Mediagazer: Weigel, WaPo, and the Tracy-Flickization of Public Life (Julian Sanchez/The Atlantic Online)

12:10 AM ET, June 26, 2010

Top News:

On Journolist, and Dave Weigel — I began Journolist in February of 2007. It was an idea born from disagreement. Weeks, or maybe months, earlier, I had criticized Time's Joe Klein over some comments he made about the Iraq War. He e-mailed a long and searching reply, and the subsequent conversation was educational for us both.

Discussion: The Atlantic Online, Ross Douthat, The Plum Line, Politics Daily, The Corner on National …, Washington Monthly, Big Journalism, Guardian, Hot Air, The Wrap, FishbowlDC and Ben Smith's Blog

Julian Sanchez / The Atlantic Online:

Weigel, WaPo, and the Tracy-Flickization of Public Life — Like Megan and most of my fellow guestbloggers, I'm fortunate to count Dave Weigel—until this morning a blogger covering the conservative movement for the Washington Post—as a friend. Insofar as that probably renders real objectivity impossible …

Discussion: The Daily Dish, FishbowlDC, Ezra Klein, The New Republic and Mediaite

Matt Dornic / FishbowlDC:

BREAKING: Weigel Resigns — FIRST ON FBDC: FishbowlDC has confirmed that WaPo conservative-beat blogger Dave Weigel has resigned after a slew of his anti-conservative comments and emails surfaced on FishbowlDC and Daily Caller over the past two days. — A spokesperson for the Post …

Alex Pareene / Salon:
David Weigel resigns because old media can't have nice things

Discussion: Ombudsman Blog, The Huffington Post, The Atlantic Online, Vanity Fair, The Politico, Romenesko and The Awl

Michael Triplett / Mediaite:
WaPo's Dave Weigel Resigns After More Journolist E-Mails Surface

Discussion: FishbowlDC, Washington Post, The Daily Caller, Hit & Run, Gawker, Swampland, Big Journalism, Matthew Yglesias, Politics Daily, The Atlantic Wire and Romenesko

Karen DeYoung / Washington Post:

Rolling Stone broke interview ground rules with McChrystal, military officials say — Gen. Stanley A. McChrystal has made no public comment since President Obama relieved him of his Afghan war command Wednesday, silently taking his lumps for disparaging remarks he and his aides …

Discussion: Romenesko, The Daily Beast, National Review, PostPartisan, Emptywheel, Political Punch, Hot Air, Hit & Run, Daily Kos, The Fix, American Times and Audience Development Blogs RSS

David Brooks / New York Times:

The Culture of Exposure — The most interesting part of my job is that I get to observe powerful people at close quarters. Most people in government, I find, are there because they sincerely want to do good. But they're also exhausted and frustrated much of the time.

Discussion: The Huffington Post, Guardian, New York Observer, The Daily Dish, The Nation, The Wrap, Gawker, Mediaite and PostPartisan

Michael Calderone / Yahoo! News:
Rolling Stone writer blasts back at Brooks' column on McChrystal story

Discussion: Romenesko and The Nation

Walter Shapiro / Politics Daily:
Rolling Stone McChrystal Profile: The End of Fly-on-the-Wall Reporting?

Discussion: mediabistro.com, Matters of Varying …, Big Journalism, Guardian, Breaking Media and Romenesko

Joy Victory / WordPress.com News:

Overcome Writer's Block With Plinky Prompts — Do you ever think “Ugh, I'd totally write a new blog post, if I just had something to say?” Or maybe, “I'm sick and tired of writer's block but I don't know what to do about it!” — We've all been there — those days when the light bulb seems dim, if not burned out.

Leena Rao / TechCrunch:
Automattic Buys Up Thing Labs' Plinky To Help Bloggers Overcome Writer's Block

Discussion: Thing Labs, Inc., paidContent, Xconomy, The Next Web, Erictric and Techie Buzz, more at Techmeme »

Howard Kurtz / Washington Post:

Al Gore and the Enquirer's non-checkbook journalism — The executive editor of the National Enquirer says the Oregon masseuse who made a sexual allegation against Al Gore asked the tabloid for $1 million but that the Enquirer did not pay her or anyone else in reporting the story.

