Mediagazer: MEMO TO PROSPECTIVE FREELANCERS (Tony Ortega/Runnin' Scared)

Jim Romenesko / Romenesko:

Slate Group pulls the plug on The Big Money — A memo to Slate Group employees says: “This has been a difficult decision, in part because so many aspects of the project have worked as we hoped. ... The problem, in a nutshell, is that the site is not pointed toward profitability on a fast enough timetable.”

Discussion: FishbowlNY, MediaMemo, paidContent, The Wrap, mediabistro.com, New York Observer, DailyFinance and New York Magazine

Hunter Walker / The Wrap:

Breaking: Piers Morgan Gets CNN Gig — NBC Universal Television Entertainment chairman Jeff Gaspin, confirmed that Piers Morgan will be going to CNN at the TCA summer press tour Thursday. — Morgan's “America's Got Talent” contract with NBC was the last obstacle standing in the way between …

Discussion: Speakeasy, MediaPost, Broadcasting & Cable, On Media's Blog, Mediaite, Company Town, Variety and New York Magazine

Michael Learmonth / AdAge:

Why Flipboard Won't Help Publishing's Smoldering Model — Sure, Smart Publishers Want to Be on Flipboard, But Let's Stop Pretending Why — Good news! Flipboard is ready to log me in via Twitter and Facebook. It took a while because demand for the new iPad app — a visual …

Discussion: NBC Bay Area, Canadian Magazines and Silicon Alley Insider, more at Techmeme »

Emma Barnett / Telegraph:

Spotify ‘will launch in US by end of 2010’ — Spotify has vehemently denied an American news report that its negotiations in the US have made no progress, saying it is “still on track to launch in 2010”. — Yesterday, Billboard, a US music industry magazine, reported that Spotify's …

Discussion: hypebot

Discussion: MediaMemo and Epicenter, more at Techmeme »

Jeremy W. Peters / New York Times:

Audio Tycoon's Newsweek Bid Said to Be Favored — As the Washington Post Company prepares to sell Newsweek to the most appealing bidder, it is closely examining an offer from Sidney Harman, the California billionaire who made his fortune selling audio equipment.

Discussion: New York Post, Romenesko, Media Buyer Planner, Gawker, paidContent, New York Magazine, On Media's Blog, Tim Sprinkle and Wall Street Journal

Megan Garber / Nieman Journalism Lab:

WikiLeaks and continuity: What if we had a news outlet exclusively focused on follow-up journalism? — In his assessment of the journalistic implications of the WikiLeaked Afghanistan War Logs earlier this week, Jay Rosen made a provocative prediction:

Discussion: Romenesko, Scott Rosenberg's Wordyard and Making a Mockery

Discussion: CJR, Threat Level, CNN and Politics Daily

Financial Times:

News Corp looks at unit for tablet devices — The media group is said to be close to a decision on whether to start a news organisation to provide content for a subscription application on platforms such as Apple's iPad

Discussion: blogs.journalism.co.uk, Editors Weblog, Shaping the Future …, paidContent:UK and Poynter Online

New York Times:

Disney Sells Miramax for $660 Million — LOS ANGELES — The Walt Disney Company agreed to sell Miramax Films to an investor group late Thursday for about $660 million. — The deal ends a laborious six-month bidding process that saw the co-founders of the storied independent film label …

Discussion: Guardian, NewTeeVee, Los Angeles Times, Thompson on Hollywood, /Film, Fast Company, Company Town, Top Digital Journal News and New York Observer

The Wrap:

Paul Lee a Done Deal at ABC; Will Replace McPherson — Though it's taken a back seat to reports of sexual harassment by his predecessor, ABC finally announced Friday what has been common knowledge for almost a week: Paul Lee, president of the ABC Family Channel, will replace Steve McPherson as president of ABC Entertainment Group

Discussion: Company Town, Broadcasting & Cable, Media Decoder, Hollywood Reporter, MediaPost and The Big Picture

Mark S. Luckie / 10,000 Words:

The Washington Post gets ‘Luckie’; Goodbye Cali, Hello D.C.! — I am extremely excited to announce that I have just been named the new National Innovations Editor for the Washington Post. I will be responsible for helping to coordinate the online strategy for the Post's National desk …

Discussion: Nieman Journalism Lab and California Watch

Tony Ortega / Runnin' Scared:

MEMO TO PROSPECTIVE FREELANCERS — Dear Prospective Village Voice Freelancers, — Each and every day, you send me pitches for stories that you hope I'll bite on. Some are quite good. A few are excellent. Most, however, don't interest me in the least. I try my best to answer as many pitches as I can.

