Mediagazer: Media Deals Soar, 445 In First Half of '10 (Wayne Friedman/MediaPost)

3:20 PM ET, June 30, 2010

Top News:

CNN:

Statement from Larry King — Before I start the show tonight, I want to share some personal news with you. 25 years ago, I sat across this table from New York Governor Mario Cuomo for the first broadcast of Larry King Live. Now, decades later, I talked to the guys here at CNN and I told …

Brian Stelter / New York Times:

Larry King to End Show After 25 Years — In the face of falling ratings, the CNN host Larry King announced Tuesday evening that he would end his long-running talk show, “Larry King Live,” this fall. — Jonathan Klein, president of CNN's domestic channel, said that Mr. King, 76 …

Discussion: Media Decoder, Los Angeles Times, New York Post, The Wrap, NY Daily News, Washington Post, Company Town, newsfeed.time.com, Chickaboomer, Tuned In, Inside Cable News, Gawker and Movieline

Frankie Stone / The Wrap: Why Was the Larry King Announcement Handled So Badly?

Peter Kafka / MediaMemo:

Wired's iPad App Boasts a New Feature: A Price Cut — The second edition of Condé Nast's much-praised Wired magazine iPad app is out, and it boasts some new features. The biggest one: A 20 percent price cut. — The magazine publisher sold some 95,000 digital copies of its June issue at $4.99 …

Discussion: Folio, paidContent, WebNewser, Poynter Online and eMedia Vitals

Hunter Walker / The Wrap:

Troubled Times at CNN, Anchors at Odds with Cooper — Larry King's leaving is not the only problem at CNN. The cable news network is plagued by high-profile departures, low ratings and - TheWrap has learned - widespread resentment among producers and anchors.

Discussion: TVWeek.com, TVbytheNumbers, The Wire, Inside Cable News and New York Magazine

Economist:

Le Monde gets a new owner — LE MONDE, the iconic French newspaper founded by Charles de Gaulle after Paris was freed from Nazi occupation, has been saved from insolvency. On June 28th, its supervisory board voted 20 to 11 to accept a takeover bid by three French businessmen, Pierre Bergé …

Discussion: /Message

The Irish Times:

Banker, maverick and couturier - unlikely trio betting on journalism — Why have three of France's canniest businessmen bought debt-ridden ‘Le Monde’ at such a difficult time in the industry, asks RUADHÁN MAC CORMAIC in Paris — ONE IS a punk rock-loving banker who attended one of France's elite finishing schools.

Megan Garber / Nieman Journalism Lab:

ProPublica's website redesign puts “future of context” ideas to work — Late last night, ProPublica launched a redesign of its website. As most site revamps tend to be, the new propublica.org is sleeker, slicker, and generally more aesthetically pleasing than its previous incarnation.

Discussion: ProPublica

Brian Stelter / Media Decoder:

MSNBC Hires Mark Halperin — Adding to its roster of political boldface names ahead of the midterm elections, MSNBC said Wednesday that it had signed Mark Halperin as a senior political analyst. — Mr. Halperin holds the same position at Time magazine, where he is also an editor at large

Discussion: TVNewser, WebNewser, The Wire, Variety and AmSpecBlog

Kuan Yong / YouTube API Blog:

Flash and the HTML5 tag — There's been a lot of discussion lately about whether or not the HTML5 <video> tag is going to replace Flash Player for video distribution on the web. We've been excited about the HTML5 effort and <video> tag for quite a while now, and most YouTube videos can now be played via our HTML5 player.

Discussion: NewTeeVee, PC World, TechCrunch, CNET News, THINQ.co.uk, ReadWriteWeb and Gizmodo, more at Techmeme »

Peter Kafka / MediaMemo:

Hulu CEO Jason Kilar: We're No Cable Killer! We Swear! — If you're planning on swapping out your expensive cable TV service for Hulu's $10 a month subscription offering, Jason Kilar has advice for you: Don't do it! — The Hulu CEO insists that his “Hulu Plus” service …

Discussion: Silicon Alley Insider, The Money Game, the Econsultancy blog, Deadline.com and The Wire, more at Techmeme »

