MUMBAI: Giving the Murdoch empire its very own e-publishing platform, News Corp has decided to buy out the Skiff Reader tablet from Hearst for an undisclosed sum.

The company also announced that it had invested in online journalism LLC, a start-up that specialises in revenue-collection services for online newspapers and magazines.
 
The twin deals, the terms of which were undisclosed, underscore News Corp.‘s efforts to wrest consumer payments for its news properties on the web and also to put its media content across several tablet computers, mobile phones and other gadgets.

Skiff and the investment in the online-payments firm, Journalism Online, also could become a backbone of News Corp.‘s emerging project to encourage collaborations between news organisations on strategies and sales of digital subscriptions and advertising.  
 
News Corp. envisions a business similar to cable-TV subscription for news, where consumers could set up one bill to access digital content from multiple media companies.