Mediagazer: Same-Day E-Book Sales Propel Grisham's Thriller (Jeffrey A. Trachtenberg/Wall Street …)

4:55 PM ET, November 9, 2010

Top News:

Schools Chancellor Klein to Join News Corp. — New York City schools chancellor Joel Klein is resigning to join News Corp., ending an eight-year reign at the helm of the nation's largest school system. — In his place, Mayor Michael Bloomberg is expected to announce Cathie Black, chairwoman of Hearst Magazines.

Discussion: New York Times, Media Decoder, Romenesko, Runnin' Scared, Gothamist, Bloomberg, WNYC News, NY Daily News, The Politico and Crain's New York Business

Steve Cohn / MinOnline:

Cathie Black Quits Hearst to Become NYC Schools Chancellor — Cathie Black, president of Hearst Magazines for nearly 15 years before becoming chairman with David Carey's hire in June, was appointed New York City schools chancellor by Mayor Michael Bloomberg.

Michael Calderone / Yahoo! News:

Fake ‘Olbermann’ emails sent to Philly columnist — Tucker Carlson boasted last July that his site, The Daily Caller, bought the domain name for liberal MSNBC host Keith Olbermann. Carlson, a conservative journalist and pundit, even said he would start using the email address keith@keitholbermann.com as a gag.

Discussion: Romenesko, New York Observer, CJR, Media Decoder, The Wire, Salon and Inside Cable News

Bill Carter / Media Decoder:
Olbermann Apologizes to Viewers, But Not to MSNBC

Discussion: Mixed Media, Mediaite, Washington Post, Inside Cable News, Gothamist, Gawker, Salon, TPM LiveWire, Romenesko and New York Times

Clay Shirky:

The Times' Paywall and Newsletter Economics — It is, perhaps, the end of the beginning. — In early July, Rupert Murdoch's News Corporation placed its two London-based “quality” dailies, the Times and Sunday Times, behind a paywall, charging £1 for 24 hours access, or £2 a week …

Discussion: Jon Slattery, George Brock, Boing Boing, TeleRead and Guardian

Jeffrey A. Trachtenberg / Wall Street Journal:

Same-Day E-Book Sales Propel Grisham's Thriller — In recent years, even some of the biggest authors have lost gravitational pull with readers. But for John Grisham's 24th adult book, “The Confession,” the e-book version has helped propel first-week sales beyond that of his last legal thriller.

Discussion: Poynter Online and TeleRead

Jane Smith / How Publishing Really Works:

Cooks Source Issues A Statement — I had a brief look at the Cooks Source website this morning and it was still there in a somewhat truncated version: the home-page was pretty much unchanged, but most of the other links had gone. — I just took another look, and all it contains …

Discussion: Whatever, All Facebook, kane-magus.livejournal.com, The SunBreak, Lisa Gold and NPR

Janet Paskin / CJR:

Serious Fun With Numbers — We're drowning in data, but few reporters know how to use them — The story was already great, even before Daniel Gilbert opened his first spreadsheet. Thousands of citizens in the southern Virginia area Gilbert covered for the Bristol Herald Courier …

Steve Krakauer / Mediaite:

Conan O'Brien's First TBS Monologue: Still Bitter About The NBC Break-Up — Conan O'Brien made his return to late night TV tonight with the first episode of TBS' Conan. In some ways, the opening monologue of the premiere picked up from where he left off in the two weeks of his former NBC show …

Discussion: Gawker, Media Decoder, MediaFile, AdAge, New York Times, The Daily Beast, Gothamist, Vanity Fair and SportsGrid

Matthew Lynley / VentureBeat:

So you think you're a journalist? Sell your stories on eByline — eByline, an online service that brings together freelance journalists and publishers looking for stories, announced today it has raised $1.5 million in its first round of funding from The E.W. Scripps Company.

Discussion: VatorNews and paidContent

New York Observer:

Woodward, Bradlee Star in Slick WaPo Promotion — “Hey, was that Robert Redford?” someone asks as a camera follows Bob Woodward around the offices of The Washington Post. The recently posted video is meant to promote the paper's iPad app. We can't speak to the quality of the app but this video sure is polished!

