The deal underscored the growing importance of strategic investors motivated by business strategies and not just financial incentives, points out Porter Bibb, managing partner of MediaTech Capital.

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Things started to go awry, he says, when Bush brought in New York investment banker Porter Bibb to raise money and stopped returning Schonfeld's e-mails this past summer.

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"We believe their negligence was driven by the council's financial fear that if permission were refused Tesco would almost certainly appeal (against) the decision, " resident Rachel Bibb said.

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Bibb, who owns a tiny stake in Xinhua Financial, says he's no longer involved in the TV venture now that he has finished raising an undisclosed sum to get it going.

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Actor Woody Harrelson is often seen skimming over the waves near his ranch on Maui's North Shore ("He's a hazard, " one observer says), and actress Leslie Bibb has also given it a try.

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Bibb wondered why Al Jazeera America would plan to produce 60% of its content in the United States, as it has said, when Al Jazeera has increasingly become renowned for its coverage of the Middle East, especially during the recent Arab Spring revolutions.

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"I think it's a very, very well-done news network, " said media expert and former White House correspondent Porter Bibb of Mediatech Capital Partners in New York, where he listens to a related network, Al Jazeera English, now available in a tiny fraction of U.S. markets.

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