Let's Get Honest! Absolutely Uncommon Analysis of Family & Conciliation Courts' Operations, Practices, & History

Consciousness-raising on this ongoing Auction Block reality is always timely.

THIS POST IS: Freedom of the Press IS on the Auction Block  (Rupert Murdoch, Walter Annenberg empires: Consolidate, New Markets, Buy&Sell, handle the Scandals, go public, go private, keep on trucking…) and its case-sensitive short-link ends “-6BH.” [excluding the “.”]

Attempting to differentiate what I do here, and my purpose in doing it, from journalistic, personal anecdotal, or high-profile (poster child) case anecdotal reporting, and cause-based rhetoric on many of the same topics on which those journalistic, anecdotal types of reporting have been dominant:  family courts, domestic violence, marriage/fatherhood, child support, divorce-custody and so forth, has been an ongoing theme in my blogging.  We should recognize that, and I call attention to this situation, information on these topics that is publicized on-line may comes from both secondary, pro-bono (volunteer) social media reblogging, and primary sponsorship — which primary (organization) sponsorship may be itself several levels deep as to seeding one rhetoric or another (and with this recommended solutions).

Beyond how many levels deep is sponsorship of the reporting websites/organizations (that others like to quote, repost, and reblog) is the question of sponsorship of the technology platforms on which the rhetoric is itself disseminated, decade by decade, 1900s – 2000s.  This brings us into the question of high-technology media corporations, conferences, and just how profitable the sector is — although when it’s NOT profitable, someone’s company or subsidiary IS going to get sold off sooner or later.  At the bottom of this post, I take a single corporation’s history on a timeline and show some of the trends — all of which relates to the on-line news, other media, and print (where they still exist) publications, and who owns whose at any point in time.

Yet another factor comes up when professional journals (such as the Family Court Review with its affiliations) about which the average person NOT into the professional fields involved, whether academic or “created” fields (domestic violence advocates, fatherhood researchers or practitioners, etc. may not even know, and to which therefore they cannot respond properly, or timely, which is to say, effectively.  This is no accident!

Institutions (such as universities) have their own additional blogs and websites to further promote ideologies which the public, in general, may be completely unaware of, between comparing the mainstream news media (ABC, NBC, CBS — PBS — or now, Fox) with their favorite right-wing or progressive news outlets, a choice of “pro or con” a limited series of issues which BOTH sides profit from debating in public.

Up next (as part of demonstrating this situation), I have an example of law-school sponsored journalism hooking up with another private nonprofit-university published journal seeking, deliberately over time, to transform the systems of:  family courts, juvenile justice, school truancy law, and of course behavioral health/social science-related services.  I remember exactly what search phrase led me to become aware of this center, but unless you happened to be on the lawschool website and curious about one of its many “Centers” and take that curiosity some steps further, you might not have known.  (Next images show first, the lawschool banner, then that banner with the “Centers” dropdown — in fine print):

UCBaltimore SOLaw Home page

UCBaltimore SOLaw Home page showing drop-down menu for “Centers” in very fine print) Click for full-sized.

LAW UBALT EDU Centers, annotated + showing the CFCC (Screen Shot 2017-04-21 at 4.04PM)

UCBaltimore SOLaw Home page; having clicked on “CFCC” option, the donors name in such large letters, important parts of the page aren’t even visible on the top half (scroll down to see now more overt connections between CFCC founder and AFCC-affiliated (co-published) Family Court Review, of which this Associate Professor is now Editor in Chief. And, newsletters, and recommendations for a new post-JD certificate in family law, etc.

And the trend is to Unify under themes controlled, again, by private interests — but in the case of UBaltimore School of Law, that university is part of the Maryland State System.  And I have already posted on the influence of this particular center WITHIN the law school having had a role of pushing through the setup of family court divisions when it COULD NOT and WAS NOT being passed legislatively.  It was done administratively through a well-known presiding judge at the time (Chief Administrative Judge Bell) with a well-known and clearly well-earned civil rights record.  I am not going to hunt up all my specific links, but believe they will be found on the TOC page under late 2013 as I recall. For example:  Dec 22, 2013, my “Eavesdropping into an Indoctrination Center; Hindsight from a Pilot Project Outpost” specifically references this CFCC and one of its founders, Barbara Babb.  Next to images are screenshots from that part of the post, including one link to an article cited on turning the tide, and endorsing this “unified family court” concept for “families and children,” which is to say, most people!

No apologies for the sarcastic tone, either!

#1 of 3 from my Dec 22, 2013 post referencing UBaltimore School of Law CFCC in re creation of the family law division (late 1990s) in Maryland — through an administrative judicial ruling

#2 of 3 from my 12/22/2013 blog

Title and publication/issue# referenced in Image 2 of 3 from my 12/22/2013 post

Here’s another example I discovered not too long ago from a UBaltimore School of Law CFCC website which I sarcastically (but I still say, accurately) referred to as an “AFCC Outpost” in late 2014.  Predictably, they are recommending more training of judges and in fact, a post-J.D. certification regarding family law issues.

This theme refers to the private, professional journals which, when read, reveal intent to affect public institutions.

However that is not the major emphasis of this post.  Below this illustrated section, I will talk more about the sale of Triangle Publications (and with it, TV Guide) in ONE large section involving (at least) TWO major actors (see post title for which one).

AND, below that, in a different (more gray) background-color, a section on  high-technology specialty corporations buying and selling each other over time, using for an example the 1971-formed CMP Publications.  I think it’s interesting, and sale of THAT media wealth (ca. 1999) helped set up yet another privately controlled family foundation which went — where else? — into education reform, this time, the “progressive” way.

I would like to have here provided access with active links to this Spring (April 2017) Full Court Press issue (3 annotated images below) to readers, however none were provided (the links were basically NOT active) on my received email and I see from the website (Scroll down further, it’s on the left sidebar) where this “Full Court Press” might normally show up (and a Summer 2016 version of “The Unified Court Connection, 17th issue” (and the Spring 2017 one is called the 18th issue) is supplied, it may not be yet available on their main website.  Odd, that!  But, you can learn there its stated goals:

CFCC primary goals are to:

• Deliver cutting-edge family law education by engaging law students in real-life learning opportunities   [[i.e., mentoring fresh generations of law students in the “RIght Way” to think about family courts]]
• Promote the development of unified family courts to provide children and families with a single court system with comprehensive subject-matter jurisdiction
• Improve the delivery of legal, social, judicial, administrative and other services within the family justice system, including evaluating family court systems
• Develop training programs and tools for judges, court staff and attorneys to build their understanding of the complex issues underlying family law proceedings
• Support school success for children by bringing together judges, attorneys, law students and other members of the legal community to improve school attendance, reform school discipline practices and protect legal rights for children in school

We invite you to learn more about what we are, what we do, and how you can get involved with our work.

This CFCC (now named after alumni donors, a married couple) is innately intertwined with private nonprofit associations and has been since is 2000 co-founding. There is a clear intent to protect the proprietary “Train the judges, protect AND EXPAND our turf” visible, with the emphasis on therapeutic jurisdiction, a “holistic approach” and all this said throughout to be in the public’s best interest, and families’.  Now it’s not enough to combine the unified family court jurisdictions, they also want to help steer entire communities, thus pretty much revealing the true colors behind the movement, from the start.

Image 1 of 3 (UBaltimore School of Law S&M Meyerhoff CFCC Spring 2017 Full Court Press) email alert

Image 2 of 3 (see caption for image 1). Note reference to Diane Nunn. Diane Nunn also has a long history  as an AFCC-affiliated person with the California Judicial Council (TOP ruling body of the Calif. courts)  AOC/CFCC, which CFCC historically has seemed to coordinate policies with CFCC here in Maryland.  Her AFCC affiliation is not mentioned here but (see image 3 of 3) this CFCC’s is now more “out in the open.”

