Mediagazer: An Airline Magazine That Makes Travelers Want to Pull the Rip Cord (Michael M. Phillips/Wall Street Journal)

Liz Shannon Miller / NewTeeVee:

Auto-Tune the News Hits the Billboard Top 100 — Online video stars The Gregory Brothers continue making strides towards world domination. Their latest hit Auto-Tune the News single, Bed Intruder, debuted at number 89 on the Billboard Hot 100 today. — Billboard uses a number …

Discussion: Softpedia News, Hit & Run, Techdirt, Trends in the Living Networks, The Lede, All Things Digital, Gawker and Billboard.com The Feed

Jeff Bercovici / DailyFinance:

The Dumbest How-to Content From Demand Media — Do you know how to brush your teeth? How to buy beer? How to poison a gopher? How to belch? If so, you could be a contributor to Demand Media, one of a growing number of “content farms” that use large networks of freelancers to produce cheap reference content.

Discussion: The Wire, Romenesko and City Room

Virginia Heffernan / New York Times:

What ‘Fact-Checking’ Means Online — The day I became a fact-checker at The New Yorker, I received one set of red pencils and one set of No. 2 pencils. [FC: There used to be a training period before the pencils.] [[VH: O.K. for “the day I became a fact-checker” to designate end of training period?]]

Discussion: CJR

Meghan Keane / the Econsultancy blog:

Social media lessons from the “Ground Zero Mosque” — A small plot of land near the World Trade Center in New York City has been thrown into the spotlight recently. A Muslim organization called The Cordoba Initiative set out to build a mosque and community center in the space …

Discussion: New York Times, New York Observer, Newsbook, Most Recent Home Page Posts …, The Daily Caller, The Daily Politics and Salon

Discussion: Yahoo! News

Nick Axelrod / WWD:

No News at the New York Times Magazine... Fashion at Google: Out or In?... NO NEWS AT THE NEW YORK TIMES MAGAZINE: The proposals are in to executive editor Bill Keller (he received upward of 20 applications, according to sources), but that's as far as The New York Times has gotten in the process …

Discussion: Romenesko

Prescott Shibles / eMedia Vitals blogs:

Facebook Places: What it means for media brands — Facebook has launched its much-anticipated location-based service, “Facebook Places,” which allows users to “check in” to certain locations such as restaurants, bars, music festivals, etc. Dubbed a “collective memory” …

Discussion: ReadWriteWeb, TechCrunch, Poynter Online, Guardian, BetaNews, Friday, August 20, 2010, Webmetricsguru, CNN, The Snitch, Gadgetwise, Webmonkey, Faster Forward, PSFK, CenterNetworks, The Social, VentureBeat and Financial Times, more at Techmeme »

Discussion: TechCrunch, Fast Company, eMarketer and Blog Posts, The Praized Blog and Poynter Online

Dirk Smillie / Forbes:

The Highest-Paid Authors — Times may be tough for book sellers, but for Stephen King, James Patterson and Stephenie Meyer, the money keeps rolling in. — Publishers are feeling the heat, with hardcover sales weak and the rise of e-books promising to upend their business models.

Discussion: ArtsBeat, New York Observer, New York Magazine, The Second Pass and ResourceShelf

Jon Friedman / MarketWatch:

Brian Williams: Serious anchor and a jokester — Commentary: You'll find him on ‘30 Rock’ or ‘SNL,’ but not Facebook … NEW YORK (MarketWatch) — “NBC Nightly News” anchor Brian Williams made his reputation as a self-assured anchor man who could discuss Iraq and Afghanistan in decisive tones.

Discussion: Speakeasy and Romenesko

Brian Caulfield / Forbes:

Can Animals Save Mainstream Media? — Forget crime and celebrities. These websites know what really sells: critters. — SAN FRANCISCO — Can Apple Chief Executive Steve Jobs save mainstream media? Probably not. — When it comes to making his own products a success, however …

Discussion: mediabistro.com

Amy Chozick / Wall Street Journal:

Revenge of the TV Writers — Annoy a television writer at your peril: You could wind up committing unspeakable crimes or dying a horrible death—in prime time. Settling scores with difficult stars, clueless executives and childhood enemies. — After several seasons of disappointing reviews …

Discussion: Gawker and New York Magazine

Erick Schonfeld / TechCrunch:

Industry Insiders Say Online Video Advertising Is Reaching A “Frenzy Point” — With the flood, comes the feast. Advertising dollars are pouring into online video. Some of the largest online video ad networks are seeing revenue growth accelerating this quarter, and expect the fourth quarter to be even bigger.

