How to win at publicity: John MacBain celebrated, ex-wife Louise Blouin vilified

 Montreal's John McCall MacBain made heroic headlines Wednesday by handing over $200-million to McGill University, making it the largest-ever Canadian charitable donation.

   The gift was greeted with joy and jubilation as it will fund 50 Canadian students and another 25 foreign students.

   MacBain, a onetime Rhodes Scholar, said he was inspired to give because he himself had once benefited from scholarships.  

   MacBain made his money alongside then-wife Louise Blouin by purchasing Auto-Hebdo in 1987.

   Auto-Hebdo was an unglamorous publication that ran grainy black and white classified ads for used cars.

   The couple transformed the publication into Auto Trader, a much more profitable outlet with a considerably larger reach.

    She owned 22 percent, which MacBain purchased for $200 million when they split up in 2000. 

   He sold the entire business in 2006. 

   MacBain, now 58, now has an estimated worth of $1.4 billion and manages his philanthropic endeavors full-time, handing over $118 million to the RhodestTrust in 2013. He was also named to the Order of Canada.

   Blouin, for her part, took a different route with contrasting results.

   She used her fortune to create a variety of other media enterprises. 

   For a year year she ran a prominent London-based auction house owned by her new boyfriend Simon de Pury. 

   All went well for a while as she partied with fellow jet-setters and supposedly dated Prince Andrew. 

   Blouin also launched a philanthropic undertaking but rather than reap admiration for her generosity, she became a target for endless negative attention as she purchased art publications and "ran them into the ground," according to one feature article in New York magazine. 

   An apparent failure to pay $250,000 in back wages to former employees of her various magazine offerings resulted in a publicity disaster for Blouin, who was described as "one of the richest women in the U.K." 

  Scorning journalists is a dangerous game, as she learned by a steady stream of negative press as they united against her in 2010. A similar thing happened to journalists she hired in India a couple of years later.

   Blouin has been regularly targeted by negative press since, with descriptions of being "capricious and tyrannical."  She has responded by stating that one New York Post journalist has written dozens of negative articles about her because he was smitten with her and disappointed that she shot him down. 

   “I’m amazed she can show her face,” said a woman sued Blouin for unpaid wages. 

     MacBain and Blouin both live in Geneva Switzerland, presumably so both can have access to their three children.