Image 3 of 3 (annotated, Click HERE to read my comments on the AFCC affiliations .Note reference to Barbara Babb (co-founder of this) now being Editor in Chief of the (AFCC-Hofstra Univ. -produced) “Family Court Review.” Notice also reference to yet more certifications and trainings being recommended (for both judges and lawyers) and continued promotion of “Unified Family Courts”

There is a place and importance to telling one’s story, but when it comes to advocacy, analysis and exposure of the problems in the above areas, who is using the story for what purpose has to be determined, and those in the least advantaged position at any point in the time, should be most concerned to determine, through following the financial and corporate funding trails (profit and nonprofit) WHO is behind the message they’re repeating, for free presumably, to the world in seeking:  justice, court reform, protection, (etc.) from any government entity.

It takes at least two sides to play ping-pong, tetherball, or Good Cop/Bad Cop with a single theme.

I have continued to say, that vocabulary has to be business and accounting related, and to be wide enough in scope, it must incorporate the financial relationships with government.  And I have continued to demonstrate what you can find once you start looking into that.

People do not seem to realize (in my experience) that once you become entrenched in a subject matter side to the point of NOT perceiving the operational foundations of those propagating it, you lose objectivity and credibility, period. Credibility becomes limited to those who happen to side with you already, or who may help further a journalistic career writing up the problems for their publications, whether as employee or freelance.

People eager for change and reform [again, I’m referring experientially to people in the family courts, domestic violence, marriage/fatherhood, child support, divorce-custody and related fields] also often don’t seek to distinguish between what is anecdotal (even if true) to others not personally eyewitnesses of the events, and what can be at least verified by others from afar as true statements, and from those true statements (qualified, of course, as to the credibility of their sources), compiling a reasonably comprehensive, fair, logical and set in a historic context, account for the present situation.

I would not expect 100% agreement “across the board” ever, but if these discussions cannot move out of the realms of religion or quasi-religious assertions, it should not be a viable discussion for public policy in the USA until consent is made to suspend the Constitution and formally declare instead a “theocracy.” That wouldn’t pass (I hope!), so instead, the trend has been to slip elements of major religious beliefs (again, either pro- or con- monotheism and male-dominance) in the back door –which is to say, functionally, administratively, and INdirectly.

In some of the soft, social sciences attempting to be hard, clinical, evidence-based, etc. to justify their continued sponsorship — and get some “R.E.S.P.E.C.T.” like the other sciences — I have to re-assert my opinion that psychology, psychoanalysis (cf. Freud) (particularly prevalent in the family court and within education as a professional field (i.e., professional schools of psychology and of education) — are in practice AND in substance (essence) not just populated by missionary zealots in one or another religions or quasi-religions (whether new-age, “fundie” of any of the three major “Abrahamic” strands of globally known religions around which wars have been fought for centuries — Christianity, Judaism, Islam — with one or two typically trying to wipe out the other — or politically correct and allegedly more objective “humanism…” but in essence, forms of religion.

Which is to say, social and behavioral (population) control based upon speculation.  In practice, and historically each has particular constructs of how society ought to be put together (which typically begins with “Who’s on top” [who gets to lead] defined by (#1 GENDER and #2 ETHNICITY and overall #3 CLASS).

They will typically continue to fight each other within a category, but if one from an affiliate category challenges the “CLASS” sector, a quick unity (“collaboration”) will be found among the former opponents.

NONE of this particularly leads to stability or the ability to plan for the future for the general population.

Therefore it seems that those able to produce the most instability and with existing ability to weather it (that is resources to survive failure in one enterprise through revenue streams or resources from another) stand to profit the most from running the lives of those who CANNOT easily weather economic storms.  Part of the benefit is having a population in confusion and in distress (economic storms or concerns about the same) while debating conflicting accounts of LESS THAN the most important topics of the day (which would be along the lines of, WHO is controlling the most revenue-producing assets in any scenario — and what are they doing with them, alongside — just for a sampler — WHY AREN’T GOVERNMENTAL COMPREHENSIVE ANNUAL FINANCIAL REPORTS taught to the people from adolescence on, AND discussed in on-line news media, consistently, and by “the people”???  

Is understanding this subject matter “not in our best interests”?  Because to me, it sure would seem to be in the public interest to know where public funds are going, and how to navigate the forms in which they are reported, which, when comprehended, provides a wider and better basis from which to judge public policy and particularly public “let’s transform all our major institutions before HOW and BY WHOM really sinks in to those who will be most affected by the changes….”

Just thought I’d keep that question on the map.  It’s a rhetorical question — why doesn’t mainstream media encourage people to read and comprehend financial reports as the backdrop to the issues of the day?

Along these lines, I cannot identify any Form 990 filings for the AISR (Annenberg Institute for School Reform) or a solid explanation for why they are not found, NOR have I found any financial statements for an acknowledged JPA, “WestEd” which got two negative audits, one in 1998, not long after it started up, by federal agencies — and WestEd has a LARGE budget, it claims.

In addition, there is example after example of those who do file — in these fields — not handling their filings honestly, or keeping them coming when, by law, they are to be maintained (example:  Coalition of Essential Schools, Inc. in Rhode Island — when not in California as a Rhode Island foreign nonprofit — or was it really?  Was it revoked in Rhode Island, then mysteriously claiming to be a domestic California entity before in (2011) returning to Rhode Island, where (it seems) all was forgiven (it took an act of the legislature to make that happen — but no doubt Annenberg’s $50 M to Brown University may have been a possible persuasive element) — and then became a Rhode Island domestic nonprofit again — then got threatened with revocation again, but quickly filed to stay legit, and, having at some point in between 2015-2016, claimed now a MAINE address, and from Maine (as a legitimate again Rhode Island corporation) in Feb. 2017 as I recall, voluntarily dissolved.

IS THIS REALLY THE KIND OF LEADERSHIP WE WANT, OR DESERVE? Laws for you — but not for us?

I keep seeing in corporate history after corporate history (here, it’s in the field of publications, but of course there are other forms of corporate wealth) domination or success in one often leads to diversification and seeking other fields to dominate, multi-generation.  Basically, this is empire-building.  Only now, it’s at warp-speed thanks to technologies developed in the 1900s, early, mid, and late, and further developed (as to technology) in the 2000s.

If that summary doesn’t quite sink in, move forward to the two-part post below, which I took about a half day to assemble here.  One part focuses on the two former owners of media empires, one of which was sold to the other; the other half by re-telling the CMP Publications // Media// UBM story, showcases (a) the speed of buying and selling of companies and (b) trends AWAY from emphasis on publications and consolidating (vertically integrated markets) more into the event/conference/trade show market, while continuing revenues from subscriptions extremely targeted to each market — in the form of e-commerce also. It also shows “how global it is.”

THAT story (bottom half of this post) only covers about 1971- now.  The Murdoch/Annenberg part (top half), starting with their father’s companies they inherited, could be said to begin in the early 20th century.  Rupert Murdoch is still alive and kicking; Wallace H. Annenberg and his long-time wife Leonore are not — but their progeny are, and they are also still “alive and kicking.”

Anyone reading from an on-line media source in this decade of the 21st century ought to develop a KEEN sense for, and awareness of, who currently owns their favorite “independent” market outlet.   Like food, housing, transportation and education, COMMUNICATIONS as a business sector, being equally pervasive, should always be viewed as to asset ownership and parent companies, not just which brands are preferred over others.  

***In the history, for example, of one Murdoch publication, typically solidly conservative, it says in hopes of a sale, it suddenly switched to pro-Labour (?) More quotations from “FundingUniverse.com” (which stops around the year 2001 making it not at ALL current regarding this particular empire, but still).

Machinations to keep the “too-pro-Labour” Robert Maxwell from buying a certain entity:

In 1964, News Ltd. launched The Australian,Australia’s first national newspaper, based in Canberra. Murdoch considered the venture prestigious enough to be worth a loss of A$30 million, over the course of 20 years, to keep going. Typesetting in Canberra and flying the matrices to Melbourne and Sydney for printing were difficult, and in 1967 the paper was moved to Sydney. In 1969, its latest editor oversaw its re-adoption of opposition to the Vietnam War, a return to the stance first espoused by the paper in 1965 when Australian troops were initially assigned there.

