Facebook's, in turn, was much longer than Google's - highlighting the contrasting fortunes of the two members of the digital duopoly at the moment. Google has been on a media charm offensive lately, and recently struck a partnership with Fairfax Media, which publishes this column. Apple, meanwhile, whose Apple News product is an increasingly important distribution channel for publishers, didn't feel the need to submit anything. In addition to News Corp's leviathan tome, there were also substantial entries from businesses it controls - online real estate portal REA Group, and pay-TV provider Foxtel. That Murdoch forces went in hard on this issue should be no surprise. The company's executive chairman Rupert Murdoch has been leading the resistance against Google and Facebook for years. At times, it has been a lonely fight. News Corp chief executive Robert Thomson has been equally critical. With the digital duopoly under fire for privacy breaches, failing to stem hate speech and fake news, Murdoch's stance has been vindicated.

Still, some of the claims and suggestions contained in the News Corp submission to the ACCC were...pretty interesting. On just the second page of the document, News argues that digital platforms have reduced choice and diversity in journalism, something the platforms (and the hordes of digitally native outlets that have sprung up in recent years) would contest. It then veers into get-off-my-lawn territory when it calls on the regulator to investigate a range of digital services, presumably because they are digital. These include Spotify and Netflix, as well as aggregation services such as Flipboard and Medium, whose impact on traditional media is marginal at best. News says it expects "Netflix to become a major supplier of news and journalism in the future". For the record, Netflix has publicly declared no interest in live news, at least in the conventional sense. One proposal from News Corp is the establishment of an Algorithm Review Board, which would analyse the effects of algorithm changes on publishers, and remove the incentives for the platforms to distribute lower quality content.

It is an interesting idea - Facebook's arbitrary changes to its secretive algorithm have done serious damage to publisher traffic. But it's also one the digital giants would fight with more fury than News Corp is throwing their way at the moment. Some of the claims made by News and other traditional media companies will also be challenged by those digital giants, it just remains to be seen whether that happens in public or behind closed doors. There were 57 submissions to the ACCC review in total. They were heavy on complaints, but light on solutions, highlighting the challenge facing Rod Sims. Remember, it was independent senator Nick Xenophon (and One Nation) who secured the digital platforms inquiry as part of the deal to change cross media ownership laws. Now, in being seized upon by a media company the centrist South Australian clashed with, the inquiry risks veering off course.