News Ltd cleared of cartoon crimes. The Australian Press Council has cleared The Australian of breaching its principles when the newspaper ran a front-page cartoon depicting the Prime Minister and Treasurer as communists after last year’s budget. The Daily Telegraph has also been let off for photoshopping former House of Reps speaker Peter Slipper as a rat on its front page. But the Press Council has warned that newspapers do not have free rein to humiliate and ridicule politicians — even in photos and cartoons.

In the case of The Oz — which ran a Soviet-art-style Bill Leak cartoon last May under the headline “Smash the rich, save the base” — the APC found it would have caused “deep offence” among those who considered it “grossly inaccurate and unfair”.

“The Council does not look favourably on unjustified and offensive imputations of violence, even in the genre of hyperbolic cartoons about public figures,” the APC said in its ruling. “However, it also believes robust freedom of expression on political issues is of fundamental importance in the public interest.” As for the The Tele — which depicted Peter Slipper with whiskers and a rat’s tale under the headline “King rat deserts the ship” — the APC ruled the image “created a substantial risk of excessive offence and unfairness”.

“The Council does not consider that politicians are ‘fair game’ for extreme levels of abuse and ridicule. Indeed, such behaviour can unreasonably inhibit their freedom of expression as well as harm the important processes of democracy and good governance … Despite these concerns, the Council considers on balance that they are outweighed by the overall public importance of freedom of expression.” — Matthew Knott

Woolies spam. Here’s one in the eye for Woolworths: its Cellarmaster Wines subsidiary has been pinged by the media regulator, the Australian Communications and Media Authority, for breaching the Spam Act. ACMA said this morning that Cellarmasters had “paid a $110,000 infringement notice” following an investigation “that found Cellarmaster Wines sent marketing messages that did not comply with the Spam Act”.

“Some of the messages, which promoted Cellarmaster Wines’ online website, were sent without an opt-out facility, while others were sent to customers who had previously chosen to opt out of its email promotions,” ACMA ruled. “The Spam Act requires that all marketing emails are sent only with the consent of the recipient and provide an opportunity for recipients to opt out of receiving further marketing messages.” — Glenn Dyer

Ten’s new strategy looks old. According to The Australian Financial Review, the Ten Network is going to chase viewers in the 25-54 age group, going head-to-head with the better resourced Seven and Nine Networks. James Chessell’s interview with new chief executive Hamish McLennan revealed Ten would target viewers “young at heart” — the fourth audience strategy in as many years.

The old management under Grant Blackley and Nick Falloon sought to go upmarket and away from 16-39’s, adding 18-49 viewers as a target demographic and then into the older viewers with the abandoned 6-7.30pm news and current affairs programs.

That proved slow to get traction and costly, so James Packer and then Gina Rinehart bought into Ten, joining the perennial wannabee dealmaker in Bruce Gordon on the share register (he is losing tens of millions of dollars). Packer then sold half his stake to Lachlan Murdoch, who grabbed the chairmanship and removed the existing management. Murdoch told the world Ten would go back to its roots in the 16-39 demographic, while not forgetting the 18-49s. That set in train the collapse in the network’s ratings and ad share from August 2012 under former CEO James Warburton’s brief reign.

Warburton was Murdoch’s choice as CEO, and the board’s. That failed. Now Murdoch’s next choice, McLennan, wants to go head-to-head with his two commercial rivals — the board has signed off on this new approach. It will be expensive; Ten has paid out money for the Winter Olympics from Russia and will have to pay money for the Commonwealth Games from Scotland later in 2014, despite losing heavily on the 2010 games from New Delhi. He is also bidding big for some or all of the cricket. The cost could be more than $100-$150 million by early 2015, when the results of the strategy should be either confirmed, or dead in the water. — Glenn Dyer

First (spoiler-free) Arrested Development review. If you’d told me a couple of years ago that I’d be sitting here at 5.30am, having finished a new season of Arrested Development, I likely wouldn’t have believed you. It’s somewhat surreal, really, to think this show could rise out of the mountainous ash-pile of lamented cancellation. It’s fitting that the fourth season premiere is entitled “Flight of the Phoenix” — the meaning of which I shouldn’t have to spell out to fans of the show.

Firstly, a caveat of sorts: I watched the entire season within 12 hours of its release, so my reaction to it here is an initial one. As those who have seen the show will know, part of its commensurate charm is its heavily self-referential nature with running jokes and callbacks dotting each episode. Watching it all at once helps one to catch these, but it also wears on one’s patience. I will not be revealing any key plot details if I can help it, though I will be talking about the characters and about my reaction to the ending but not in any explicit way, so only read on if this won’t bother you.

I feel like my reaction to it is quite reasoned, however, and am confident that this review will provide a relatively good guide as to what to expect if you haven’t had a chance to watch any yet. So: the season no one could’ve predicted. Here we go … — Laurence Barber (read the full story here)

Front page of the day. They’re having a gay old time in France. Le Parisien captures anti-gay marriage protests over the weekend while recording the success of lesbian drama La Vie d’Adele at the Cannes Film Festival …