Murdoch, meanwhile, was in London. [[SEPARATE ISSUE]] In October 1968, Robert Maxwell had offered to buy the United Kingdom’s News of the World Organization (NOTW) for £26 million. The company owned the Sunday newspaper News of the World, the Bemrose group of local newspapers, the papermaker Townsend Hook, and several other publishing companies. It had been run since 1891 by the Carr family, which had now split into two factions, one led by NOTW’s chairman, Sir William Carr, with 32 percent of the shares, the other by his cousin, Derek Jackson, whose decision to sell his 25 percent stake had precipitated the crisis.

Interesting, how it is individuals with the title “Sir” who are owning the news organizations (Murdoch’s father also).

Maxwell, born in Czechoslovakia, was then a Labour member of Parliament. Maxwell’s foreign origin, combined with his political opinions, provoked a hostile response to his bid from the Carrs and from the editor of the News of the World, Stafford Somerfield, who declared that the paper was–and should remain–as British as roast beef and Yorkshire pudding.

Interesting, a member of Parliament offering to buy a news organization, but was not thought “British enough” by those who were going to sell it. How did that happen, and what happened next??

News Ltd. arranged to swap shares in some of its minor ventures with the Carrs and by December it controlled 40 percent of the NOTW stock. In January 1969, Maxwell’s bid was rejected at a shareholders’ meeting where half of those present were company staff, temporarily given voting shares. Illness removed Sir William Carr from the chairmanship in June 1969, and Murdoch succeeded him. In 1977, just before his death, Carr wrote to Maxwell to express regret that he had spurned his original offer for NOTW. The News of the World remained the biggest-selling English-language newspaper in the world.

I went looking (my memory was not fresh) whether this Robert Maxwell was associated with the UBM (United Business Media) I knew had bought “CMP Media” ca. 1999 – about which I post below.  Perhaps not, but to further demonstrate how flamboyant, influential and charismatic various media-owning personalities can be, I suggest visiting Robert Maxwell’s Wikipedia (here’s one image from it).  He died under undermined circumstances in 1991 and his sons were not able to keep the empire together as he was accused of having stolen from pension funds.  The British government got involved, and eventually “it” (See wiki for the details) filed for bankruptcy when, upon his death, banks started calling in the loans.  Meanwhile there were questions of his political leanings during the 1960s and 1970s, despite him having survived the Nazis and fought in the British army:

Robert Maxwell, 1923-1991, and Parliament (representing Buckingham) 1964-1970; died at sea near the Canary Islands, buried on the Mount of Olives. Mirror Group Newspapers, Pergamon, BPC (British Printing Corporation), MacMillan, Inc. among other publishing companies. Father of 9 children.

Wikipedia on media owner and member of British Parliament, Czech-born, Nazi-survivor, Robert Maxwell

Still following this theme in the Murdoch empire chronology from FundingUniverse.com:

…Back in Australia, Murdoch found that The Australian had become too liberal for his liking. In 1971, he dismissed its editor, Adrian Deamer, who had been in the post for three years–a remarkable record, considering that the paper would have 13 editors in its first 16 years. In 1972, News Ltd. bought the Sydney Daily and Sunday Telegraph from Packer’s Consolidated Press, which had been losing circulation to the three Fairfax papers, the Sydney Morning Herald, the Sun, and the Sunday Sun-Herald. The ailingSunday Australian was absorbed into the Sunday Telegraph soon afterward.

Murdoch had become close to Gough Whitlam, then leader of the Australian Labor Party, and gave A$75,000 to the party’s advertising campaign in 1972. If this was a return to Murdoch’s earlier radicalism, it was short-lived. Within three years his papers were attacking the Labor Party again, with The Australian, for example, using raw figures, rather than seasonally adjusted ones, to suggest, wrongly, that unemployment was rising

But skip ahead to the 1980s, and….

Growth Through Acquisition: Late 1980s

While 1986 was a year of triumph for Murdoch in Britain, in Australia it was a year of retreat. News Ltd. sold off both Channel TEN-10 in Sydney and ATV 10 in Melbourne, as well as radio stations, a record company, and three newspapers. However, 1987 was the year of the acquisition of the Herald and Weekly Times group once run by Murdoch’s father. Shortly before the deal went ahead, Murdoch had a private meeting with the prime minister, Bob Hawke, and the treasurer, Paul Keating, and his Australian newspapers all switched political allegiance to Labor, the governing party. The purchase of the Herald and Weekly Times group cost A$2.3 billion, was the biggest single takeover of newspapers ever accomplished, and made News Corp. the largest publisher of English-language newspapers in the world. Shortly afterward the chairman of the Australian Press Council resigned in protest at the government’s failure to invoke the Foreign Takeovers Act against Murdoch, for by this time Murdoch had become an American citizen. It was not until 1989 that newly released government documents revealed that the Foreign Investment Review Board had opposed the acquisition, although Prime Minister Hawke declared that it had not.

News Ltd. = I believe was Australian;  News Corp. (since 1979). = American.  Murdoch had run into problems in Australia, but by the time they were resolved, says this chronology, moved to the United States (a recurring theme — when in trouble with the law in one country, re-patriate, ex-patriate, or move for a season).  His country of origin was Australia.

News Corp. ended 1987 with two more purchases, the South China Morning Post, the most important English-language newspaper in Hong Kong, and the American publishing house Harper & Row. It then sold 50 percent of Harper & Row to William Collins and Sons. This arrangement lasted only until April 1989, when News International bought Collins outright. HarperCollins Publishers, created as a merger of these and other book and map publishers, is now the largest English-language publisher in the world.

News International would be the British arm of this Australian-American’s media empire, at the time, as you can see from the “Early 1980s | Focus on Publishing” section of this same article:

Focus on Publishing: Early 1980s

In 1981, News International, the British arm of the Murdoch group, acquired 42 percent of the voting shares in the British publishers William Collins and Sons and bought the London Times, the Sunday Times, the Times Literary Supplement, and the Times Educational Supplement from what is now The Thomson Corporation. Fifteen years earlier, Lord Thomson’s own purchase of The Times and its supplements had been investigated by the Monopolies Commission, as Lonrho was to be investigated when it made a bid for the London Observer later in 1981. Yet the government of the day waived this requirement in News International’s case.

Interesting, it was borderline monopoly — or just WAS a monopoly, but let slide by the regulating Commission.   The Thomson Corporation was (or is) another media empire — but that’s another story! See “WestLaw” and “LexisNexis” on this post, I probably published some of it already….

[“NOW” means as of this article, which again only goes to about 2001].  Which brings us up to the theme of this section of my post — the purchase of Triangle Publications and TV Guide by Murdoch:

In 1988, three decades after he had borrowed its format for his own publication on television, Murdoch bought the American magazine TV Guide and the company that published it, Triangle Publications, for $2.83 billion. Fox Broadcasting Company started up during the same year as the first new television network in the United States to challenge the long-established trio of ABC, CBS, and NBC. Its huge initial costs were reduced, fortuitously, when a Hollywood writers’ strike allowed it to run a large number of repeats, and it broadcast at first only on Saturdays and Sundays.

Wikipedia on UBM, plc and Funding Universe on United Business Media plc (predecessor to UBM, and showing its predecessors about a century back) illustrate who, at least in the UK, was in control of publications, and that politicians (“Lords” and “Sirs”) had long understood how important controlling the press was to their careers and interests, including managing political crises.  These also will show (just read the chronologies) overall the gradual change into more diverse media and event corporations, as opposed to publishing and newspapers or on-line news only.  It’s a systemwide shift, and we are now on the far side of that shift, regardless of how fondly we may value or remember (some of us) days of newspapers, particularly LOCAL newspapers!

UBM plc is a global business-to-business (B2B) events organiser headquartered in London, United Kingdom. It has a long history as a multinational media company. Its current main focus is on B2B events, but its principal operations have included live media and business-to-business communications, marketing services and data provision, and it principally serves the technology, healthcare, trade and transport, ingredients and fashion industries. UBM is listed on the London Stock Exchange and is a constituent of the FTSE 250 Index.