Discussion: FishbowlNY

Julie Bosman / New York Times:

Barnes & Noble Planning Big Push to Increase Nook Sales — BARNES & NOBLE customers are about to see a lot more of the Nook. — In September, the chain will begin an aggressive promotion of its Nook e-readers by building 1,000-square-foot boutiques in all of its stores, with sample Nooks …

Discussion: The Next Web and Gizmodo, more at Techmeme »

the nytpicker:

At Last: New Website Lets Status-Crazed Readers Search NYT Wedding Announcements By Snooty College, Swanky Job, Glitzy Locale. — Wondering which Harvard grads got their wedding announcement into the NYT this week, while your best friend from Northeastern never even got his calls returned by the social editor?

Discussion: New York Observer, Gawker, Romenesko and New York Magazine

Lauren Kirchner / CJR:

Bringing a Big Story Home at The Omaha World-Herald — Local reporting in the age of wire copy — Most regional papers have relied on wire copy to tell the story of the 92,000 classified military documents released by WikiLeaks. The Omaha World-Herald, weekday circulation around 150,000 …

Discussion: ProPublica, Romenesko and Omaha World-Herald

Laurel Wentz / AdAge:

Is Your Detergent Stalking You? — Brazil's Omo Uses GPS to Follow Consumers Home With Prizes — NEW YORK (AdAge.com) — Unilever's Omo detergent is adding an unusual ingredient to its two-pound detergent box in Brazil: a GPS device that allows its promotions agency Bullet to track shoppers and follow them to their front doors.

Discussion: the Econsultancy blog

Foster Kamer / Runnin' Scared:

Anatomy of an Error: Why Nobody Got Fired From the New York Post This Week — We reported Wednesday on the turmoil an embarrassing New York Post correction caused in the newsroom, fueled by what we heard was rage called down from the top: News Corp owner Rupert Murdoch. Fun times.

Discussion: Gawker

Rachel McAthy / Journalism.co.uk:

Online journalists in Italy protest Wiretapping bill's ‘blog-killing clause’ — Online journalists in Italy have signed a petition against a so-called “blog-killing clause” in the country's controversial new Wiretapping Bill. — According to a report by the AFP, Prime Minister Silvio …

Foster Kamer / Runnin' Scared:

Journalism 101, How TMZ Got The Exclusive on Snooki's Arrest: via Twitter — Watch carefully, Journalism majors. This is how you do it. — Step 1: Set up a column on Tweetdeck for news on Snooki. — Step 2: Watch news of Snooki out and about today on “The Shore” the day after Jersey Shore's second season premiere fly by.

Discussion: TMZ.com and MyFox Philadelphia

Paul Dacre / EDITORS' CODE OF PRACTICE COMMITTEE:

KILLING THE MYTHS — Chairman of the Editors' Code of Practice Committee — THE Press lives by disclosure. And so, as an industry, we can't complain when caught in the headlights of public scrutiny. Nor do we. It is healthy, and we welcome it. — Indeed, in a particularly onerous year …

Discussion: Press Gazette and Guardian

Jason Fell / Folio:

Transcending Print — Last week, Condé Nast announced a slew of management changes, including the promotion of consumer marketing group president Robert Sauerberg to president of the company. The moves were part of a transitioning business model “focused around digital connectivity …

Rob ORegan / eMedia Vitals:

A better way to monetize search traffic? — Traditional publishers have been slow to adapt to the search-driven economy - getting steamrolled by content aggregators, bloggers and content farms that are much more effective at tuning their content for search engines.

Amy Gahran / Knight Digital Media Center:

Scott Rosenberg: Why are news corrections so hard? — On July 19, video excerpts from a speech by USDA official Shirley Sherrod were posted to the web site of popular conservative blogger Andrew Breitbart. He claimed they demonstrated blatant racism, and a media firestorm ensued.

Discussion: mediabistro.com and Media Matters for America

aolnews.com:

Pioneering Weird News Agency Calls It Quits After 30 Years — The world is a little less weird today, thanks to the demise of FlashNews, a pioneering news agency that made journalism even stranger than it already was. — After three decades of generating offbeat stories …

Discussion: Romenesko

David Kaplan / paidContent:

United Business Media Profits Rise; More Emerging Markets Acquisitions — United Business Media (LSE: UBM), the owner of PR Newswire, turned in decent results for the first half of 2010 and is maintaining a cautious yet stable outlook for the second part of the year.

Discussion: eMedia Vitals