Scott Rosenberg / Scott Rosenberg's Wordyard:

Dr. Laura, Associated Content and the Googledammerung — I was on vacation for much of the last couple of weeks, so I missed a lot — including the self-immolation of Dr. Laura Schlessinger. Apparently Schlessinger was the last public figure in the U.S. who does not understand the simple rules …

Discussion: Romenesko and TPMDC

Andrew Adam Newman / New York Times:

Now Playing: A Short Film Starring Branded Content — IN “Charley,” a nine-minute film by Dee Austin Robertson, a young couple visiting New York for a romantic weekend, Courtney and Ryan (played by Alexia Rasmussen and Brian McElhaney), are first seen through a glass door with an Ace Hotel sign painted on it.

Discussion: AdPulp

The 48th New York Film Festival:

Film Comment September/October 2010: Revenge of the Nerd — The misanthropic soul at the heart of The Social Network, David Fincher's 21st-century moral tale — It was E.M. Forster, of course, who scripted that immortal, oft-abbreviated imperative: “Only connect, and the beast and the monk …

Discussion: The Playlist, MTV Movies Blog, Awards Daily's Oscar Countdown and The Middletown Press

Chris Tolles / TechCrunch:

When Attorneys General Attack — Earlier this year Topix CEO Chris Tolles got the call no one wants to get - that they were under investigation by a government entity. Two attorneys general, one of which was deep into his senate run, were leveling accusations of abuse at Topix.

Michael M. Phillips / Wall Street Journal:

An Airline Magazine That Makes Travelers Want to Pull the Rip Cord — Safi Shows the Real Afghanistan, From Dog Fighting to Dry Swimming Pools — KABUL—Safi Airways, a start-up Afghan airline, ventures where few air carriers dare to go: Its in-flight magazine tells the ugly truth about the place where you're about to land.

Discussion: CJR, newsfeed.time.com, Romenesko and New York Magazine

Claire Atkinson / New York Post:

Disney, TWC talks escalate — Negotiations between Walt Disney Co. and Time Warner Cable over continued carriage of ESPN, ABC and other Disney channels are intensifying as both companies gird for battle. — ESPN President George Bodenheimer and Sean Bratches, the sports network's head …

Discussion: Light Reading and Company Town

Mike Fleming / Deadline.com:

Google Founders Sergey Brin And Larry Page Get Feature Film Treatment — EXCLUSIVE: The founders of Facebook aren't the only game-changing geeks poised to have their story told on a movie screen. Michael London's Groundswell Productions has teamed with producer John Morris to acquire movie rights …

Sarah Rabil / Bloomberg:

Yahoo May Buy a Stake in Hulu Video Site, Stifel Nicolaus Says — Aug. 20 (Bloomberg) — Yahoo! Inc. may buy a “considerable” stake in Hulu LLC if the video website pursues an initial public offering, according to Stifel Nicolaus & Co. — Hulu, owned by three of the biggest U.S. broadcast networks …

Steve Buttry / The Buttry Diary:

Research shows Twitter's value in questioning rumors — Readers of this blog know that Twitter is one of the best tools for covering breaking news. — But if you listen to and read the Twitter haters, you also hear that Twitter is a place where false rumors spread rapidly.

Lucia Moses / Mediaweek:

Elle to Launch Customizable iPad App — Hachette Filipacchi Media's Elle won't be the first of the big fashion monthlies to come out with its own app for the iPad when it launches with its October issue in mid-September (Condé Nast's Glamour beat it by a month, having launched with its September issue).

Wall Street Journal:

Violence in Mexico Takes Rising Toll on Press — MEXICO CITY—When unknown assailants recently lobbed grenades at the offices of Mexico's powerful broadcaster Televisa in Monterrey and Matamoros, the blasts were seen as a message to the country's media: Beware covering the drug war.

Chris Cameron / ReadWriteWeb:

Can Augmented Reality Help Save the Print Publishing Industry? — There's a memorable scene in the movie Minority Report where a man reads a futuristic newspaper with rich embedded multimedia updating live with breaking news. While we are a long way seeing anything like this in the hands …

Discussion: CJR, TeleRead, Mobile Marketer, Journalism.co.uk, TechCrunch Europe and MarketingVOX

Diana Marszalek / TVNewsCheck:

CNN's Switch To Oasis Troubles Stations — Not long ago, KPHO Phoenix producers used to air up to eight CNN Newsource stories a day in its newscasts. — “Now, they use virtually none,” says Ed Williams, director of engineering at the CBS affiliate. One, maybe two, CNN stories make it on air a week, he says.

Discussion: TVNewser

Claire Atkinson / New York Post:

Hulu brouhaha — A top Hollywood producer lashed out against Hulu amid reports that the popular online hub for watching TV shows is preparing a $2 billion public offering, saying content providers will come away empty-handed. — Steven Levitan, who created ABC's hit comedy “Modern Family …

Foster Kamer / Runnin' Scared:

ChatRoulette Made Relevant Possibly for the Last Time by Genius, Hysterical Marketing Campaign (Video) — Yes, if you can see that headline, you read it correctly: “Genius,” and “Hysterical.” Two things people haven't thought about ChatRoulette being since, well, everyone got over the initial excitement of ChatRoulette.