Mediagazer: Google Campaign to Build Up Its Display Ads (Claire Cain Miller/New York Times)

7:45 PM ET, September 22, 2010

Top News:

Michael Oliveira / Globe and Mail:

Netflix apologizes for using actors to meet press at Canadian launch — Video-streaming website Netflix Inc. NFLX-Q closed down a Toronto street Wednesday and attracted dozens of onlookers for a splashy launch to promote its highly anticipated foray into Canada. — MORE RELATED TO THIS STORY

Discussion: MediaMemo, Romenesko, Gawker, Media Maverick, Engadget, The Next Web, Gearlog and Techdirt, more at Techmeme »

The New York Times Company:

The New York Times Company Updates Third-Quarter 2010 Outlook — The New York Times Company today will discuss its business, strategy and management's outlook during the Goldman Sachs Communacopia XIX Conference. — The following are certain anticipated results for the third quarter of 2010 compared to the same period in 2009:

Discussion: MediaPost, Romenesko, Associated Press, The Wrap, Guardian, Gannett Blog and eMedia Vitals

Henry Blodget / The Wire: The Next Shoe Drops At The New York Times: Now Circulation Revenue …

Peter Kafka / MediaMemo:
New York Times: We're Not a Newspaper Company. …

Discussion: paidContent, WebNewser and Press Gazette

Jeff Bercovici / DailyFinance:

Muzzled Reporter Says ‘Maw of Yahoo’ No Place for Journalism — Yahoo (YHOO) has been trying to leverage its leading position in the portal business into a comparable dominance of premium content. But it's not so easy for a technology company to build a culture of journalism …

Discussion: Runnin' Scared, Silicon Alley Insider, New York Observer and New York Magazine

Foster Kamer / Runnin' Scared:
John Cook Leaving (Maw of) Yahoo News, Returning to Gawker

Discussion: Andrew Golis, New York Observer and The Wrap

Scott Rosenberg / Scott Rosenberg's Wordyard:

Journalists follow their voices, vote with their feet — As the beleaguring of traditional news organizations continues, newsrooms are actually growing elsewhere. You may have noticed that places like Yahoo, AOL and the Huffington Post are all hiring these days — and they're hiring, um, actual journalists.

Discussion: Salon, The Wire, On Media's Blog, Etaoin Shrdlu, Gawker, Washington Monthly, Soup, The Wrap and Washington Post

The Huffington Post:
Phil Pruitt Joins Yahoo! News As Politics Editor

Discussion: Romenesko and The Wire

John Koblin / New York Observer:

Jill Abramson Returning to Role of Managing Editor Ahead of Schedule — Back in May, Times executive editor Bill Keller announced that managing editor Jill Abramson would be taking a detour from her managing editing duties to immerse herself with life on the web.

Discussion: Runnin' Scared and Romenesko

Claire Cain Miller / New York Times:

Google Campaign to Build Up Its Display Ads — Google, the online search ad giant that rarely advertises, has decided it needs to advertise the fact that it is in the online display advertising business. — And if that is not enough advertising about advertising, it has picked …

Discussion: Silicon Alley Insider, New York Observer, MarketingVOX and NYConvergence

Peter Kafka / MediaMemo:

Tim Armstrong Won't Talk About AOL's Secret Video Plans — Tim Armstrong will usually talk at length, if not in specifics, about what he's up to at AOL. Not so when it comes to video. — “Yes, we have a video strategy, and no, I'm not going to go into detail on it,” he told (or didn't tell) …

Discussion: NetNewsCheck Latest, Media Money …, paidContent and Silicon Alley Insider

Dylan Stableford / The Wrap:

What's Behind the Exodus at Newsweek? — Next week, the sale of Newsweek to Sidney Harman will be finalized, giving the 91-year-old audio equipment magnate control of the struggling newsweekly. — And the magazine's masthead will look quite a bit different than the one he agreed to buy more than a month ago.

Discussion: New York Magazine, Romenesko and MediaPost

Keith J. Kelly / New York Post: Harman: My son's an intern, not an heir apparent

Mallary Jean Tenore / Poynter Online:

How Slate's Jack Shafer Calls Out Bogus Trend Stories — After Jack Shafer called out The New York Times for running a “bogus trend story” about criminals wearing Yankees caps, journalists had fun with the criticism on Twitter. — The Times' Nicholas Kristof tweeted: “@jackshafer Quit picking on us!

Discussion: Romenesko

Howard Kurtz:

Woodward scores but loses exclusive — The scoop artist keeps getting scooped. — Bob Woodward's carefully choreographed rollout of his new book on the Obama White House was disrupted Tuesday night when the New York Times got hold of a copy and posted a story on its Web site.

