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News Corp. CEO Slams Facebook, Google for Not Sharing Enough Ad Revenue

  • ‘Too many publishers have been patsies,’ Robert Thomson says
  • BuzzFeed CEO agrees that Facebook should share more ad revenue

Apple, Google and Amazon Seem Unstoppable. Now What?

He’s derided them as “bot-infested badlands,” “dysfunctional and sometimes dystopian,” and platforms for “the fake, the faux and the fallacious.” On a recent earnings call, he called them “mephitic,” prompting his spokesman to tweet the definition: “foul smelling.”

No media executive has more tirelessly criticized Google and Facebook -- and done so with such a colorful vocabulary -- than News Corp. Chief Executive Officer Robert Thomson. A top lieutenant of the billionaire media mogul Rupert Murdoch, Thomson uses alliterative attacks as part of a decade-long crusade to pressure Silicon Valley for a greater share of its advertising revenue.