Rupert Murdoch has opened an account on micro-blogging platform Twitter. Murdoch, who is the owner of News Corp., now has more than 40,000 followers on the site. The media mogul has tweeted about a range of subjects, including politics and movies. Murdoch himself was openly criticized via the social media platform when the News of the World scandal broke earlier this year.

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Saudi prince Alwaleed bin Talal has invested $300 million in Twitter. With Twitter's worth currently estimated at $8 billion, the investment amounts to a 3.75% stake. The prince, who is the second largest investor in Rupert Murdoch's News Corporation, has taken the stake with his Kingdom Holding Company investment firm. "Our investment in Twitter reaffirms our ability in identifying suitable opportunities to invest in promising, high-growth businesses with a global impact," said Alwaleed in a statement.

Related News: Prince Alwaleed’s Kingdom Holding may acquire 3% Twitter share

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The National reports that Rupert Murdoch’s Fox International Channels plans to launch additional entertainment channels next year. Now broadcasting 12 channels in the MENA region, including Fox Movies, Fox Series and Star World, Fox plans to convert all of its regional broadcasts to high definition by 2012. The company intends to pursue its strategy of broadcasting across both pay-TV and advertising-driven free-to-air platforms.

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Financial Times has reported that British Sky Broadcasting is in talks to broadcast a 24-hour rolling news service in Arabic, based in Abu Dhabi, as part of a joint-venture with a local private investor. Entering a highly competitive market, the satellite channel would launch under the Sky News name and be the UK broadcaster's first venture into a territory outside the UK.

In a statement, John Ryley, head of Sky News, said: "This venture would build on our existing strengths as an international news provider and bring the Sky News brand to a new audience. Discussions are progressing well and we look forward to bringing a new approach to Arabic-language news."

Discussions are at a relatively early stage, but the channel would launch within two years if the talks succeed, according to the source.

Talking to Bloomberg TV, Arabian Business reports that Saudi Prince Alwaleed bin Talal is planning to start a regional news channel, one that would compete with Al-Arabiya and A-Jazeera. This investment is something that Prince Alwaleed will be doing personally, and not produced through Kingdom Holding or Rotana. According to Bloomberg, the news channel would borrow from the business model used at Rupert Murdoch’s Fox and Sky News channels while broadcasting different content in the Middle East.

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Prince Alwaleed bin Talal is a major investor in News Corp, and in return Rupert Murdoch took a 9% stake in Alwaleed’s Rotana music-to-movies TV channel empire. RapidTVNews reports that there have been many discussions over the past few weeks whereby News Corp’s may exercise its option to take a larger stake in Rotana.

News Corp certainly has options to increase its stake in Rotana, and the rumours in Cairo are that News Corp wants a greater say in Rotana’s overall output including Alwaleed’s Arabic film library. The same rumours suggest that the pair want to stay in free-to-air TV at the moment, which is where the mass-market audience is.

The ramifications may be starting. It is reported that an official sent by Murdoch visited Cairo in January and laid off 49 Rotana staff. Rotana has also pulled out of a $1.5m annual rental of studio space at Egypt’s giant Media Production City and has switched production to Beirut.

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