Mediagazer: Digital Media Deals Up 68 Percent in First Half 2010 (Matt Kinsman/Folio)

1:15 PM ET, August 18, 2010

Top News:

News Corp. defends $1 million donation to Republican Governors Association — Rupert Murdoch, who has never been shy about making his political views known, has voted with his sizable checkbook. — Murdoch's News Corp. has made a $1 million donation to the Republican Governors Association …

Discussion: Mediaite, mediabistro.com, Media Matters for America, New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Company Town, Chickaboomer and The Daily Politics

Michael Calderone / Yahoo! News:
Murdoch's News Corp. gives $1 mil. to Republican govs

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Keith J. Kelly / New York Post:

Auton on the go at Time Inc. — Shakeups are already underway at Time Inc. in advance of Ann Moore's exit and Jack Griffin's arrival from Meredith as the new CEO. — Sylvia Auton, executive vice president in charge of Time Inc.'s Lifestyle Group, which includes Real Simple and Southern Living …

Discussion: Romenesko, MinOnline, The Wire, Media Week and On Media's Blog

Alexis Madrigal / The Atlantic Online:

What's Wrong With “X Is Dead” — Technologies die violent deaths less often than we think. — This is the basic problem with the Chris Anderson-anchored Wired cover story, “The Web is Dead.” If you think about technology as a series of waves, each displacing the last …

Discussion: TechCrunch, @vanelsas, Techdirt, GigaOM, Podcasting News, Bits, Poynter Online, Infocult, Wired, VizWorld.com, FlowingData, The Awl and Kirk LaPointe's …, more at Techmeme »

Ryan Tate / Gawker:
Wired Says ‘The Web is Dead’ — On Its Increasingly Profitable Website

Discussion: eMedia Vitals, Wired, Fast Company, kottke.org, New York Observer, broadstuff, Gizmodo and New York Magazine, more at Techmeme »

Jessica E. Vascellaro / Wall Street Journal:

Google TV Is a Tough Sell Among Would-Be Partners — Google Inc. is launching a campaign to line up TV networks' support for its new Google TV software, but many remain reluctant to partner with a service that encroaches on their turf. — The service will allow people to watch and search cable …

Discussion: Online Video News, Los Angeles Times, NewTeeVee, The Digital Home, TechCrunch, CrunchGear, ReadWriteWeb and Fortune, more at Techmeme »

Jessica Guynn / Los Angeles Times: Google TV undergoes a trial by partisans

Lee Margulies / Los Angeles Times:

Dr. Laura to leave radio amid N-word controversy — Schlessinger, under fire since using a racial slur on her radio show, won't renew her contract. ‘I want my 1st Amendment rights back,’ she says, citing threats. — “I want my 1st Amendment rights back, which I can't have on radio without …

Discussion: Media Decoder, Speakeasy, The Wrap, Media Buyer Planner, Cal Coast News, Media Matters for America, Politics Daily, New York Observer, DailyFinance, MultiCultClassics and Associated Press

Andrew Wallenstein / Hollywood Reporter:

EXCLUSIVE: People magazine iPad app delayed by paparazzi — Photo agencies want payment for photos used with new app — The publishing world's headlong rush to Apple's iPad has hit a big hitch. — More than a dozen of the photo agencies that supply celebrity snapshots from the paparazzi …

Discussion: Poynter Online

Matt Kinsman / Folio:

Digital Media Deals Up 68 Percent in First Half 2010 — However, individual valuations decline, according to Peachtree Media Advisors. — The number of digital media deals exploded in the first half of 2010, up 68 percent to 564 while overall value for those deals jumped 117 percent to $9 billion …

Richard Sandomir / New York Times:

Gray, the Reporter, Often Becomes the Story — Two incidents in the past six weeks are serving to mold the public's jaded view of the reporter Jim Gray. — When he interviewed LeBron James for ESPN last month, he needlessly stretched the night's suspense for six minutes before asking …

Discussion: Romenesko, Washington Post and The Big Lead

Alex Williams / New York Times:

Up Close: A Founder of Vice Magazine Branches Out — SHANE SMITH, a founder of Vice, the streetwise, testosterone-fueled culture and fashion magazine, still chugs canned American beer. He still listens to Bad Brains. And he still favors tattered Vans skateboard shoes and black T-shirts.

