Friday, as the News Corp. Board of Directors held their annual shareholders meeting, close to two hundred demonstrators from Good Jobs LA, Brave New Foundation, NABET-CWA, Media and Democracy Coalition, Media Alliance, and Media Action Center joined with Occupy LA, AAVAZ.org, Free Press and Common Cause to protest the media giant’s behavior -including having politicians on their payroll as media commentators and authors, phone hacking and bribery, one-sided reporting, use of faulty statistics, bad governance, and most especially, not acting in the public interest.

Media activist Sue Wilson rallied the crowd when she told them that a local Fox channel in Florida went to court and received a ruling that a news broadcast over our public airwaves does not have to be true.

Dave Saldana, the communications director of Free Press, explained to the crowd that political parties –be they Republican or Democrat, conservative or progressive– should not be in bed with the media because that can cause a distortion of the news. Saldana read a list of demands to News Corp. shareholders which he and Wilson delivered to a representative of News Corp., who said he would deliver it to the shareholders (at 23:00 in video). Saldana explained that Fox News is a symptom of corporate consolidation. (33:30)

News anchor icon Bree Walker was also there and told FDL’s Ustream that she has seen the creeping influence of corporate interests in news programming over the past thirty years. (43:00)

Early on I ran into an intern from NPR who was taking pictures of some of the more colorful folks protesting. He basically admitted that they are looking for catchy, extreme things to capture interest. (Cue the drum circles!) So I kinda told him that as public radio they should be serving the public, and maybe he should take a look at the stories of the people who are at Occupy LA and why they are there, like Michelle the kitchen manager who has been battling ovarian cancer for nine years. Despite the cancer metastasizing to her liver and having to undergo 6 hours of chemotherapy several times a week, she is down at Occupy LA daily making sure that food for over 300 people is prepared to health department standards and arrives on time.

As usual the cute Occupy LA kids who wear bandanas over their faces and dance behind speakers with their signs were outside Fox positioning themselves to try go get as much camera time as possible. Their cam-ho antics are a bit tiresome by now, but I appreciated their enthusiasm. Since Real World’s Occupy casting won’t be out of Zucotti Park, maybe they should apply!

The event was widely covered by local, national and international news. It will be interesting to see how it’s spun.

Jude Law as Hamlet: "Alas, poor Rupert, I knew him well...where your your jibes now?"

Acting on a lawsuit filed by actor Jude Law and his assistant Ben Jackson claiming their phones were hacked in New York by reporters working for  News of the World, the FBI plans to contact the actor, according an official who spoke with the BBC.

NOTW’s story, publish in September 2003 detailed conversations between the actor and Jackson which the suit claims  could only have been obtained by listening in on the pair’s phone messages. Since the messages were relayed through United States carriers, the suit opens the door to charges under US laws.

Additionally, Law has filed another suit against another of Murdoch’s paper, The Sun, alleging his messages were hacked by reporters in 2005 and 2006, resulting in four stories.

News International, the UK branch of Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp said in a statement to the BBC:

We believe this is a deeply cynical and deliberately mischievous attempt to draw the Sun into the phone-hacking issue. The allegations have been carefully investigated by our lawyers and the evidence shows they have no foundation whatsoever.

Rupert Murdoch’s son, James may have proven even more ineffective at dodging the truth than his father at dodging pies. According to the BBC, the younger Murdoch who is the chairman of News International told:

the media committee on Tuesday he had not been “aware” of an email suggesting the practice went wider than a “rogue” News of the World reporter.

But ex-NoW editor Colin Myler and ex-NI legal manager Tom Crone have now said they “did inform” him of the email.

Mr Murdoch later said he “stands by his testimony”.

In 2008 NOTW settled a phone hacking claim against them brought by Gordon Taylor, chief executive of the Professional Footballers’ Association; thesettlement payment was £600,000 (appr0x $967,000). In January of this year Bloomberg reported:

At least seven pending lawsuits from celebrities allege their phone voicemails were hacked into by News of the World.

Actress Sienna Miller received an apology and a settlement of £100,00 ($164,000) for legal costs and personal damages after filing suit against NOTW for phone hacks that occurred in the mid 2000. Miller was Jude Law’s girl friend from 2004 to 2006. They reunited three years later, but ended the relationship this February. Law and his relationships have long been tabloid fodder, but nothing justifies phone hacking.