Discussion: Romenesko, Most Recent Home Page Posts …, FishbowlNY, CNN, First Draft, TPMMuckraker, NewsLab, CJR, Hot Air and Words at Work

Jay Yarow / Silicon Alley Insider:

The Wall Street Journal's iPad App Revenues So Far: $2.4 Million (NWS, AAPL) — The Wall Street Journal charged 6 advertisers $400,000 to get in on its iPad app launch, according to an internal memo sent to Dow Jones employees. — Quick math: The WSJ's iPad revenues so far are $2.4 million.

Chris Roush / Talking Biz News:
WSJ launches “The Big Interview” series

Discussion: FishbowlNY, MediaPost, Strupp and NetNewsCheck Latest

Michael Miner / Chicago Reader:

Alison True Fired as Reader Editor — Alison True was fired Friday morning by acting publisher Alison Draper as editor of the Reader, the paper which True joined as an editorial assistant in the early 1980s. True's dismissal was announced by Draper at a staff meeting later in the morning attended …

Discussion: Romenesko and Tower Ticker

Joe Pompeo / The Wire:

Traditional Media Is Having A Field Day On Tumblr — Tumblr, the innovative blogging platform created by young web entrepreneur David Karp in 2007, had a bit of a media moment on the afternoon of Thursday, June 24. — Around 1 p.m., we reported that The New York Times had recently created a Tumblr …

Discussion: Romenesko and ReadWriteWeb

Michael Lewittes / Gossip Cop:

How TMZ broke news of Michael Jackson's death one year ago — June 25, 2009 started off as an ordinary day in the L.A. offices of TMZ. — In fact, when TMZ got its first tip at around 1 p.m. PST that Michael Jackson was being taken to the hospital, “it was not that alarming,” …

Discussion: blogs.tampabay.com and The Huffington Post

Robert Niles / Online Journalism Review:

How to optimize your news website for better Google AdSense revenue — By Robert Niles: A hot topic of discussion during last month's KDMC News Entrepreneur Boot Camp was online advertising networks, specifically Google's AdSense program for publishers. More than one speaker cautioned the participants to not expect much from AdSense.

Brian Easter / iMediaConnection Blog:

Part I: “Google TV: Advertising's New Frontier” — Why Google TV Advertising is a Marketer's Dream — If you are reading this post and looking for confirmation that Google TV will ultimately be a failure, I suggest you stop now. The discussion of whether or not Google TV will succeed in this …

Jose Antonio Vargas / The Huffington Post:

What's the Future of the Journalist in Our Digital Era? (VIDEOS) — Exactly how has technology changed the journalist's role? — The question has nagged me since the latest Future of News and Civic Media conference in Cambridge, hosted by MIT and the Knight Foundation.

Peter Kafka / MediaMemo:

Sports Illustrated's iPad App: Think Print, Not Web — Sports Illustrated's iPad app, which the company first started showing off in concept form last winter, is now in the iTunes store. — No point in going into detail about it when you can see it for yourself.

Discussion: Publishing Perspectives, BRANDING UNBOUND, Digits and paidContent

C-MONSTER.net:

On the Future of Freelancing: The Journalist as Marketer. — Pondering the future (and burritos) at Stanford. (Photo by C-M.) — For two days last week, I traveled to Stanford to participate in a conference on The Future of Freelancing. Needless to say, any gathering of journalists …

Peter Kafka / MediaMemo:

Why ABC's iPad App Is Free, but ABC Shows on Hulu's App-to-Be Won't Be — One of the benefits of the upcoming Hulu subscription service: The ability of users to watch shows from NBC, Fox and ABC on the iPad. But iPad users can already watch ABC shows on the iPad via the network's free app.

Discussion: Gizmodo