Mediagazer: The Fallen Status of Books (Jack Shafer/Slate)

3:25 AM ET, September 10, 2010

Top News:

Brian Stelter / New York Times:

Coverage of Koran Case Stirs Questions on Media Role — A renegade pastor and his tiny flock set fire to a Koran on a street corner, and made sure to capture it on film. And they were ignored. — That stunt took place in 2008, involving members of the Westboro Baptist Church from Topeka …

Discussion: Orlando Sentinel, Guardian, The Daily Dish and Gothamist

Sarah Lacy / TechCrunch:

Don't Blame Media, Blame the Media-Audience Infinite Loop — I've spent two days listening to and reading near-constant coverage of the wacko who's planning to burn Korans in Gainsville, Florida, and increasingly the stories have been about whether or not all the press attention has been irresponsible.

Discussion: Mediaite, New York Times, Romenesko, Lost Remote, Strupp, International Media and CNN

Michael Calderone / Yahoo! News:
Plan to burn Qurans ignites media frenzy

Discussion: Romenesko, George's Bottom Line, The Huffington Post, Silicon Alley Insider, Threat Level, The Register, The Daily Caller, CrunchGear, Poynter Online, Washington Wire, USA Today, TPMMuckraker and CNN, more at Techmeme »

David Zurawik / Z on TV:
Fox News says it will not cover burning of Quran

Discussion: Associated Press, Media Decoder, Romenesko, New York Times, CNN, USA Today, Daily Record, PostPartisan, Mediaite, CJR, Gothamist, TVNewser, The Wire, New York Magazine and Spiegel Online

Jack Shafer / Slate:

The Fallen Status of Books — Hard times for hardcovers. — No greater pride befalls a scholar, a thinker, a journalist, a business executive, or other writer than to have a party thrown in honor of the publication of his book. A book party is like a wedding, a birthday party, a baptism …

Discussion: Change of Subject

John Koblin / New York Observer:

Wall Street Journal To Launch A Book Review Section — The Observer has learned that The Wall Street Journal will launch a weekly book review within the next few weeks. The Journal has never had a standalone book review before, and creating one now flies in the face of ever-dwindling book coverage in papers across the country.

Discussion: Media Buyer Planner, Gawker, Romenesko, New York Magazine, Shaping the Future …, Crain's New York Business, The Wire, GalleyCat and On Media's Blog

Jenna Wortham / Bits:

Betaworks and The Times Plan a Social News Service — Something is stirring deep within the technology incubator Betaworks: A personalized news service called News.me that is being developed in collaboration with The New York Times. — On Thursday, a cryptic placeholder for the service went live.

Discussion: Mashable, The Next Web, paidContent, Lost Remote and New York Magazine

Jennifer Valentino-DeVries / Digits:

Online Measurement Creates a Muddle for Web Journalists — When it comes to data about readers, maybe online news organizations have too much of what should be a good thing. — Web editors have a plethora of options when it comes to seeing what visitors are doing online.

David Kaplan / paidContent:

Reuters Taps Slate's James Ledbetter As Website Editor — Two months after the Slate Group folded its business news site The Big Money, its former editor-in-chief James Ledbetter is heading to Reuters (NYSE: TRI) to run the company's website, paidContent has learned. Both Reuters and Ledbetter confirmed the hiring.

Discussion: Talking Biz News, Romenesko and DailyFinance

Joel Johnson / Gizmodo:

Forget Apple TV. AirPlay Is Apple's Sneak Attack On Television — It was almost a footnote. AirPlay, the audio streaming protocol once known as AirTunes, got just one minute of keynote time last week. But it might end up as the backbone of Apple's assault on the living room. More »

more at Techmeme »

Michael Calderone / Yahoo! News:

Newsweek's Weymouth heads to Washington Post — Lally Weymouth, a special diplomatic correspondent at Newsweek, becomes the latest high-ranking staffer to leave the magazine since audio magnate Sidney Harman agreed to buy it from the Washington Post Co. — Weymouth will join …

Discussion: Romenesko and On Media's Blog

rbr.com:

Emmis buyout effort ended in frustration — Founder and CEO Jeff Smulyan had tried and failed once before to take Emmis Communications private, so he hung on to the bitter end this time as a shareholders meeting that began August 3rd was convened for the 10th time on Thursday, September 9th.

Discussion: Indianapolis Star, Romenesko, Folio and Media Buyer Planner

Philip Stone / FollowTheMedia:

What's More Important: The Money A Paywall Web Site Brings In Or The Influence - Branding - Earned From Letting Everyone In Free? — Jimmy Wales, founder of Wikipedia, says the Murdoch paywall at the Times and Sunday Times in the UK is a “foolish experiment” mainly because their readership online …

Kim Zetter / Threat Level:

Massive Cache of Iraq War Docs to Be Published by WikiLeaks — A massive cache of previously unpublished classified U.S. military documents from the Iraq War is being readied for publication by WikiLeaks, a new report has confirmed. — The documents constitute the “biggest leak of military intelligence” …

Discussion: New York Magazine and Boing Boing

Helsinki Times:

Telanne: “Prepare to pay for online content” — Alma Media's CEO Kai Telanne is convinced that the days of free online news content are numbered. In an interview with the National Coalition party organ Verkkouutiset, he said that in future more and more newspapers will charge readers for online content.

Peter Kafka / MediaMemo:

BREAKING: YouTube Still Isn't Profitable. But It Will Be, Says Google. Again. — Officially, Google doesn't talk about YouTube's profitability, or lack thereof. Except, of course, when Google executives do talk about it. — Then they say that YouTube is very close to becoming profitable.

Discussion: Gizmodo, Macworld and NewTeeVee

Wall Street Journal:

As Ratings Slump, CNN Shifts Focus to New Faces — CNN, rebooting in a bid to revive its slumping ratings, officially tapped a former British tabloid editor to take over its flagship prime-time show. — Piers Morgan, who in recent years has reinvented himself as a TV interviewer and judge …

Discussion: Speakeasy