SO ..,..

“The Press” is not what it used to be, and in fact while it’s always required sales to survive, typically more advertising than subscriptions (as I learned from the quick background of Thomson Corporation (Canada)), right now calling it “information” or “news” may be a bit of a euphemism.  And, it’s generally not free.

For example, I am not charging access to this blog, nor selling subscriptions.  But it is costing me, personal time.  I am not doing this for a living. I am doing it for my learning AND, as originally conceived and to this day, continued, for my daughters — and for future generations.  I didn’t see anyone else really keeping these matters consistently reported, and so stepped into that gap, and so far, have managed to stay there.  While “hope” is not a business plan, I still hope that others may recognize the value and take the time to consider what’s being said here.

This post was (originally) intended to supplement a post “Challenging the Annenberg Challenge,” as you can see again in its title.

THIS POST IS: Freedom of the Press IS on the Auction Block  (Rupert Murdoch, Walter Annenberg empires: Consolidate, New Markets, Buy&Sell, handle the Scandals, go public, go private, keep on trucking…) and its case-sensitive short-link ends “-6BH.” [excluding the “.”]

While I’m looking at Annenberg Foundation and spinoff foundations, trusts, projects, etc. as tax-exempts exerting private influence on public things that should be handled, I believe, AS public institutions, not private investments first, and the public as “problems to be solved,” because we WILL protest, eventually, corporatization of government through “philanthropy” while being personally burdened to pay off the debt for OTHERS investments mischaracterized as our own, or in our best interests, it’s fair to recognize the the original source of wealth was (a) inherited, and (b) in the field of publications before the current technologies such as the internet, and not long after TV itself came to exist.

Part of Walter Annenberg’s was “TV Guide,” and part of Rupert Murdoch’s was recognizing this and creating a version of it in another country, before moving into the USA and eventually buying not just TV Guide but also its publisher Triangle Publications.

Any major publications getting sold WILL create significant wealth at the time, and this sale apparently set in place the Annenberg Foundation in the 1980s, which helps moderate the taxes paid.

Related subject matter, but not reported otherwise in this post:

I also reported earlier in this (dense) blog and in the context of school-reform networking (both Left and Right) another media enterprise, though smaller (CMP Media) helped fund the Leeds and Jobin-Leeds family wealth, who then got promptly active in things Democratic and Progressive, and Education Reform in nature.  Without the inheritance, they wouldn’t have been so set up to have loud voices in the field.  I then looked at what happened to CMP Media after it got sold to a Brit, and no doubt some of that story (which ends up around UBM (United Business Media) focused on global-region-based event/trade shows along the lines of SXSW conferences in the US. In other words, reporting has gone more into sales and advertising.

CMP Publications (formed 1971) was absorbed into CMP Media Briefly, CMP Media (formed 1996), which then (1997) went public, was bought (1999) and after its on multiple acquisitions (thereafter) eventually as a brand shut down when UBM (2008) broke it up into four different companies. Meanwhile the heirs got busy investing in education reform and democracy, through multiple websites and 501©3 / ©4 entities alongside one that doesn’t self-identify, but turns out to be a (for-profit) LLC, and along the way, not exactly offer up their own financials on any of the websites or much help to the readers in keeping the corporate stories straight.

I realized I wanted to review this material. It identifies what types of businesses are enthusiastically investing in the proprietary technology so prominent in the Fix (or Replace) the Schools Reform movements — and what these firms have a proven background in doing, historically, when their pet projects don’t produce adequate profits. It also reflects in general what’s been happening to “Publications” and their But I’ll put it as a BOTTOM Section to this post. You’ll see a big heading to announce it and a different background color (such as this..) and bright blue borders to mark it as the second half of this post. Here is the first link of that section: Crunchbase summary

In other posts (some maybe still in draft) I also looked briefly at CPB and PBS in context of unifying city/county governments [Wyandotte County & Kansas City?) for greater efficiency (?) and discovered how the Board of Overseers of a university (of Missouri, I believe) were running the local radio station, which also took support from CPB.  And so on.

This supplement to an existing post is also timely in that Fox News, coming under pressure for Bill O’Reilly’s workplace sexual harassment of female coworkers — plenty of them over time — has stepped down and/or settled.  The news media in referencing this is mentioning Roger Ailes for similar issues; a name that comes up in these quick summaries below.

Lead-in: As previously explained (on the last post, above), this … large family foundation (well, at least one) whose primary wealth came from ownership of publications/media field — the sale of “Triangle Publications,” by a second-generation business success, Walter H. Annenberg.

This consists of a quick compilation of articles on the two publication empires and, because I’ve already posted links to Annenberg’s (d. 2002) and am currently developing more than one post, for this one, more on Murdoch’s.  Murdoch is an Australian who went to first, the UK, then the US in building his empires, of course incorporating here, while Annenberg was born here, was a U.S. Citizens and so, from what I can see, are his issue, offspring, his family line continuing to control the foundations set up during his lifetime, and from there, again, demanding a front-row seat in steering US government.

And, I’m not kidding about that last statement — see Article IX of the “Annenberg Foundation Trust at Sunnylands” (a jointly-managed by individual trustees, well trust) with Sunnylands representing a 200-acre property in Rancho Mirage California where Walter (who was Ambassador to Great Britain) and Leonore (U.S. Chief of Protocol), hosted Presidents and leaders, and 2001-2005, continued to set in perpetuity an intentional “Camp David West” scenario by writing certain terms into the trust which would, controlled by Annenbergs, continue to control that property.  It’s unbelievable (I mean, the arrogance of this!) (one link for all three pages, annotated images just the first two images): Annb’g Fndtn Tr@ Sunnylands ArticleIX (4pp) ONLY from FY2004 (Permitted Programs — Post!) EIN#256774871_200506_990PF (last 4pp of the 123-pager!)  See esp. bottom of page 1, and inside the red rectangle on p.2.  The trust currently shows about $550B assets. (By giving both the year and EIN# here, I’m giving enough information to view the whole return, including the rest of the “keep our family in control” Articles or By-laws attached to that return, i.e., previous to Article IX….   The focus on Article IX is “Permitted Programs” and the intentional focus of the estate (the Sunnylands property):

So my interest in Murdoch at this time is less personal than that he developed an inherited business, briefly how that went, and where he intersected from one billionaire to another in the sale of a major enterprise which then funded these foundations with whom we ALL must deal in the US, regardless of our personal income level, and with or without any income-producing assets of our own.

This started went I went looking at FundingUniverse for anything on “Triangle Publications” (which it doesn’t, strangely, seem to have profiled) and landed on the page dealing with the Murdoch empire, which at one point, bought Triangle.

[FundingUniverse.com usually only goes up to about Year 2001, but I like its fast-paced summary, outlines, and description of the backgrounds of owners of major corporations.  Part of Walter H. Annenberg’s genius was starting TV Guide, here’s from FundingUniverse.com on Rupert Murdoch who first, copied TV Guide for his own publications, then later bought it (and Triangle).  Both men had inherited from their fathers’ prior involvement in publications, and Murdoch’s father was a “Sir” in addition.  I realize Murdoch has been making news, not just publishing it since, but I am looking at activities 1950-2000 here contributing to the Annenberg wealth, as well as noting the buying, selling, and consolidation (internationally) of news media. For more, see also Thomson Corporation, Reuters, West Publishing Company, WestLaw, etc.

News Corporation Limited History from FundingUniverse (viewed Apr2017)

In 1988, three decades after he had borrowed its format for his own publication on television, Murdoch bought the American magazine TV Guide and the company that published it, Triangle Publications, for $2.83 billion. Fox Broadcasting Company started up during the same year as the first new television network in the United States to challenge the long-established trio of ABC, CBS, and NBC. Its huge initial costs were reduced, fortuitously, when a Hollywood writers’ strike allowed it to run a large number of repeats, and it broadcast at first only on Saturdays and Sundays.