Staci D. Kramer / paidContent:
Interview: Hulu's Kilar: Hulu Plus Preview Programming Is ‘Just Step One’

Discussion: Media Maverick, PC World, Wall Street Journal, eMarketer and Blog Posts and Poynter Online

Ned Resnikoff / Salon:

“Neutral” journalism can't die fast enough — We'd all be better off if reporters simply acknowledged their biases and disclosed them to their audiences — You're probably already sick of Weigelgate (and if you don't know what that is, here's a primer from Weigel himself …

Discussion: Quote and Comment and Yahoo! News

Jxpaton / Digital First:

Who Would You Pick For The ideaLab? — We are just days away from July 4th and the implementation of our Ben Franklin Project. — On July 4th all of our 18 daily newspapers will publish, both online and in print, using only free web-based tools. As with our earlier successes ( http …

Associated Press:

NY Times wins Loeb award for series on food safety — NEW YORK — The New York Times on Tuesday won a Loeb Award, among the highest honors in business journalism, for a series of stories detailing how the safety of the nation's food has been compromised by laxly enforced safeguards and industry shortcuts.

Discussion: BusinessJournalism.org …, St. Louis Post-Dispatch, Business Wire and MiamiHerald.com

Crain's New York Business:

Conde Nast takes newsstand plunge — Matthew Flamm - In a further sign of its willingness to think like other publishers, Conde Nast will begin putting out newsstand-only special editions of some of its magazines, Charles Townsend, chief executive of the company, announced Tuesday.

Discussion: The Wire and New York Observer

Julia Moskin / New York Times:

When Is a Free Meal Just Part of a Writer's Job? — BY all accounts, the wedding of the food writer Josh Ozersky and Danit Lidor on May 23 in Manhattan was an eater's idyll. — There were clouds above the Empire Hotel's rooftop bar, and breezes ruffled the water in the swimming pool.

Discussion: The Awl and Eater National

Jennifer Saba / MediaFile:

The future of newspapers via Sam Zell — Sam Zell popped over to CNBC's Squawk Box on Tuesday to chat about real estate and investment opportunities in the U.S. and abroad. This being MediaFile, we were most interested in what Zell had to say about Tribune Co., the company that he helms …

Discussion: paidContent, Romenesko and Tower Ticker

Wayne Friedman / MediaPost:

Media Deals Soar, 445 In First Half of '10 — Deals for media business rocketed up over 50% in the first half of 2010 — the highest level in at least six years. But the value of those deals is still well below record levels. — Media investment banking company Jordan …

Discussion: Publishing Executive …, Folio and paidContent

David Weinfeld / Lost Remote:

Digital Newsstands Heading to New York City … A team of companies from the digital out-of-home media industry have come together to make digital newsstands in New York City a reality. Led by CEMUSA, the international outdoor advertising company that beat out competitors JCDecaux and Viacom …

Discussion: The Wire

Julia Angwin / Digits:

YouTube to Introduce ‘Skippable’ Ads — Google Inc.'s YouTube plans to introduce “skippable” ads later this year, senior product manager Baljeet Singh said Tuesday at a Google press conference. — Mr. Singh said that the new format will let users skip the pre-roll ads that are embedded in videos …

Discussion: Fast Company, Media Buyer Planner, Gizmodo, Investor's Business Daily, Telegraph, paidContent, NewTeeVee and The Next Web

The FADER:

Sam Sifton's Golden Ears and Million Dollar Taste Buds — Eater.com is obsessed with Sam Sifton. The still semi-new New York Times food critic has been gleefully stalked by the website as though he were a rare bird. Sifton's writing has an occasionally dramatic flair that has both riled …

Discussion: New York Observer

comScore, Inc.:

Flash and Rich Media Ads Represent 40 Percent of U.S. Online Display Ad Impressions — JPEG Still Leads as Top Ad Format at 42 Percent — comScore, Inc. (NASDAQ: SCOR), a leader in measuring the digital world, today announced the introduction of the Ad Metrix Creative Summary report …

Discussion: MarketingProfs Daily, Andy Beal's Marketing Pilgrim, MediaPost, the Econsultancy blog and TechCrunch