Mediagazer: Informed Shopping, at a Price (Jeremy W. Peters/Media Decoder)

2:25 PM ET, October 18, 2010

Top News:

Daily Beast Drops Out of Talks With Newsweek — The Daily Beast news and commentary website has withdrawn from talks with Newsweek magazine about a possible merger between the two news organizations, according to a person familiar with the matter. — The two parties have been discussing …

Discussion: The Daily Beast, New York Magazine, Gawker, Folio, The Wire, New York Observer, The Atlantic Online, Romenesko, Mixed Media, The Huffington Post and Mediaweek

Jeremy W. Peters / New York Times:

Traffic Bait Doesn't Bring Ad Clicks — Sure, articles about Lindsay Lohan's repeat trips to rehabilitation and Brett Favre's purported sexual peccadilloes generate loads of reader traffic, but do they actually make decent money for the Web sites that publish them? — According to a new analysis, no.

Discussion: CJR, AdAge, SEOmoz Daily SEO Blog and Brooks in Beta

Perfect Market Blog:

Perfect Market: Vault Index Summer 2010 — Following Perfect Market's release today of the Vault Index and Infographic, which shows that serious news stories have markets for both audience and advertisers, a reporter asked this question, which is worth addressing:

Discussion: Search Engine Land, PRWeb, Nieman Journalism Lab, BusinessJournalism.org …, The Wrap, eMedia Vitals and NetNewsCheck Latest

Richard Mauer / Anchorage Daily News:

Miller security guards handcuff editor — The editor of the Alaska Dispatch website was arrested by U.S. Senate candidate Joe Miller's private security guards Sunday as the editor attempted to interview Miller on camera at the end of a public event in an Anchorage school.

Discussion: Alaska Dispatch, Nieman Journalism Lab, The Huffington Post, KTVA-TV, Ben Smith's Blog, CJR, New York Magazine, Yahoo! News, Gateway Pundit, Politics Daily, BAGnewsNotes, Hot Air, The Daily Dish, Talking Points Memo and Boing Boing

Peter Preston / Guardian:

We thought the internet was killing print. But it isn't — There is no clear correlation between a rise in internet traffic and a fall in newspaper circulation. Some papers are growing in both formats, others are succeeding in neither, according to new research — The woe, as usual, is more or less unconfined.

Discussion: Brooks in Beta and Kirk LaPointe's …

Paul Carr / TechCrunch:
NSFW: Respected Newspaper Man on the Death of Print - “La La La, I Can't Hear You”

Discussion: Soup

J. Jennings Moss / Portfolio:

The Quiet Mogul — What does it take to succeed in China or win as a venture capitalist or figure out a successful media strategy? For IDG's Pat McGovern, the answer to all three rests in trusting the people you hire. — Talking with Pat McGovern, you wouldn't automatically label him as a “media mogul.”

Brian Steinberg / AdAge:

Simon Who? ‘Idol’ Spots Still Priciest in Prime Time — Ad Age's Exclusive Annual Survey of Broadcast TV Ad Costs Has Fox Sitting Pretty With Five of Top 10 Shows — What a spot costs — Sunday Monday Tuesday Wednesday Thursday Friday Saturday

Discussion: TVWeek.com

Simon Dumenco / AdAge:

Why Do So Many New-Media Startups Ultimately Commit Suicide? — Life in the Fast Lane With VC-Enabled ‘Geniuses’ Who Do Themselves in With Not-So-Genius Moves — It's become accepted wisdom that many old-media companies are doomed; they're led by, the thinking goes, out-of-touch numbskulls.

Amir Efrati / Wall Street Journal:

Yahoo to Offer Media Links — Yahoo Inc. plans to mimic a strategy used by rival Facebook Inc. to help drive traffic to its site, people familiar with the matter said. — The Sunnyvale, Calif., company soon will roll out a feature called Y Connect to allow media publishers …

Discussion: Facebook Developer Blog, Mixed Media, Fast Company, Silicon Alley Insider, paidContent and Search Engine Land, more at Techmeme »

Jeremy Porter / Journalistics:

The Top 25 U.S. Newspapers According to Google — Clicks is one thing, credibility is another. When it comes to online credibility, Google PageRank rules over all. Few metrics illustrate true authority on the Web more than Google's PageRank. PageRank is the accepted standard for authority on the Web.

John Koblin / WWD:

Condé Nast Banks On Scott Dadich — CUTTING THE WIRE: Condé Nast “It” boy Scott Dadich has resigned as creative director at Wired to focus full time on his other gig as the company's executive director of digital-magazine development. Dadich got his corporate job back in July …

Discussion: New York Observer, Romenesko and magCulture.com/blog

Russ Smith / splicetoday.com:

One Quibble About the Best English-Language Magazine — Britain's Spectator stomps the competition for witty and erudite commentary, but its explanation of a re-design was gratuitous. — An editor of a magazine these days may receive no greater compliment than when a reader expresses …

Andy Plesser / Beet.TV:

HTML5 Video is Not Ready for the Web, W3C's Le Hegaret — CAMBRIDGE, Mass — Despite the growing demand for HTML5, and its deployment by many big online players, its commercial introduction is premature as there is no standard for the new technology, says Philippe Le Hegaret …

Lucia Moses / Mediaweek:

Daily Beast Still Reeling From ‘Brill-gate’ — In journalistic circles, the name Brill has come to be associated with comebacks—but it's also one that Tina Brown's The Daily Beast probably wishes would just go away. — This past week, a red-faced Beast added an unusually large number …