Interjecting a short summary of how Triangle Publication got its start and the fortuitous linking of TV, TV Guide, and Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz’s “I Love Lucy” show driving sales of the guide, and their fortunes too.  Source link is on the image:

[Click for full-sized]

from “Lucy and TV Guide 1953-2013” in PopHistoryDig (under TV, Publishing, Culture)

From the same PopHistoryDig article, more on the impact of TV Guide on Triangle Publication’s success, and vice versa, capitalizing on how the nation loved Lucy:

( In the 1950s, Walter Annenberg’s business empire in Philadelphia also included WFIL-TV, where a new TV dance show in the 1950s called American Bandstand was taking hold, which TV Guide would promote as well.)

In April 1953, when it first launched nationally, the weekly circulation of TV Guide’s was about 1.5 million. But it soon climbed upward that fall, and would sell millions more copies for years to come.

By the 1960s, TV Guide was the most read and circulated magazine in the United States. Each issue’s features were also promoted in a weekly television commercial.

By 1974, TV Guide became the first magazine ever to sell 1 billion copies in a year. Among inside jokes then circulating in Annenberg’s Triangle Publications was: “Each week we lose more copies of TV Guide off the backs of our trucks than most other magazines sell.”

TV Guide, like other magazines, was sold at grocery stores, drug stores, and supermarket check-out counters nationwide. Subscriptions were also available. But over the years, typically two-thirds of TV Guide’s sales came from those newsstands. And Lucy and her travails – both on and off screen – would prove especially appealing to newsstand readers over the years. “Lucy covers” no doubt sold well in those years, so she continued to receive top billing in the magazine. Lucy, her family, and the I Love Lucy TV series all became a rich vein for TV Guide cover stories and articles over the next sixty years, from 1953 through 2013.+++++

[earlier, from the same fundinguniverse.com site on “News Corporation]: “Company History” + early paragraphs. Also see “Key Dates”]:

News Corporation Limited is the holding company for the large range of enterprises created or acquired since the 1950s by the Australian-American businessman Rupert Murdoch. It operates as one of the five largest media conglomerates in the world with assets totaling $43 billion in 2001. The company’s holdings include businesses involved in filmed entertainment, television, satellite and cable network programming, newspapers, magazines, book publishing, music, digital television technology, and online programming. News Corp. also owns 85 percent of the Fox Entertainment Group, 40 percent of the STAPLES Center–the home of the Los Angeles Lakers basketball team and the Los Angeles Kings ice hockey team–and major league baseball team the Los Angeles Dodgers. Nearly 75 percent of the firm’s revenues stem from its U.S. operations, while Canada, Europe, the United Kingdom, Australia, Latin America, and the Pacific Basin region account for the remaining 25 percent.

Beginnings of News Coporation

Rupert Murdoch was born in Melbourne in 1931, the son of Sir Keith Murdoch, managing director of the Herald and Weekly Timesnewspaper group. Sir Keith did not own many shares in the group, but was the major shareholder in News Ltd., which published the Adelaide News and Sunday Mail, and in a Brisbane company whose two newspapers he amalgamated into one, the Courier-Mail.

Sir Keith died in 1952. After graduating that year, his son spent some months as a junior subeditor at the London Daily Express and returned to Australia in 1953 to take over the Adelaide newspapers. His father’s executors sold the Courier-Mail to the Heraldand Weekly Times group. In 1956, News Ltd. acquired the Perth Sunday Times; in 1957, it launched TV Week–inspired by the American TV Guide–which was to be the most profitable of all its Australian publications. In 1958, control of Channel 9, one of two TV channels in Adelaide, was awarded to Southern Television Corporation, in which News Ltd. had 60 percent of the shares. Murdoch’s empire-building had begun.

Key Dates Images and NewsCorp screenshot summarizing it currently, including recent split into two companies.

from “FundingUniverse.com”

Source named at top of image!

From another perspective: Wikipedia on “News Corporation” (not referring to the 2013ff company after the split).  In case we are thinking that consuming news from a variety of outlets without realizing who controls the parent or holding companies, somehow represents diversity of viewpoints in life!

(The wiki also refers to some scandals in 1990s and since; fundinguniverse.com does not.  The absence of links is a current and temperamental symptom of this WordPress blog, not deliberate on my part; I am not going to manually re-insert all the footnotes and links.  For more active links on this quote, see link to original which I just provided..):

The original News Corporation or News Corp. was an American multinational mass media corporation headquartered in New York City. It was the world’s fourth-largest media group in 2014 in terms of revenue.[7][8][9][10][11] Board members include prominent former Spanish prime minister José María Aznar.[12]
News Corporation was a publicly traded company listed on the NASDAQ. Formerly incorporated in Adelaide, South Australia, the company was re-incorporated under Delaware General Corporation Law after a majority of shareholders approved the move on 12 November 2004. News Corporation was headquartered at 1211 Avenue of the Americas, New York, in the newer 1960s–1970s corridor of the Rockefeller Center complex.

On 28 June 2012, Rupert Murdoch announced that, after concerns from shareholders in response to its recent scandals and to “unlock even greater long-term shareholder value”, News Corporation’s assets would be split into two publicly traded companies, one oriented towards media, and the other towards publishing. The split formally took place on 28 June 2013; where the present News Corp. was renamed 21st Century Fox and consists primarily of media outlets, while a new News Corp was formed to take on the publishing and Australian broadcasting assets .

So “News Corp.” =/= “News Corporation” which became 21st Century Fox according to this.

Its major holdings at the time of the split were News Limited (a group of newspaper publishers in Murdoch’s native Australia), News International (a newspaper publisher in the United Kingdom, whose properties include The Times, The Sun, and the now-defunct News of the World—which was the subject of a phone hacking scandal that led to its closure in July 2011), Dow Jones & Company (an American publisher of financial news outlets, including The Wall Street Journal), the book publisher HarperCollins, and the Fox Entertainment Group (owners of the 20th Century Fox film studio and the Fox Broadcasting Company—one of the United States’ major television networks).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rupert_Murdoch  [[this quote DID include the links; who knows why? I don’t!]]:

By 2000, Murdoch’s News Corporation owned over 800 companies in more than 50 countries, with a net worth of over $5 billion.

In July 2011, Murdoch faced allegations that his companies, including the News of the World, owned by News Corporation, had been regularly hacking the phones of celebrities, royalty, and public citizens. Murdoch faces police and government investigations into bribery and corruption by the British government and FBI investigations in the U.S.^[10][11] On 21 July 2012, Murdoch resigned as a director of News International.^[12][13] On 1 July 2015, Murdoch left his post as CEO of 21st Century Fox.^[14] Murdoch and his family own both 21st Century Fox and News Corp through the Murdoch Family Trust. ^{[15][16][17][18]}

In July 2016, after the resignation of Roger Ailes due to accusations of sexual harassment, Murdoch was named the acting CEO of Fox News.^[19]

Et cetera.  There is also a wiki on “Triangle Publications;” it has two kinds of flags though (layout, and needs additional cites for verification).  The “flagging” of Wiki may also be somewhat political, and the wiki still contains helpful information about the origins of the publication, before inherited from the father Moses by the son, Walter H.

Crunchbase summary  It then went public and was shortly after sold to UBM (a UK operation) which then broke it back down into four smaller companies.

CMP is a leading publisher of magazines and newspapers about technology, designed for the builders, the sellers or the users of technology.
The Company was founded in 1971 as CMP Publications, Inc., a New York corporation. On May 24, 1996, a new corporation, CMP Media Inc., was incorporated in Delaware. On May 31, 1996, CMP Publications, Inc. was merged with and into CMP Media Inc. so that, effective as of such merger, CMP Media Inc. possessed all the rights and became subject to all the liabilities of CMP Publications, Inc.
Many of CMP’s publications were the leaders in their respective market niches and five of CMP’s publications were among the ten fastest-growing technology publications in the United States. Of the three largest U.S. technology publishers, CMP is the only one which serves the broad spectrum of builders, sellers and users of technology and which is therefore able to offer technology advertisers access to customers in all three groups. In 1990 United Business Media, a UK-headquartered media firm bought CMP and did away with the CMP brand name, and separated the company into 4 smaller companies.

