Mediagazer: Gerry Spector exiting as Tribune Co. COO (Phil Rosenthal/Tower Ticker)

6:25 PM ET, December 28, 2010

Top News:

Michael Calderone / Yahoo! News:

Shuster's officially out of MSNBC; starting new journalism venture — David Shuster told his Twitter followers Monday night that he's “returning to the airwaves” as a substitute radio host this week. — The brief message was notable because it had been more than five months since Shuster …

Discussion: Mediaite, Inside Cable News, TVNewser, New York Observer, Poynter and On Media's Blog

Phil Rosenthal / Tower Ticker:

Gerry Spector exiting as Tribune Co. COO — Tribune Co. Chief Operating Officer Gerry Spector, a long-time associate of real estate billionaire Sam Zell, is leaving the Chicago-based media company he has helped lead since Zell took it private three years ago.

Discussion: MediaPost, Poynter, New York Observer and The Wrap

Justin Osofsky / Facebook Developers Blog:

Making News and Entertainment More Social in 2011 — Throughout this year, we have worked closely with media organizations to make their content even more social by empowering readers to experience media through their friends and easily discover and share great content.

Discussion: Lost Remote, Thanks:malliegator

Julia Boorstin / CNBC:

2010 Surprise: Newspaper Stocks Q4 Surge — Newspaper publishers face huge challenges—the decline in subscriptions and ad revenue, and the flight of readers to the web. So it comes as a surprise that newspaper stocks have led media in the fourth quarter, rising 22 percent.

Discussion: Beet.TV

Joel Rosenblatt / Bloomberg:

Apple Sued Over Applications Giving Information to Advertisers — Apple Inc., making of the iPhone and iPad, was accused in a lawsuit of allowing applications for those devices to transmit users' personal information to advertising networks without customers' consent.

Discussion: AdAge, Epicenter, SAI, Bloomberg and Hillicon Valley, more at Techmeme »

Glenn Greenwald / Salon:

The merger of journalists and government officials — The video of the CNN debate I did last night about WikiLeaks with former Bush Homeland Security Adviser (and CNN contributor) Fran Townsend and CNN anchor Jessica Yellin is posted below. The way it proceeded was quite instructive …

Discussion: The Huffington Post, The Wire and mediabistro.com

Marshall Kirkpatrick / ReadWriteWeb:

Anonymous Twitter Account Named Music Critic of Year by Village Voice — New York cultural periodical the Village Voice has named @discographies, an anonymous Twitter account that publishes 140-character reviews of the life work of musicians and bands, as its music critic of the year.

Discussion: mediabistro.com, Fast Company and Sound of the City

Clive Thompson / Wired:

Clive Thompson on How Tweets and Texts Nurture In-Depth Analysis — We're often told that the Internet has destroyed people's patience for long, well-thought-out arguments. After all, the ascendant discussions of our day are text messages, tweets, and status updates.

Kevin Zimmerman / splicetoday.com:

Late Night Comedy to U.S. Congress — Will Jon Stewart soon be another Al Franken? — A piece in yesterday's New York Times explores the idea that Jon Stewart's vocal support of a bill pledging federal funds for 9/11 responders' health care was key to its passage.

Discussion: The Huffington Post and Most Recent Home Page Posts …

Steve Krakauer / CNN:
Media Analysis: Murrow didn't do fart jokes: Why Jon Stewart …

Discussion: Media Myth Alert, Gothamist and Soup

Palo Alto Patch:

An Apology to Palo Alto Patch Readers — To Palo Alto Patch Readers: — We recently discovered that one of our freelance writers lifted information for one of his business reports from VentureBeat, an online news site covering technology and innovation in Silicon Valley and elsewhere.

Discussion: NetNewsCheck Latest and San Francisco Peninsula …

Neal Pollack / Wired:

Spotify Is the Coolest Music Service You Can't Use — On the first Monday in October, Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer gave a speech to students at Sweden's Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm. The lecture hall—"one of the most vertical auditoriums I've ever been in," Ballmer told the group …

Andy Plesser / Beet.TV:

New Social Video Sharing Site Qlipso Claims 14 Million Monthly Uniques with 4X Time Spent vs. YouTube — MONACO — Qlipso, the Los Angeles based video sharing site, which allows users to interact around videos with friends in “private rooms” with videos and their own avatars, claims 14 million unique monthly viewers.

Debra Aho Williamson / eMarketer and Blog Posts:

Marketers Spending More on Social Media for the Wrong Reasons — Companies will spend more than ever on social media marketing in 2011, but some businesses are boosting budgets for entirely the wrong reasons. — In my new report “Social Media in the Marketing Mix: Budgeting for 2011,” …

Sports Illustrated:

Media Awards for 2010 — Honoring best, worst from TV, radio, print, online … Person of the Year — THE PICK: Mike Pereira (Fox Sports). — Revolutions in sports television sometimes come with little fanfare. Fox initially thought Pereira, the former vice president of officiating for the NFL …

Dan Sabbagh / Guardian:

Watch the next Ashes on the Times website — It's the future of media: live and exclusive daytime sports from the comfort of your office and your favorite Murdoch newspaper. Don't bother with the rest. — So, England may yet win the Ashes, which some of you will have been watching during …