Jon Friedman / MarketWatch:

Brian Williams on Katrina, being No. 1 and Couric — Commentary: The NBC anchor is at the top of his game — This is the first of a two-part series about NBC News anchor Brian Williams. — NEW YORK (MarketWatch) — Say this about Brian Williams, the anchor of NBC's No. 1-rated “Nightly News” program.

Discussion: Speakeasy

Robert Andrews / paidContent:

Improving EMI Says Digital Music Is Over-Inflated, Too Reliant On iTunes — EMI again isn't detailing how much money it's making from digital in latest earnings, but it is saying estimates for digital growth were too high and labels must ween themselves off iTunes Store...

Kara Swisher / BoomTown:

Exclusive: BermanBraun Strikes Big Ad Deal with Starcom — In an interesting move for premium online content, Hollywood's BermanBraun has signed an advertising deal with Starcom MediaVest Group, the media agency unit of advertising giant Publicis Groupe, sources said.

Discussion: paidContent and New York Times

Ron Mwangaguhunga / eMedia Vitals blogs:

Gawker's media image-driven redesign — Gawker Media sites are in the beta version of a significant redesign. Each redesign in beta — which at present only involves Gawker and Jalopnik — features a prominent headline over a single, dominant image while directly underneath lie three less prominent stories and a menu to the side.

Discussion: NYConvergence and Runnin' Scared

Ken Doctor / Newsonomics:

Nine Questions on Patch's New Push: National Hyperlocal?, SEO Sauces, and the Case of the Besieged Florist — It's Patch day in the news news world, as AOL formally announces the expansion of its network of local sites. It's really a ratification of what we've been hearing …

Discussion: Editors Weblog, MarketWatch, Local Media Watch, New Jersey Online, Romenesko, Seeking Alpha, Forbes, NPR and eMedia Vitals

Edmund Lee / AdAge: Patch and Pro-Am Media by the Numbers

Gina Lovett / New Media Age:

News of the World paywall planned for October launch — News International is to put News of the World content behind a paywall by October, with The Sun to follow. — This content is only accessible to subscribers of new media age. Sign in below if you already subscribe to new media age or subscribe now for unrestricted access

Discussion: Guardian and paidContent:UK

E.B. Boyd / WebNewser:

5 Questions with John Byrne of BusinessWeek, Fast Company, and Now, C-Change Media — Last week, former BusinessWeek and Fast Company editor John Byrne's new company, C-Change Media, launched the first site in a network he says will become “the Huffington Post of business.”

David Bauder / Associated Press:

Survey of viewers shows extent of TV time shifting — NEW YORK - If you've never time-shifted a prime-time television series — watched it later on a DVR, over the Internet or ordered it on demand — you're now in the minority. — A survey of viewers conducted on the eve …

Discussion: NewTeeVee, Media Buyer Planner and TVbytheNumbers

Dareh Gregorian / New York Post:

Columbia grad wants to know who called her a ‘whore’ on YouTube — Ho no you don't! — A Columbia business school grad wants a judge to unmask the cowardly creep who anonymously labeled her a “whore” on YouTube. — In a Manhattan Supreme Court suit, Carla Franklin says she has …

Philip B. Corbett / Times Topics:

Everything Old Is Hip Again — Notes from the newsroom on grammar, usage and style. (Some frequently asked questions are here.) — We try hard to shed our old image as stodgy and out of it. Perhaps too hard, sometimes. — How else to explain our constant invocation of the old/new slang “hipster”?