Article in CNET…/uk/… on CMP Media’s 1997 “going public” and how shares value settled to about $24 a share overseen by two firms Bears Sterns and Furman Selz listed at the bottom of the article. Among the first actions was curtailing and combining some publications.

CMP Media (CMPX) taking advantage of a resurgent market for technology IPOs, today thrust itself into the public realm, raising $110 million in capital.

CMP, publisher of such magazines as Computer Reseller News, Windows, and HomePC, floated out 5 million shares at $22 a share. The target price comes in nearly 16 percent higher than CMP’s initial pricing range of 17 to 19 a share set earlier this month. Shares of CMP rose 18 percent on the first trade to 26, but tapered back in morning trading to close at 24-7/8, down 1-1/8.

With the IPO target price of 22 a share, CMP launched with a market value of nearly $500 million.

Of the 5 million shares of class A common stock offered, 3.75 million are being offered by the company, which will generate $82.5 million in capital for CMP. Another 1.25 million shares are being offered by stockholders. …. CMP said in a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission it would monitor new developments and trends in technology markets to identify emerging audiences for technology-related information, as well as expand its international business by launching local versions of its strongest publications, either independently or in joint ventures with local publishers.

This article is unfortunately undated, but it’s “looking forward” to the year 2000, and I believe from (as I recall) prior — though not recent — reading, would be in 1999. My interest in CMP Media’s sale was only that it provided resources for some foundations and nonprofits I was looking into at the time (Including, I THINK, Alliance for Excellent Education and related 501©4s in the “fix-the-schools” networks; as in one of which had invested in Bernie Madoff funds early in the 2000s….)(!!)

UK Firm buys CMP Media After heavy restructuring efforts and across-the-board job cuts, CMP Media today said it will be bought by U.K.-based United News & Media in a cash deal worth $920 million. 

Under the agreement, United News & Media said it plans to buy the New York-based technology media company for $39 per share, a net total consideration of $920 million after deducting cash on hand of $27 million. United said that members of the Leeds family and related trusts, which hold more than 68 percent of CMP stock, have agreed to tender their shares.

CMP’s Internet assets, such as CMPNet, and its tech publications, such as Information Week, combined with the trade show and publishing businesses of United’s subsidiary Miller Freeman, will give Miller Freeman leverage in the media market and in the “global high-tech sector,” United said in a statement. In addition, United said the acquisition also boosts Miller Freeman’s position as an online provider of products and services for the tech sector.

The yellow highlighting just reminds us that among the many worthy things family and other trusts can and do, engage in, is holding company stock in the family business, and if enough of it, maintaining control also, whether it’s public or privately held.  Next excerpt references three other big companies that were looking at buying CMP Media at the time, which again, seems to be 1999.

I also want to emphasize WHO the global tech and high-tech media companies were most interested in at the time — those who had the bucks, i.e., the high-tech industry.  What was more “publications” is morphing into servicing technology companies (and advertisers):

“The two businesses have developed good positions on the Web, and CMPNet in particular is the leading business-to-business site for the high-tech industry, and we can fold a number of our very strong Web positions from Miller Freeman into it,” United chief executive Clive Hollick told Bloomberg News in an interview. “I think that we’re going to create a very attractive Web company, which we have plans to list separately later on this year.”

Hollick said the company probably would do a tracker stock, noting what CMP competitor Ziff-Davis has done with ZDNet, and said the firm is planning the move for the end of this year.

In early March, CMP got attention from a number of possible suitors, such as Netherlands-based publisher VNU and U.S.-based tech publishers Ziff-Davis and IDG. As previously reported, this came after CMP, which suffered from slumping advertising revenue due to the unstable Asian economy and product delays, announced it would cut its workforce by 4.6 percent.

As a publisher, they were counting on, and needed, that advertising revenue; subscriptions alone weren’t going to make it in these times.  What does that say about who the existing publications and media companies are really likely serving?

Next image is from IDG which I quickly looked up:

IDG about page, linked from older CNET article on the sale of CMP Media to UBM (UK firm). IDG pageview however is current.

“IDG” stands for “International Data Group” and here’s that first paragraph:

IDG is the world’s leading technology media, data and marketing servicescompany. We influence the most powerful tech buyers in the world — from business technologists to enthusiasts and everyone in between.

Notice what three kinds of technology company it claims to be, and that “news” or “publishing” is no longer the terminology.

A look at IDG’s privacy policy (bottom of web page fine print links are often great sources of summary, or specific, information on any company (I was looking for legal domicile, but this begins by listing IDG’s products)  This privacy policy “last updated Jan. 2009” and I notice their customer service at least is in Framingham, Massachusetts:

International Data Group (IDG) is the world’s leading technology media, event, and research company. The IDG media family consists of hundreds of award-winning publications and websites including Computerworld,CIO, CSO, GamePro, Network World, Macworld and PC World, idgconnect.com,computerworld.com, cio.com, csoonline.com, infoworld.com, networkworld.com, macworld.com, maccentral.com, pcworld.com, and gamepro.com. A complete listing is available here.  IDG is also a leading producer of more than 750 computer-related events worldwide including LinuxWorld Conference & Expo, Macworld Conference & Expo, DEMO, and IDC Directions. IDC provides global market research and advice through offices in 50 countries.

THAT was 1999, and here’s CMP Media buying parts of MediaLive International only a few (seven) years later, in 2006, per PRNewswire (which itself was also bought-and-sold, but see “fundinguniverse.com” for that story).

CMP Media Acquires MediaLive International's Technology Media Group
Combination Creates Unprecedented Marketing Solution for Technology Companies
Jan 11, 2006, 00:00 ET from  CMP Media LLC

MANHASSET, N.Y. and SAN FRANCISCO, Jan. 11 [2006] /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- CMP
 Media today announced that it has acquired MediaLive International's
 Technology Media Group, including a premier portfolio of events, conferences and publications.  This acquisition, the sixth in the past five months, further expands CMP Media's brand portfolio and its ability to provide access,insight and actionable programs that more closely connect technology sellers to buyers.
     MediaLive's brand portfolio includes 20 annual global events spanning emerging, accelerating and established technology markets. These include bellwether events such as Interop, VoiceCon, Next Generation Networks, as well as fast-growing, emerging events such as the Collaborative Technologies Conference, Mobile Business Expo and Web 2.0 (in partnership with O'Reilly Media.) These brands strengthen CMP's event portfolio, which includes the Embedded Systems and Game Developer Conferences and the recently acquired RFID
 World and TelcoTV.  Along with established print and online brands like InformationWeek, Network Computing, TechWeb and Light Reading, this broad events portfolio allows CMP to offer its customers an integrated set of products that reach IT buyers at all stages of the purchasing process.
     "The combination of the MediaLive assets with CMP's industry-leading publications, significant online investments and vertical market events will offer technology vendors the most comprehensive marketing solutions available in the industry," said Steve Weitzner, President and CEO of CMP Media.  "With the rapid build-up of additional live and online offerings, we are best positioned to deliver content to our audiences when, where and how they want it -- increasing our value to customers."
     According to IDC, event spending allocation within the enterprise technology marketing mix increased by 42% in 2005, to 19.3% of the overall marketing budget (CMO Advisory Research, Tech Marketing Trends, September 2005).  In that same year, MediaLive launched 12 new products around the world and increased event attendance by 50 percent over 2004.
     "Our integration with CMP Media offers technology companies an extremely powerful partner to help them more closely align their marketing initiatives and sales goals," said Robert Priest-Heck, CEO of MediaLive International.

I showed you January 2006 at CMP; here’s March, 2006 and former COO become new CEO, Steve Weitzner, a brief piece in “Folio Magazine” shows you what directions print publications were going at the time — and fast!:

Steve Weitzner: President & CEO, CMP Media
By FOLIO: Magazine Staff :: March 29, 2006

Weitzner streamlined and consolidated CMP’s print publications, while expanding and diversifying the company’s online and live event offerings.

