Mediagazer: How Neutral Should Journalists Be? — One school of thought contends … (Conor Friedersdorf/The Daily Dish)

12:30 AM ET, December 23, 2010

Top News:

Approval Talks Delay Comcast-NBC Deal — The long-awaited completion of the takeover of NBC Universal by Comcast will have to wait until the new year. — The outgoing NBC Universal chief executive Jeffrey Zucker sent a memo to staff members Wednesday afternoon explaining that regulatory approval …

Discussion: Susan Crawford blog, Broadcasting & Cable, Hillicon Valley, Company Town, Multichannel, Adweek, The Wrap, GigaOM, paidContent, On Media's Blog and Yahoo! News, more at Techmeme »

Edmund Lee / AdAge:

Barry Diller's IAC Creates Own Content Farm — Joins Yahoo, Demand Media With the Writer's Network, Seeking Freelancers for $10 to $25 Assignments — NEW YORK (AdAge.com) — Barry Diller appears to be cultivating his very own “content farm” at IAC. Though he recently relinquished …

Discussion: The Wrap and WebNewser, Thanks:learmonth

John Cook / Gawker:

ABC News Staffers Produce Propaganda Video Attacking Their Horrible New Boss — Nobody likes Ben Sherwood, a notoriously self-promoting former Good Morning America executive producer who was recently, and inexplicably, placed in charge of ABC News. Some of his new employees hate him so much they made this undermining video about him.

Discussion: The Huffington Post, Mediaite, The Daily Caller, The Wrap, New York Observer and Hollywood Reporter

Mathew Ingram / GigaOM:

Video Killed the Radio Star, But Might Save Newspapers — What comes to mind when you think of newspapers? Whatever it is, it's probably not streaming video. And yet, one of the interesting facts in a new survey of the online video market (PDF link) from video-hosting platform Brightcove …

Bloomberg:

WikiLeaks Joins Forces With Billionaire Lebedev — Dec. 22 (Bloomberg) — Novaya Gazeta, the Moscow newspaper controlled by former Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev and billionaire Alexander Lebedev, said it agreed to join forces with WikiLeaks to expose corruption in Russia.

Discussion: Yahoo! News, New York Magazine, Hit & Run and New York Observer

John Eggerton / Broadcasting & Cable:

Discovery: Dish Does Not Have Right To ‘Sling’ Its Content To Web — Tells FCC Dish does not have their permission to distribute its channels over the Internet — Discovery Counsel Tara Corvo has told the FCC that Dish does not have that company's permission to deliver Discovery's channels via …

Discussion: Free Press

Alan J. Heavens / Philly.com:

Stan Wischnowski named Inquirer's top editor — Stan Wischnowski, a veteran journalist who has presided over The Inquirer's front page for a decade, was named the newspaper's editor Tuesday by publisher Gregory J. Osberg to applause from reporters, editors, and photographers gathered for a holiday party in the newsroom.

Discussion: Media Decoder, MediaPost and mediabistro.com

James Barron / New York Times:

Times Sues City Police, Saying Information Has Been Illegally Withheld — The New York Times has sued the New York Police Department, saying the department had routinely violated a state law that requires government agencies to provide information to the press and the public.

Discussion: Yahoo! News, Mediaite, Gothamist, mediabistro.com, New York Observer, FishbowlNY, On Media's Blog and New York Magazine

Joshua Benton / Nieman Journalism Lab:

Vox populi: What Lab readers think journalism can expect in 2011 — In case you haven't noticed, we've been writing a lot about what a variety of smart people think 2011 will bring to the world of journalism. Will paywall go up everywhere or come tumbling down? Will hyperlocal thrive?

Nick Summers / New York Observer:

New York's Sam Anderson Ditches Moss, Joins Lindgren at Times Magazine — Here's a bomb blast in the war between Adam Moss and his former protege, Hugo Lindgren: Sam Anderson is leaving New York to join Mr. Lindgren's growing roster of talent at the New York Times Magazine.

Discussion: FishbowlNY

Conor Friedersdorf / The Daily Dish:

How Neutral Should Journalists Be? — One school of thought contends that balance is paramount: a contested matter demands that the reporter gives equal space to “both sides,” presents the debate to readers, and allows them to make up their own minds. — “We report, you decide!”

Patricio Robles / the Econsultancy blog:

Your iPad newspaper: even more expensive than the real thing? — Ask many consumers why they've stopped purchasing dead tree publications like newspapers, and chances are you'll hear comments like “the cost is too high.” — Ask those same consumers what they expect when it comes …

Discussion: Poynter

Martin Bryant / The Next Web:

The Social Guardian points to the future of real-time news sharing — It was only last week that we looked at the sad demise of Readness, a promising service that allowed users to share the news articles they were reading in real-time. Now, a new experimental project shows that the idea lives on.

Thanks:cbmyers