“Laurene Powell Jobs, widow of Apple Inc. co-founder Steve Jobs, is the lead investor who funded the buyout of News Corp’s money losing digital education business Amplify earlier this year,” Liana B. Baker reports for Reuters. “A representative for Powell Jobs’ organization, the Emerson Collective, confirmed the investment in Amplify but would not specify how much of the company Powell Jobs would own or the amount paid for it.”
“Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp said Sept. 30 that it had sold Amplify to a management team backed by a group of private investors for an undisclosed sum,” Baker reports. “Murdoch, News Corp’s chairman, has been an outspoken critic of weaknesses at U.S. public schools. News Corp poured hundreds of millions of dollars building the educational technology unit. As part of News Corp, Amplify introduced a digital curriculum program for middle school students in 2014.”
“Powell Jobs is the president and founder of the Emerson Collective, which focuses on making investments in education, immigration reform and social issues,” Baker reports. “She was tied for 23rd on Forbes’ list of the richest Americans with a net worth of $19.1 billion last year. The Emerson Collective said in a statement that it shares a belief with Amplify that technology and innovation can transform classrooms and looks forward to the company growing and expanding its services.”
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Note: The Emerson Collective focuses on “improving education, championing common sense immigration reform, and fostering innovative solutions to social issues,” according to the group’s website. More info here.
SEE ALSO:
Steve Jobs & Rush Limbaugh agree: U.S. public schools are ‘unionized in the worst possible way’ – February 20, 2007
Apple CEO blasts teacher unions, says US schools are ‘unionized in the worst possible way’ – February 16, 2007
So Steve Jobs’ widow gets to spend his billions on nation-breaking amnesty and other leftist causes. She already renamed the Steve P. Jobs Trust into the Laurene Powell Jobs Trust. Amplify (created by News Corp no less) sounds like a great way to propagandize the next generation of kids. I’ll be home schooling mine.
The father of propaganda is none other than “Rupert Murdoch himself. At least in this day and age.
Maybe now the kids will get some truth in their news.
What is truth? Hard to tell these days.
If truth is what you believe and your agenda then, no thanks.
Anybody got suggestions where to find truth and what or who to believe?
The only way to find truth is to expose yourself to as much information from as many different sources as possible and determine it yourself. You will never find truth if you get all your information from one source or many sources all beholden to the same point of view.
I’m with you. I dig around the net to read a variety of sources and avoid the usual suspects who squirt propaganda. IOW: No Huffington Post, No FoxNews…
You actually should not avoid any source, as it is important to know what information other people are getting and include these perspectives as well.
It’s up to individual choice, as ever. But I don’t have the time, patience or stress tolerance to bother with deliberate propaganda. I used to listen to Rush Limbaugh if only to know what was written on The Talking Points sheet from the neo-c0nservatives each week. But it gets old and predictable fast.
There are FAR better sources of actual, real, intelligent, thoughtful points of view, sources of news, perspectives, etc. Weeding out the rats from the rest of the menagerie is, IMHO, a critical skill these days. Spend your time among the sane.
“There are FAR better sources …” You were quick to tell us who you don’t like, who are your “FAR better sources”?
My daily list of not-so propaganda oriented news sources:
– The Guardian
– The NY Times
– Ars Technica (esp Dan Goodin)
– The Register
– ExtremeTech
– MDN of course
– TechDirt
– EFF
– 9to5 Mac
– MacNN
– Krebs On Security
– iMore
– MacIssues
– SANS newsletters
– BBC
– Scientific American
– NPR
– PBS (including NHK TV [Japan], France 24, Deutsche Welle…)
– Local TV & web
I like to intersperse lots of other country’s news sources as well, esp. India, Denmark, Australia, Italy, Singapore…
And yes, there is plenty of the usual propaganda infested into any or all of the above. It’s just that none of the above have an actual manifesto of existing for the sole purpose of propaganda, unlike a nauseating menagerie of other news sources. Note the lack of news courses from the Middle East, Israel, China, Korea…. I like to switch around my news sources over time to be sure I’m not missing out on something sane for the sake of some obsolete meme stuck in my head.
For truth, I’d suggest part of the answer is:
– Don’t “believe”.
– Look at data, not opinion.
– That hangs together, logically.
– Where the system allows new evidence to change it.
– That makes predictions that can be tested.
Emotions are irrelevant.
Tradition is irrelevant.
Anything that says, “This is the truth because it says it’s the truth” is just silly.
“Truth is a pathless land.”
-Krishnamurti
Indeed! How dare she, Nick. Doesn’t she know that only those whose ideas you agree with are allowed to spend money to spread their beliefs? E.g. the Kochs and their buddies. She’ll probably be promoting a curriculum that includes SCIENCE.
Hopefully REAL science, as opposed to the crufty bad science designed to win dubious grant applications, get press headlines or ‘safely’ entertain the kiddies on TV.
People can do whatever they want with their money. It is not as if Rupert Murdoch doesn’t have his own, well known political agendas that he loves to propagandize through his media empire.
It is very interesting how your type strongly favors the accumulation of wealth, but gets so aggravated when it is spent in areas that somehow conflict with your belief system. You don’t even KNOW what she is doing…you just assume that she is going to force “propaganda” on kids in the public education system. Only YOUR flavor of science-hating propaganda is acceptable. You are so messed up and paranoid that I consider you to be mentally deranged and a menace to society.
Murdoch, News Corp’s chairman, has been an outspoken critic of weaknesses at U.S. public schools.
… And yet: FoxNews.
What an ass.
… And yet: It’s viewed by more people that all the other cable news networks combined.
Considering my disgust with all things Murdoch, that apparently makes me exceptional and the rabble, mere sheeple.
But there are alway other personal, inner world, realities to consider. I agree with quite a few values and points of view labeled as ‘Conservative’. I’m typing this inside one of my favorite coffee shops, which happens to be Christian oriented. I’m thoughtful like that. But I’m not into being 1337. (Aka elitist). I just like to think, unlike apparently the masses.
Lets hope Powells money trumps Trumps money in all areas.