Jim Ottoway has 6% of Dow Jones voting shares. He sheds some light on why the bid was rejected.

"It's the principle, not the price .... It's the person, not the price," says Ottoway, referring to Rupert Murdoch, who owns News Corp, and who made the bid for Dow Jones. Ottoway looks at Murdoch's other newspapers, such as New York Post, and sees a bias. He knows Murdoch's $5 billion offer is a lot of money, but he's more concerned about the integrity.

"We're not trying to get another $2 a share. We don't want to sell to Murdoch for $75 a share," said Ottoway. Maybe he's exaggerating for effect. Or maybe not. Murdoch's bid comes down to $60/share.

Other shareholders don't agree with Ottoway's stance. Two of them have filed lawsuits against Dow Jones for rejecting Murdoch's bid. But as far as Ottoway is concerned, the company doesn't need to be bought out - definitely not by Murdoch.

"The company is basically sound and can survive very well without Mr. Murdoch swallowing it," he said.

News Corp did not respond specifically to Ottoway's remarks, but they have responded to the general criticism of integrity and bias, by calling them "tired clichés."

More than 200 e-mail messages awaited Jim Ottaway last weekend. Instead, he spent some time reading the Odyssey -- in ancient Greek.

Ottaway, who controls more than 6 percent of Dow Jones & Co. Inc.'s voting shares, has been in high demand after he publicly rejected Rupert Murdoch's $5 billion bid for the company in the pages of its flagship, The Wall Street Journal.

(Continue reading this story on Reuters)

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