Information wants to be free, a writer once opined in a book largely about Nicholas Negroponte, MIT professor and former chairman of the school’s famous Media Lab. And it does, even when that information is potentially unflattering to Nicholas Negroponte.
Mr. Negroponte, currently on leave from MIT, was just named to the special editorial “buffer” board of The Wall Street Journal, designed to protect the newspaper’s coverage from meddling by its controversial new owner, Rupert Murdoch.
One problem: according to an article today by Reuters, Mr. Negroponte runs a foundation that has gratefully received a $2.5-million gift from Mr. Murdoch.
That sounds like a conflict of interest, Louis Ureneck, chairman of the journalism department at Boston University, told Reuters. “Is a person truly independent if a decision he makes puts at risk a significant grant to his foundation? It strikes me that there is a conflict,” said Mr. Ureneck.
The gift went to Mr. Negroponte’s One Laptop Per Child foundation, which makes low-cost computers for poor children. Mr. Murdoch, Mr. Negroponte told Reuters in an earlier interview, is one of the foundation’s chief strategists. Mr. Negroponte is widely respected and has a reputation as an independent thinker. Still, this degree of closeness is why Mr. Negroponte’s presence on this buffer board is raising eyebrows at media trade journals such as Editor & Publisher.
But a spokesperson for Dow Jones, the company that owns the Journal (and is owned in turn by Mr. Murdoch), said the firm is confident that all board members, including Mr. Negroponte, will be able to make independent decisions. —Josh Fischman
