A non-profit owned by a for-profit business is no longer a non-profit. To my mind it is really that simple.

The root problem is the merger wave that started in the 80s in the US and spread through "the West" (which somehow includes Australia). To this day mergers are no longer scrutinized to verify they are good for society or competition, only if "something, something, lower consumer costs."

So the real owners of National Geographic, the Murdock family, push an ostensibly non-profit organization to produce content that helps the bottom line of the Murdock empire, not necessarily what would keep a sustainable base of NG readers in the digital world of the 21st century.