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I was dismayed to see that Rupert Murdoch had succeeded in his quest to buy Dow-Jones & Co (D-J).  I think that the Wall Street Journal’s vulnerability to this underwhelming bid represents a failure of vision on the part of its former custodians.

The WSJ had been able to maintain its edge as the world’s most respected business paper, even as the world of business swirled, changed, crashed, and re-invented itself in the past 10 years.  That’s a redoubtable advantage but one which was basically mishandled.

For example, why did Dow-Jones elect to sign an “ironclad,” exclusive agreement to provide news content to CNBC, through the year 2012?  Why didn’t Dow-Jones management think about leveraging a reputation for quality coverage and top-notch reporters to create its own “WSJ Channel?”  They could have given Bloomberg, CNBC, et al., a run for their money on the content side, and opened up a major channel for their print and online advertisers to escalate their investments with D-J.

Why didn’t the Dow-Jones management decide sooner – and with more decisiveness – to “free up” greater portions of the WSJ Online?  As reported in today’s NYTimes, “executives at News Corp. are keen to explore whether more of (the WSJ’s online) content ought to be offered free online to increase the audience and attract advertising…”  You can’t tell me that the D-J team never considered such an option, especially if they ever noticed the rise of social news aggregator sites like Digg.  Couldn’t they have experimented with such concepts?

In that same NYTimes article, reporter Richard Siklos says “Murdoch has shown in the past that he is willing to experiment, even knock over some sacred cows.”  That’s exactly the kind of thinking that should have inspired the Dow-Jones organization’s prior management team. 

It’s too bad that the opportunity to be creative and daring with the august WSJ brand will now be exploited (err, umm, “leveraged”) by an organization that has proven willing and able to play fast and loose with the news.

If I were running the NYTimes, I’d get imaginitive, starting today, about how to best invest in its own Business section.  Now is the time to gird for war; now is the time to show the world that it need not lack for in-depth, unbiased Business coverage.  Are you listening, Gray Lady?