al-Masri al-Youm's recent coverage

I noted a while back that my friend/former boss Hisham Kassem had left his position as executive publisher of al-Masri al-Youm, the independent daily newspaper he launched in 2004 and that went on to become the premier source of reporting in Egypt. Many people have asked me if it has had any impact on al-Masri al-Youm's editorial line. I have not noticed anything special, except that these days it seems al-Masri seems to run a front-page article about a stories on Egypt that appear in foreign media nearly every day. Today's it's a negative FT report that touches on the Gamal/succession issue. Before that there was an Economist article, and before that a Carnegie Endowment report (and there have been others I can't remember.)

What's the bloody point? Al-Masri does a great service by doing original reporting. Who cares what other publications are saying? Why is it worth prominent placement? I hope this isn't an indicator of a loss of quality.