Mediagazer: TV Tiptoes into the Web: Why Apple's iTunes Rentals Aren't Game-Changers (Peter Kafka/MediaMemo)

8:15 PM ET, August 31, 2010

Top News:

Mike Florio / NBCSports.com:

Washington Post suspends Mike Wise for a month — At the outset of his daily radio show on 106.7 the Fan in D.C., Mike Wise announced that the Washington Post has imposed a one-month suspension on him for his ill-advised Tuesday Twitter hoax regarding, ironically, the suspension of Steelers quarterback Ben Roethlisberger.

Discussion: Gawker, Ombudsman Blog, DCist, Press Coverage, The Huffington Post, Yahoo! News, Romenesko, NBC Sports, DailyFinance, The Wrap, Deadspin and TBD All News

Erik Wemple / TBD:
Colleague defends Washington Post's Mike Wise

Discussion: New York Observer, D.C. Sports Bog, Deadspin, Romenesko and TBD All News

Hamilton Nolan / Gawker:
Sports Columnist Cunningly Uses Twitter to Prove That He's Dumb

Discussion: D.C. Sports Bog, SportsGrid, Press Coverage, Romenesko and Back Porch FanHouse

Foster Kamer / Runnin' Scared:
The Washington Post Still Hates and Does Not “Get” The Internet (Or Themselves)

Discussion: Washington Post, Romenesko, AltWeeklies.com and SPORTSbyBROOKS

Dominic Patten / The Wrap:

Michael Eisner Close to Tribune Co. Takeover — Michael Eisner is ready to cross the finish line. — An announcement on the former Disney CEO becoming the chairman of the Tribune Co., is imminent, a person familiar with the talks has told TheWrap. — “Right now, it's going to be Eisner,” the person said.

Discussion: MediaPost, Romenesko, Gawker, Los Angeles Times, Runnin' Scared, New York Observer and LA Observed

Los Angeles Times:

Murdoch may be key to Apple's plan to offer 99-cent digital rentals of TV shows — Executives of the media baron's News Corp. are said to be split over whether to go along with the plan. NBC, CBS and Time Warner are opposed, while Disney is in favor. — The price that people pay to watch …

Discussion: VentureBeat, Company Town and TVWeek.com, more at Techmeme »

Peter Kafka / MediaMemo:

TV Tiptoes into the Web: Why Apple's iTunes Rentals Aren't Game-Changers — Very, very good bet: Steve Jobs will stand up onstage tomorrow and announce that you can rent some episodes of TV shows from iTunes for 99 cents a pop. — I'm told that Apple (AAPL) has finalized a deal with Disney …

Discussion: Multichannel News, more at Techmeme »

Village Voice:

NYC's Golden Gossip Era Fades — Gotham gossip loses grip, fights off rabble. Rattled tattletales tell all. — A few months ago, Richard Johnson, the 56-year-old long-time editor of Page Six, walks into the office of his boss, New York Post editor-in-chief Col Allan.

Richard MacManus / ReadWriteWeb:

iPad Newspapers: Ripe For Innovation — Just as the iPad has proven to be a boon to magazine publishers, newspapers have flocked to the device too. All of the major western newspapers have an iPad app now: the New York Times, Wall St Journal, Guardian, USA Today, Financial Times, and others.

Discussion: eMedia Vitals

Ryan Lawler / NewTeeVee: Cable iPad Apps at the Forefront of TV Everywhere

Howard Kurtz / Washington Post:

Bombastic Beck busts out — When I interviewed Glenn Beck two years ago, I told him that I found his remarks about the first Muslim member of Congress “horribly offensive.” — He had informed Minnesota's Keith Ellison during an interview that “what I feel like saying is, sir, prove to me that you are not working with our enemies.”