Discussion: Mediaite, CJR, Guardian, Washington Post, The Daily Dish and On Media's Blog

Rachel Sklar / Mediaite:

Kommons Will Sneakily Make You Blog For Free — Last Wednesday, Sept. 15th, a website called Kommons went live - and is sort of brilliant. It's basically Formspring meets Twitter meets “Meet The Press,” or something: A community that seeks smart, conversation-furthering answers prompted by smart, probing questions — publicly.

Discussion: Kommons

Zeke Turner / New York Observer:

Live Blog: Bill Keller Discusses the Future of the News — New York Times executive editor Bill Keller will be on NPR's On Point with Tom Ashbrook this morning discussing “his paper and the radically changing news business,” according to a promo. Live blog updates from the Media Mob here once the program gets started.

Discussion: Romenesko, WBUR and NPR and The Wire

Jeff Jarvis / BuzzMachine:

Wrong battlefield — It's kinda touching that Rupert Murdoch's loyal lieutenants are trying to entertain the boss by starting an old-fashioned newspaper war (old-fashioned modifies newspaper). But it's also ever-more revealing of their worldview. — And of course, the best way to declare …

Discussion: Guardian

Michael Arrington / TechCrunch:

So A Blogger Walks Into A Bar... Yesterday I was tipped off about a “secret meeting” between a group of “Super Angels” being held at Bin 38, a restaurant and bar in San Francisco. “Do not come, you will not be welcome,” I was told. — So I did what any self respecting blogger would do …

Henry Blodget / Silicon Alley Insider:
Hooray For Mike Arrington

Discussion: VentureBeat, GigaOM and ReadWriteWeb, more at Techmeme »

Peter Kafka / MediaMemo:

Real-Time Web Analytics Start-Up Chartbeat Tallies Up More Investors — Chartbeat, the real-time Web-publishing analytics service, has added a few more investors to its previously announced $3 million funding round. Joining Index Ventures et al are: Automattic founder Matt Mullenweg …

Discussion: New York Observer

Julie Creswell / New York Times:

For a Few, Papers Seem a Timely Bet — Randall D. Smith, a pioneer in the hard knocks business of vulture investing, is circling a new target: the beleaguered newspaper industry. — Mr. Smith puts money into risky investments that few others will touch — and these days, that includes many newspaper and radio companies.

Discussion: Romenesko and Guardian

Brooks Barnes / Media Decoder:

Barry Meyer to Remain Chairman of Warner Brothers — Barry Meyer will remain chairman of Warner Brothers after all. — Time Warner on Wednesday answered the lingering question of succession at its movie studio, extending the contract of Mr. Meyer — who had been expected to retire next year …

Discussion: paidContent, The Wrap, Variety and Company Town

Dan Duray / New York Observer:

Rise of the Recappers: For a New Class of Struggling Writers, It's Time To Watch TV — Last month Jerry Saltz, the art critic and judge on the recently finished first season of Bravo's Work of Art, praised the practice of TV recapping in an essay posted to his popular Facebook profile.

Discussion: The Awl

Thessaly La Force / The Paris Review:

Jennifer Over and Our New Web Site — You may have noticed that our Web site looks different. It's prettier, less cluttered, easier on the eyes—it's a delight to click on every page. Meet Jennifer, the Web designer with Tierra Innovation who was crucial to envisioning our redesign.

Discussion: PRWeb

Joshua Benton / Nieman Journalism Lab:

NYT's Opinion Pages continue the march toward app-inspired design — Above is a screenshot of The New York Times' opinion section, whose redesign went live a few hours ago. Looks sharp, doesn't it? It also looks like it's itching to be put into a different context:

Discussion: Romenesko and yelvington.com

Bloomberg:

Michael Eisner Says ‘Highly Unlikely’ He Would Take Tribune Chairman Job — Michael Eisner, the former chief executive officer of Walt Disney Co., said it's “highly unlikely” that he would take the chairman job at Tribune Co., the bankrupt newspaper publisher.

Discussion: Hollywood Reporter and Romenesko

Laura Oliver / Journalism.co.uk:

Building Design website puts ‘premium’ content behind paywall — United Business Media has introduced a new paywall to Building Design's site BDOnline.co.uk, which will now charge readers for “premium” content. — Breaking news will remain free to view on the site, as will video content and newsletters …

Discussion: Editors Weblog and bdonline.co.uk

Paul Bond / Hollywood Reporter:

Yahoo CEO: ‘Our real competitor is TV’ — Carol Bartz also says online advertising will get better — In case it was ever in doubt, Yahoo's competition is television. — That's what Yahoo CEO Carol Bartz said Tuesday at the Goldman Sachs Communacopia XIX Conference.