Since Steve Weitzner took over as CMP Media’s president and CEO in September 2005, he has guided a quiet transformation of the once troubled tech publisher, which experienced a major revenue decline in the first half of this decade. Under Weitzner’s watch, the U.S. publishing unit of U.K. parent United Business Media has made a series of Web and event acquisitions, and at the same time shut down poor-performing magazines and put its entertainment group on the block.

Over the past few months, the company has shuttered four technology-related print publications, …

Before he became CEO, Weitzner, who replaced Gary Marshall last fall, held several editorial and publishing positions, including chief operating officer, at CMP. Before joining CMP, Weitzner worked as an editor at Hearst Business Communications and McGraw-Hill.  Since last spring, CMP has acquired six Web or event-centric media companies, including Light Reading and MediaLive International’s Technology Media Group, for which CMP paid $65 million in January to acquire its assets….In the past several months, CMP Media has shut-down four magazines, revamped two of its print titles and launched two new print titles. It also has acquired six companies to grow and diversify the company’s Internet, event and conference offerings

I’d like to keep this a little streamelined with the focus on what happened to just one entity, CMP Media, but, curious about “FOLOIO Magazine” I’d just quoted, and noticing an absence (as happens in many on-lines) of any obvious “About Us” link, I took a screenprint of its home page showing the focus, and then looked for the fine print at the very bottom, which reads “© 2017 Access Intelligence LLC” — which gets interesting, both the history and the sectors it serves (with a major emphasis on Energy and Chemical)….

http://www.accessintel.com/aboutus/history.html

Currently [viewed April 2017], Access Intelligence serves the Energy, Chemical, Defense, Cable, Aviation, Satellite, Healthcare and Media markets through print, e-media and events such as tradeshows conferences, seminars and webinars. Many of Access Intelligence’s products are number one in their marketplaces.

Check out their highly active acquisition and “divestiture” history shown there.  I’ll upload the link — it may change, at their rate of buying and selling. (For posterity: Access Intelligence : History and Awards (Viewed Apr 20, 2017) context — following CMP Media~Access publishes FOLIO Mag who had an articleAccess Intelligence : History and Awards (Viewed Apr 20, 2017) context — following CMP Media~Access publishes FOLIO Mag who had an article ) or for now, better viewed directly from the “aboutus/history.html” link above.

This link says that what’s now “Access Intelligence LLC” started as the business division of Philips Publishing International, Inc.” which I then looked up.  Phillips Publishing, Inc. started in 1974, added the “international” in 1991 and by 1999 had deleted the “Publishing,” as announced in this 1999 PRNewswire:

http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/phillips-publishing-international-inc-announces-name-change-to-phillips-international-inc-73566007.html

...Chairman Tom Phillips said: "In addition to being one of the leading publishers in America, we have jumped into the electronic information world in a big way with a fast-growing Internet business and market-focused web sites." Phillips added that the new corporate name "preserves a link to our past while conveying that we have grown into a diversified corporation with a broad offering of products and services."
     Founded as "Phillips Publishing, Inc.," the company added "International" to its title in 1991 to reflect its growing number of offices, employees, customers and advertisers across the globe.  Phillips International, Inc. is the parent company of several major subsidiaries including:  Phillips Publishing, Inc., which serves the consumer marketplace; Doctors Preferred, Inc., which offers vitamins and nutritional supplements; and Phillips Business
 Information, Inc., which provides products and services to business-to- business customers.

Subsidiaries, obviously, can buy and sell companies or parts of them (others or themselves) too, which the third subsidiary above (“PBI” In Access Intelligence history timeline) obviously did.   Phillips International, Inc. also has I see (from OpenSecrets.org) a PAC (Political Action Committee).  In the Year 2000 cycle, it shows contributors TO the PAC (individuals and amounts) and federal candidates (plus total amounts, House & Senate) FROM it, showing it to be, for what it’s worth, 100% Republican, 0% Democrat:  Total amount $90K, from what I can tell, not that high…(incidental to a company name search result only).

From their History / Timeline, this section goes mid-1990s (expansion) to first decade of 2000s (“Merger and Acquisition” and then  (skipping ahead several more acquisitions) the 2010 paragraph “DIvestiture.”  …. It’s a buying and selling business, baby, and a fast-moving one, obviously!  Employees should remain loyal, talented, and comfort themselves  meanwhile with every kind of false hope that talent and loyalty are what it’s really about…. and their families, mortgages if it applies, and children, will be taken care of…

1996: PBI acquires Knowledge Industries Publications, Inc. (KIPI). This new, very strong presence in the new media area brings significant revenue and strength in the trade shows and conference business.

1998: Hart Publications, Inc. (also a Phillips International subsidiary) is integrated into PBI, creating a stronger unified business-to-business publishing unit. Hart is a leading publisher of magazines, newsletters, directories and products also include conferences, in the energy business.

MERGERS AND ACQUISITIONS

2000: Phillips Business Information, Inc. is acquired by VS&A Communications Partners III, LP, the private equity affiliate of New York-based media merchant bank Veronis Suhler Stevenson. In addition, Hart Publications, is acquired by Chemical Week Associates, a VS&A Communications Partners II, LP portfolio company. Over this span of years, PBI has grown to 14 offices in the U.S. and U.K., headquartered in MD.

Veronis Suhler Stevenson and media merchant banks….Should we really, at this point, be surprised that VSS.com is also into education technology (VKidz)?   From this point, out, PBI is owned by the Private Equity Affiliate of this NY, basically, BANK, and will be acting accordingly, with a view towards profits for the investors.  Take a look:

VSS is a leading private equity investment firm that invests in the information, business services, healthcare and education industries.

VSS provides capital for buyouts, recapitalizations, growth financings and strategic acquisitions to middle market companies and management teams with the goal of building companies organically and through a focused add-on acquisition program.

VSS makes privately-negotiated investments across the capital structure and has the ability to invest in situations requiring control or non-control equity, mezzanine securities and structured equity securities.

Since 1987, VSS has managed seven private investment funds with  aggregate initial capital commitments totaling over $3 billion, including four equity funds and three structured capital funds.  To date, VSS funds have invested in 77 platform companies, which have together completed over 330 add-on acquisitions.

The team of investment professionals at VSS possesses significant experience in developing transaction opportunities, evaluating and structuring prospective transactions, conducting due diligence, consummating fund investments, and formulating and executing value-enhancing initiatives for portfolio companies in the Fund’s target industries.

And here’s their recent (Feb. 2017) news about their investment in VKidz, which turns out to be aimed at the parent/homeschool market, in Florida, and as founded by none other than John Edelson, who I am going to place an educated guess, refers to the brother of Joshua Edelman (Stand for Children), both sons of the well-known Peter (Georgetown) and Marian Wright Edelson (Children’s Defense Fund), well known civil rights giants…

[That guess turns out to be wrong, but you can see why I might, not having memorized all the son’s names:  Joshua, Jonah and Ezra, might have made it, in the context of a charge for education reform by their mother and one of the sons who is involved with “Stand for Children” which at one point got in trouble for boasting about how it could take down a state teachers’ union (Illinois?).

(See SubstanceNews 2009 article on Joshua Edelman being replaced as head of “New Schools,” in the context of Turnaround schools, etc.)  who, I see, was brought by Arne Duncan to Chicago, and caused a stir there by closing so many CPS (Chicago Public Schools) and covering up scandals at the charter “Aspira” and more — according to this article anyhow.  It has been some years since I’d reviewed the situation):

This publication’s logo also advertises its POV on the matter.  Their home page, I notice, also acknowledges they can no longer afford their print publication, but people are welcome to subscribe online or donate to “Substance News”

Josh Edelman ousted, Jaime Guzman In as chief at ‘New Schools’, Nothing really changes… Renaissance 2010 continues as ‘Turnaround’, continued charter school expansion, other scams
George N. Schmidt – September 19, 2009

Chicago Public Schools Chief Executive Officer Ron Huberman has quietly ousted one of the most powerful and controversial executives left over from the administration of Arne Duncan with no public statement and little explanation.

Duncan brought Edelman to Chicago from Washington, D.C. and provided him with powerful backing during the annual tumult over school closings and privatizations.

