and then discovered which daily newspapers each respondent regularly reads.
The results are, I must add, somewhat tentative. The sample size for a couple of titles was small and these should be taken only as indicative. But despite that health warning, which probably affects the Independent more than any other, the figures from this exercise - the first of its kind - are fascinating. ''

As we said the Independent, is considered on-line, to have a basically anti-war stance, mainly because of the articles of Robert Fisk. However things in the real world are not so clear cut. Back to Greenslade in the Guardian again:

''Independent also has more than a third of pro-war readers. Though its sample was small, the editor, Simon Kelner, wasn't in the least surprised at the result. "It's broadly in line with what I'd expect," he says. "Our postbag reflects those sorts of figures too."

He pointed to Friday's letters page, in which there were two letters questioning the validity of the "moral outrage" which informed the front-page article the day before by the Independent's reporter in Baghdad, Robert Fisk. Three other writers congratulated Fisk.

That ratio, Kelner suggests, supports the ICM finding of a 55-38% split. He points out that the response to his pro-war columnist, Johann Hari, is proportionately similar.

The Independent has been one of the major beneficiaries of the war, claiming about 9% extra on its daily sale last week.''

So it appears that the Indie is playing a 2 front game. On one side it is gaining much recognition online as an anti war- publication, but it has the problem that 'Independent also has more than a third of pro-war readers.' Therefore one can conclude that one-third of readers who actually shell out hard cash for its printed equivilant in the real-world, are not happy with the opinions of Fisk, it's main star. Hence the need for someone like Johann - who'll say exactly what the boss wants him to.

The Boss in this case is one Tony O'Reilly, head of an Irish Media group, Independent News & Media, whose worldwide holdings include

UK

• The Independent
• Independent on Sunday
• Belfast Telegraph

Republic of Ireland

• Irish Independent
• Sunday World

South Africa

• 14 newspapers including Cape Argus and Pretoria News

Australia and New Zealand

• 24 daily newspapers including the New Zealand Herald and Queensland Times

A rather impressive list we think you'll agree. Big media brings big problems, however. In this case very big debt problems. According to this Guardian article of April 17, 2000

''The Independent could finally break even next year but only if the advertising market returns to health, its owners said today.''

and this on November 4, 2002

''Independent hit by £16m loss : The Independent and Independent on Sunday slipped further into the red last year, posting a £15.7m loss despite a cost-cutting drive.

The figures are a blow for Sir Tony O'Reilly, the owner of parent company Independent News & Media. When he bought the papers in 1998 he claimed they would break even by 2001.''

The Indie is in deep trouble indeed. Losing money hand-over-fist is the correct expression, I believe.

Things have gotten so bad that poor Slur Tony has had to dig deep into his own pockets in the hope of halting the slide:

''Irish entrepreneur to make £20m cash injection and sell off British regional titles to cut debt . O'Reilly has agreed to pay around ?30m (£20m) for new shares in the Independent News & Media Group he chairs as part of a ?256m restructuring plan that aims to reduce debts of more than ?1.2bn.

The Dublin-based group has launched a deeply discounted rights issue to raise ?103m in new cash to meet debt obligations that are due later this year. ''

Now the most interesting thing to note here (at least TVN thinks it is the most interesting) is that Independent News & Media Group is a Dublin-based group. Dublin being the capital city of that 'most-septic of sceptered Isles', Ireland. Hence the Independent News & Media Group, operates in Euro's and not British Pounds Sterling, which are the currency of the UK. This might indeed cause some problems for O'Reilly if his personal cash is held in Euros. Currency fluctuations have wiped the smiles from the faces of many an obese feline over the last few years. Hence Tony might indeed be very pleased were Britian to adopt the Euro.

Which, I think, brings us back to where we came in - Johann Hari ' Young Journalist of the Year' and his latest offering; 'There will never be a better time to go for the euro'

I ask myself if it's very likely that Fisk would have written such a pleasing article for SIR Tony....