Mediagazer: As Funding Talk Swirls, Tumblr Lands A Director Of Product (MG Siegler/TechCrunch)

5:20 PM ET, November 12, 2010

Top News:

Daily Beast, Newsweek to Wed! — Some weddings take longer to plan than others. The union of The Daily Beast and Newsweek magazine finally took place with a coffee-mug toast between all parties Tuesday evening, in a conference room atop Beast headquarters, the IAC building on Manhattan's West 18th Street.

Jeremy W. Peters / Media Decoder:

Newsweek and Daily Beast Have a Deal — Tina Brown is back in the world of print. — After a brief and interrupted dalliance, Newsweek, the 77-year-old magazine, and The Daily Beast, Ms. Brown's two-year-old Web site, have decided to put their cultural differences aside and join forces.

Nick Summers / New York Observer:

New Details Emerge on Newsweek-Beast Merger — Tina Brown met separately with the staffs of The Daily Beast and Newsweek today, just hours after a merger between the two very different publications was completed. Details of the combined entity, to be known officially as The Newsweek Daily Beast Company, are beginning to emerge.

Discussion: Guardian, Thompson on Hollywood, Mediaite and Romenesko

Keith J. Kelly / New York Post:

Newsweek CEO First Casualty of Deal with Daily Beast — Tweet — No sooner did the ink dry on the Newsweek-Daily Beast merger, than it claimed its first casualty in what could be a tumultuous marriage between print and the Web. — Newsweek CEO Tom Ascheim — the Washington Post Co. holdover …

Discussion: Telegraph, Los Angeles Times and The Week Magazine

Howard Kurtz / The Daily Beast:

Twitter Takes the Newsroom — The media's in trouble. The microblogging sensation is on fire. Can Biz Stone's latest gambit help prop up a financially crippled industry? Howard Kurtz reports. — Biz Stone, the funny and engaging co-founder of Twitter, had an unusual message …

Discussion: KnightBlog, AllTwitter and Romenesko

Mark Milian / CNN:

Yahoo to expand its blog network Monday — (CNN) — As countless print- or TV-based news organizations continue their descent, the future of the news business still seems curiously bright. — Just sniff around online for a look at the multitude of startups and internet giants throwing their bets on the table.

Discussion: Romenesko and New York Observer

Wall Street Journal:

James Frey's Next Act — For James Frey, success and controversy are a package deal. — His 2003 debut book, “A Million Little Pieces,” was named Amazon Book of the Year and has sold eight million copies in more than 30 languages. When it was revealed that parts of the purported memoir …

Discussion: io9 and The Awl

Suzanne Mozes / New York Magazine:

James Frey's Fiction Factory — The controversial author is hiring young writers to join him in a new publishing company. The goal is to produce the next Twilight. The contracts are brutal. — In February, James Frey was invited to speak to a small seminar in the graduate writing program at Columbia called “Can Truth Be Told?”

Discussion: New York Observer, Mediaite, The Paris Review, GalleyCat and Boing Boing

MG Siegler / TechCrunch:

As Funding Talk Swirls, Tumblr Lands A Director Of Product — Earlier today, a Business Insider report indicated that Tumblr has landed a “very big and competitive” new round of funding from Sequoia Capital. We're still looking into that, and they're not commenting, but here's one thing …

Discussion: New York Observer, more at Techmeme »

SAI: Silicon Alley Insider:
Tumblr Lands “Very Big And Competitive” Round From Sequoia

Discussion: VentureBeat

Wall Street Journal:

Valuing Facebook's Ads — The Site Commands 24% of Online Display Ads, but the Dollars Don't Match — Facebook Inc. is attracting more advertising, but marketers are still trying to figure out the value of those ads. — New data from comScore Inc. show that in September 24% …

Discussion: SAI and MediaPost

Ted Koppel / Washington Post:

Olbermann, O'Reilly and the death of real news — To witness Keith Olbermann - the most opinionated among MSNBC's left-leaning, Fox-baiting, money-generating hosts - suspended even briefly last week for making financial contributions to Democratic political candidates seemed like a whimsical …

Discussion: Romenesko, Mediaite and TVNewser

Alexis Mainland / City Room:

Young Manhattanite Is a Beacon on the Blog Scene — ON THE SCREEN In a list on its home page, the group blog Young Manhattanite offers 13 definitions of itself, including “a random Tumblr page” and “blogging Illuminati.” Both are accurate, as is this: YM is a cipher of insider chatter.

George Winslow / Broadcasting & Cable:

iPad Users More Likely to Cut Pay TV — A new survey from The Diffusion Group (TDG) finds that people who own iPads or are planning to purchased one in the new few months are significantly more likely than average adult broadband users to either downgrade or cancel their pay TV services.

Discussion: Fast Company and TVWeek.com

Hunter Walker / New York Observer:

Just How Big Is Patch.com? — After receiving approximately $50 million in funding from AOL, the hyperlocal news network Patch.com went on a hiring spree that earned it the ire of alt-weeklies and the nickname “Poach” from one rival. — Trepidation about the rapid rise of Patch hasn't been limited to its competitors.