Edelman and school closings

During his nearly three years in office, Edelman, who came to Chicago from Washington, D.C. after being hired by Arne Duncan (now serving as U.S. Secretary of Education) was responsible for the closing of more public schools in Chicago than any executive in the 150-year history of public education in Chicago. Most recently, it was Edelman’s office that ordered the 2009 “Hit List” of 22 schools to be closed, phased out, consolidated, or subjected to “turnaround” to be compiled in December and January 2009. The list of 22 produced massive protests across the city, with public opposition to almost all of the proposals and a massive turnout of protesters at the February 25, 2009 Board of Education meeting  …..

Many of the schools that Edelman managed are part of the controversial Renaissance 2010 initiative, which began in 2004 with the goal of creating 100 new schools by next year. The majority of the 92 schools opened under the program are charters.

There are currently 72 charter schools in the city, some with multiple campuses run by 29 operators. This summer, the charter movement received another big boost, when the limit on charter school operators in Chicago was raised to 45 from 30 by state lawmakers.

Edelman, an outsider to Chicago, was hired by former district chief Arne Duncan, now the U.S. Secretary of Education. He arrived from Washington, D.C., where he served for four years as the principal of The SEED School, the nation’s oldest and most successful urban boarding school. He’s the son of Marian Wright Edelman, founder of the Children’s Defense Fund. Like Duncan, the younger Edelman went to Harvard University. Reported by –Azam Ahmed 

Final edited version of this article posted at http://www.substancenews.net September 23, 2009, 2:00 a.m. CDT. If you choose to reproduce this article in whole or in part, or any of the graphical material included with it, please give full credit to SubstanceNews as follows: Copyright © 2009 Substance, Inc., http://www.substancenews.net.

VSS Completes Investment in Education Technology Company VKidz  Posted: February 15, 2017

New York – February 15, 2017 – Veronis Suhler Stevenson (“VSS”), a leading private equity investment firm focused on the information, business services, healthcare and education industries, announced today that it completed a significant investment in VKidz Holdings, an award winning provider of subscription-based, online curriculum for the homeschool, elementary school, and parent markets.

Founded in 2003 and based in Ft. Lauderdale, FL, the company is comprised of two divisions with four core programs, its homeschool division (Time4Learning and Time4Writing) and its elementary school division (VocabularySpellingCity and Science4Us). The homeschool division provides a subscription service to families for home education, primarily homeschool, and for afterschool and summer study. The elementary school division provides an online supplemental product to school districts, teachers, schools, and parents. Both divisions support users globally.

As I have been saying in my other posts, whether pro-homeschool (often, not always, homeschool for many means “charter school” although the words are NOT identical legally or in general) or whether pro-invest more in existing school districts, it’s going to involve proprietary (i.e., licensed) digital technology in the hands of private, stand-to-profit nicely from the HUGE market niche — individuals.

The programs have received an array of industry awards. In 2016, Science4Us, a K-2^nd curriculum, was the winner of a BESSIE and CODiE award for best science program.  Time4Learning has received the Homeschool award for “Top 100 Educational Websites” for 9 years in a row. VocabularySpellingCity was most recently a finalist for “Best Game-Based Curriculum Solution” in the 2016 CODiE awards.

“I am pleased with the partnership between VKidz and VSS,” said John Edelson, Founder and CEO of VKidz. “VSS’ investment will enable us to provide better products and services to both our homeschool and school customers. It will ensure our ongoing growth.”

“We look forward to working with John and his talented team as they continue to build next-generation software for the growing education technology market,” said David Bainbridge, Managing Director at VSS.  “Over the last decade, VKidz has developed, licensed and marketed a very successful portfolio of engaging and educationally-effective products

Sunbiz.org has been restructured, but still works; VKidz, Inc. and VKidz Holdings are both on there.  The 2003 filing for VKidz, Inc. shows ONLY two men’s names on it:  John G. Edelson and Jason E. Perelman, P.A.  it was (see link) for-profit with 1000 shares at $0.001 issued initially and is still active.

John Edelson’s background shows Harvard Business School, Peace Corps, and prior business involvements to this one included the ability to raise capital.  He is also on an FAU school board, which I’m sure doesn’t hurt the marketing.

A NEW NAME

2004: PBI Media merges with Chemical Week Associates and acquired the Chemical division (SRIC) from SRI International in Menlo Park, CA and company name is changed to Access Intelligence LLC, with annual revenues of approximately $60 million.

CONTINUED GROWTH

January 2006: Access Intelligence acquires Harriman Chemsult, Ltd, a chemical pricing information services in London.

April 2006: Access Intelligence acquires The Energy Daily, Defense Today and Space & Missile Defense Report from King Publishing.

November 2006: Access Intelligence acquires LDC Forums, a series of high-level conferences bringing together buyers and sellers in the natural gas marketplace.

2007: Access Intelligence acquires Daratech Plant, a chemical industry IT event in May and in June acquires, Trade Fair Group, a Houston based business with events and a magazine covering the energy market.

2009: Access intelligence acquires two tradeshows, Offshore Communications and Energy Ocean in February and in July acquires, the assets of Contexo Media, providing an entre into the healthcare market with a medical coding books business and Dorland, a publishing business serving the medical case management market.

Folio image from its main website (not showing the large name “FOLIO” at the top) states its offering, vision, or at least purpose — helping others SELL:

FolioMagazine.com

August 2006, here’s CMP Media selling The Seybold Report to RISI (which has international offices also, click to see, and is servicing the global forest products industry, i.e., paper, wood pulp, woven products, etc.)

http://www.risiinfo.com/press-release/risi-acquires-seybold-from-cmp-media/

BEDFORD, Mass., Aug. 2, 2006 – RISI, a leading business-to-business information provider, today announced the acquisition of the printing and publishing industry publication The Seybold Report from CMP Media LLC.

Launched in 1971, [CMP Publishing was also launched in 1971, right?] The Seybold Report is the pioneering publication devoted to cross-media tools, technologies and trends shaping print and Internet publishing. Published twice a month, it includes industry commentary, product critiques, technology reviews, and case studies. RISI’s acquisition also includes The Seybold Bulletin, a weekly email summary of printing and publishing industry news.

“The proliferation of new production technologies continues to make the printing and publishing industry a quickly evolving and highly competitive marketplace,” Rod Young, RISI’s CEO, commented. “Many companies struggle to stay abreast of the issues that are affecting this growth. RISI’s news and analysis have long been a key source for our clients in printing and publishing to make the best decisions about their businesses, and the Seybold publications supply content that complements this information very well.” …

THAT was 2006, and HERE IS 2008 in the UBM-owned “CMP Media” — breaking it up into 4 companies.  First, if CMP Media just went on a $225M buying spree, it seems that meanwhile UBM’s revenues were, hardly surprising, down to below that amount.

Also, UBM also spurned potential purchase of a big one (RBI — Reed Business Information) referencing it as an “orphaned print asset” instead of the nicely integrated (as to support) but modularized four companies that resulted from this UBM breakup of the CMP Brand (which, let’s remember, it only bought in 1999!)

CMP has done over 18 acquisitions worth about $225 million in the last three years, particularly events and business information products. With these four companies, the new businesses will share support functions and infrastructure, including finance, IT services, legal and global account and sales management. The central functions will become part of UBM’s US infrastructure with Scott Mozarsky, currently CMP’s CFO, taking the role of COO. More here in the release.

Meanwhile, UBM also announced its 2007 earnings, and net income fell to 108.8 million pounds ($216 million) from 141.9 million pounds a year earlier. Sales rose 8.5 percent to 801.6 million pounds. Also, UBM CEO David Levin has also ruled out bidding for Reed Business Information, telling Reuters: “We have a strategy built around integrated media so to pick up a block of orphaned print assets is not consistent with what we want to do.”

Here’s the link from “Gigaom.com” and image showing the first of the four companies, with its $148M revenues:

CMP No More:  UBM breaks the Tech Media firm into Four Companies; UBM not interested in RBI either. by Rafat Ali, Feb 29, 2008 – 6:39 AM CDT