Discussion: CJR

Paul Bond / Hollywood Reporter:

Former Time Warner CEO Gerald Levin Returns to Media Business … Gerald Levin is getting back into the media business, though in a far more subdued manner than before. — Levin, who once brokered controversial megadeals as CEO of Time Warner, is set to announce Tuesday that he has joined Oasis TV as a senior adviser.

Discussion: Gawker and Company Town

James Wolcott / Vanity Fair:

The Sound of Sanity — Not only is National Public Radio a last bastion of calm, reliable reporting, it reaches more people than Fox News. But as NPR celebrates its 40th anniversary, it suffers from one glaring bias: against the author. — It isn't until I leave New York City and turn …

Discussion: Romenesko

Claire Atkinson / New York Post:

Yahoo! on KKR radar — Tweet — The list of private-equity firms circling Yahoo! is getting longer. — PE giant KKR & Co. is among the parties interested in either taking Yahoo! private or helping finance a deal if the struggling Internet pioneer decides to go that route, The Post has learned.

Discussion: Crave and DailyFinance

Wall Street Journal:

Ads, Politics Blur Media Lines — Talk Show Hosts Help Raise Cash and Attention for Advocacy Groups That Advertise — Cable-news network MSNBC briefly suspended liberal host Keith Olbermann last week for crossing a line between the media and politics when it learned he donated $2,400 each to three Democratic Party candidates.

Shira Ovide / Deal Journal:

Shhh...Quadrangle's Kinda-Secret Media Pow-Wow Hits the Plaza — Media moguls and financiers gathered at New York's Plaza Hotel today for the kick-off to Quadrangle's hush-hush annual media conference, Foursquare. — The two-day event, hosted by the New York-based private equity firm …

Johnny Diaz / Boston Globe:

Facebook sues Phoenix Media over patent rights — Global social networking site Facebook Inc. is suing Phoenix Media/Communications, which owns The Boston Phoenix and WFNX-FM 101.7, for allegedly infringing on two patents that it says help the media company manage content online.

Discussion: Romenesko

WWD:

W Film Debuts... Net-a-porter Names U.S. Editor... COMING ATTRACTIONS: When word got out last summer that W magazine had invited a film crew into its offices, the fashion commentariat took to wondering if Stefano Tonchi and company had their own “The September Issue” in store. The answer is: Not quite.

Kenneth Li / Reuters:

US TV networks seek to stop FilmOn — Four top U.S. television networks have asked a federal court to stop the Internet video service FilmOn.com from offering TV channels over the web and on Apple Inc's (AAPL.O) iPad for free. — FilmOn.com Plc (2F0.BE), which claims to be the first high …

Sarah Rabil / Bloomberg:

The Man Who Blacked Out News Corp. World Series Says Politicians to Blame — News Corp.'s Chase Carey, the man who oversaw Fox's talks with Cablevision Systems Corp. during a two- week blackout, has advice for government officials who want to keep more TV channels from going dark: Stop meddling.

The Atlantic Wire:

Max Read: What I Read — How do people deal with the torrent of information that rains down on us all? What's the secret to staying on top of the news without surrendering to the chaos of it? In this series, we ask people who seem well-informed to describe their media diets.

Justin Ellis / Nieman Journalism Lab:

Meet Intersect, where storytelling, time, and location get all mashed up — It's near impossible to tell a story that doesn't have a place or a time. As readers and just as humans we have a difficult time connecting with a story — be it a friendly anecdote or a news article — that doesn't tell us where it happened and when.

Yinka Adegoke / Reuters:

Time Warner Cable targets rivals, Hulu with Look Back — (Reuters) - Time Warner Cable will launch on Monday a service to allow subscribers to watch some of their favorite shows three days after they've originally aired as it aims to stay ahead of the growing threat of cheaper Web video services like Netflix Inc and Hulu.

Discussion: MediaPost