Discussion: MarketWatch, On Media's Blog, Slate, Yahoo! News and main page collection

Steve Krakauer / Mediaite:
Exclusive: Glenn Beck Launches “News And Opinion” Website, The Blaze

Discussion: The Wire, blogs.tampabay.com, Salon, The Blaze, Runnin' Scared, rbr.com, The Daily Caller, National Media, eMedia Vitals, Gawker, Moneywood, The New Yorker Blog, Hollywood Reporter, On Media's Blog, New York Magazine, New York Observer, The Wrap and Media Matters for America

Bloomberg:

Apple Said to Plan Netflix Streaming Service on New TV Product — Aug. 31 (Bloomberg) — Apple Inc., preparing to announce a new set-top box that delivers TV to consumers, will include movies from Netflix Inc., according to three people with knowledge of the plans.

Discussion: NewTeeVee, Fortune, CrunchGear, CNET News, The Seattle Times, Electronista, Engadget, 9 to 5 Mac, Silicon Alley Insider and Tech Trader Daily, more at Techmeme »

Barb Palser / American Journalism Review:

The Hazards of Hyperlocal — Why neighborhood news online is a dicey proposition A hallmark of a successful product is that it addresses an unmet consumer need or want, either conscious or latent. Like DVRs, Facebook and aerosol pancake batter. At this moment, news organizations …

Discussion: Lost Remote, Editors Weblog and HyperlocalBlogger

Jack Lail / Knoxville News-Sentinel:

Q&A with Elizabeth Spiers: Media insider offers insight on changing landscape — Elizabeth Spiers says it's a great time to start a digital content business. As part of the Future of News project, e-mail Q&A's were done with digital media industry insiders for their observations …

Discussion: Random Mumblings and Soup

MediaShift Idea Lab:

What the Spot.Us Community Thinks of Objectivity — The following post comes to us from Sameer Bhuchar, who is helping Spot.Us from Austin. — It has been said a thousand times before: The landscape of the modern media is changing. With today's more complex, active Internet ecosystem …

Patrick Smith / psmith, journalist:

It's not about selling news, it's about keeping customers — The paywall debate has focused on how consumers might consume the news industry's end product: news. “Will readers pay for news online?” “Will the industry survive this change?” “Won't people just get it for free someplace else?”

Mac Slocum / O'Reilly Radar:

Hacking online advertising — I gloss over the text ads that appear at the top of Gmail, but this one caught my eye: — I think it's clear I'm not the founder of TechCrunch. In that sense the ad failed to reach its intended audience. But I did notice the ad. I even clicked through.

News & Tech:

Dallas Morning News planning paid website — The Dallas Morning News plans to convert a portion of its website to paid access within the next six months, News & Tech has learned. — The Morning News' strategy will include walling off stories written by the paper's staff writers …

Discussion: Unfair Park, Romenesko and Nieman Journalism Lab

Staci D. Kramer / paidContent:

Deseret News Tries A Controlled Burn To Save Itself — Last week, one of the nation's top dailies imploded its structure to go “digital first.” Today, the Deseret News, a much smaller paper in Salt Lake City, Utah, is following USA Today with an equally radical reorganization but very different emphasis …

Discussion: Deseret News, Romenesko, Salt Lake Tribune and rbr.com

INMA:

Go to Australia to learn what's right about the news-on-paper environment — I was warned in advance by my Australian hosts to bring examples outside of the U.S. newspaper industry. While we're interested in what big news brands are doing to grow their business, they said …

Discussion: WHAT'S NEXT

Jim Romenesko / Poynter Online:

Too many old, decrepit newspaper captains — Too many old, decrepit newspaper captains — Missoulian digital manager Tim Akimoff's farewell (posted on Facebook) — The next adventure — So I've tried to live by G.K. Chesterton's quotes for the last few years of my life.

Discussion: The Wire

Barry Schwartz / Search Engine Roundtable:

Google Adds Blog Filter To Help Find Blogs On Subjects — Google announced they added a new filter that helps you find “specialized blogs” on any topic you can imagine. — Here is how it works. Go to Google, search for a topic, then click on the “blogs” filter on the left side (note: it might be hidden under a “more” link).

Megan Garber / Nieman Journalism Lab:

Boston.com launches a real estate-focused iPhone app — Yesterday, Boston.com, the website of the Boston Globe, announced the launch of its real estate-focused iPhone app. The new (and free) tool, per its iTunes description page, will allow users to:

Discussion: Poynter Online, broadstuff and WebNewser