Fairfax Mergers - The Smage ?

Do they employ a psychic at The Guardian newspaper or perhaps they have called upon Britain's top astrologer Victor Olliver to cast the runes ?

Their timing is perfect to enter the Australian market and seize the left-of-centre ground abandoned by the once great Fairfax empire.

Now a war of words has broken out between newsmen as former Fairfax editor Andrew Jaspan today told the mUmBRELLA website that The Age & Sydney Morning Herald will combine and  "switch their editorial positioning away from the high ground occupied in the past by Fairfax’s metro mastheads and towards what is referred internally as ‘Middle Australia’. That means more mid-market fare: sport, showbiz, gossip, and fast news. He describes this as"like 2 bald men fighting over a comb".

Andrew Jaspan                 Garry Linnell

Current editor Garry Linnell has hit back and described Japser's claims as "complete fiction" and accused him of having taken The Age downmarket during his tenure.

 The Guardian's Australian editorial team are already in Australia and preparing the new local Guardian website.Many of Fairfax's best writers who last year took redundancy have been offered work on the new web newspaper.
Fairfax would do well to actually take Japser's comments as good advice. Well that's what we reckon.