This week, after news broke that James Murdoch was finalizing a deal with Jim Bankoff to acquire New York and the Vox Media Podcast Network for well north of $300 million, I’m told, a source in the market proffered two ways of looking at the acquisition. The optimistic thesis was that James, the liberal-ish outcast of his father’s conservative media dynasty, would use his inheritance to bring “real investment” to the storied mediaco and restore its political and cultural influence—thereby elevating his own status in the process. Laurene Powell Jobs has done as much for The Atlantic, after all; perhaps James could pull off a similar feat.