Mediagazer: Memo Pad: GQ's Menswear Finalists... Bill Keller's New Column... (David Lipke/WWD Media Headlines)

4:45 AM ET, January 27, 2011

Top News:

Dealing With Assange and the Secrets He Spilled — This past June, Alan Rusbridger, the editor of The Guardian, phoned me and asked, mysteriously, whether I had any idea how to arrange a secure communication. Not really, I confessed. The Times doesn't have encrypted phone lines, or a Cone of Silence.

Discussion: @wikileaks, Poynter, Threat Level, The Firewall, The Awl, Latest Open Salon Blog, Runnin' Scared, Yahoo! News, The Corsair, The Atlantic Wire, New York Magazine, The Huffington Post, FishbowlNY, Jon Slattery and Gothamist

Howard Kurtz / The Daily Beast:
Bill Keller's Clash with Assange

Discussion: Gawker, @chanders and The Atlantic Online

Raphael G. Satter / Associated Press:
AP Interview:WikiLeaks seeking more media partners

Discussion: blogs.journalism.co.uk, The Nation, Noted and Jon Slattery

Shira Ovide / Deal Journal:

New York Times Almost Bought Into Demand Media — Demand Media, which is fresh off its IPO, was almost part of the New York Times family. — Demand, a mass producer of instructional content, approached Times Co. executives more than three years ago about combining the company with About.com, a person familiar with the matter said.

Discussion: @rafat

Keith Richman / AdAge:

Why Demand Media Really Is a Media Company and Its IPO Will Succeed — Critics Conveniently Forget That Media Companies Have Always Scrambled to Give People Content They're Looking for — Today, Demand Media will have its IPO, and while the company and its model have taken a lot of hits lately …

Jeff Bercovici / Mixed Media:

Congratulations, Demand Media. You're Still Pretty Dumb. — Well, it happened: Demand Media went public. The content farm made its initial public offering this morning at a share price of $17, valuing it at almost $1.5 billion, and since then it's been trading in the range of $23.

Discussion: paidContent, The Wire, The Atlantic Online, Gannett Blog and Deal Journal

Julianne Pepitone / CNNMoney.com:
Demand Media shares soar 34% in IPO

Discussion: New York Magazine, Poynter, ReadWriteWeb, Future of Journalism, Poynter, Epicenter, Exile On Wall Street, VentureBeat and Wall Street Journal

Peter Kafka / MediaMemo:
Wall Street Welcomes the Content Farm: Demand Media Supersizes Its IPO

Discussion: FT tech hub, SAI, Deal Journal, Money & Company, Money & Company, paidContent, Black Web 2.0, VatorNews, The Wire and Dow Jones Newswires

Nicholas Carlson / The Business Insider:

Patch Is A Huge Waste Of Money, And It Has Us Worried About Tim Armstrong's Ability To Run AOL — AOL CEO Tim Armstrong believes that its local blog network, Patch, will be a “major” part of the company's turnaround as it fills one of the largest “white spaces” left on the Internet.

Discussion: Change of Subject

Maureen O'Connor / Gawker:

Plagiarizing Editor's Boss: 'Byline Doesn't Take Credit for the Work' — Rodale, publisher of Men's Health and employer of serial plagiarist David Zinczenko, explains why ripping writers' bylines off their work, and slapping Zinczenko's on, is OK: “The byline doesn't take credit for the work, but serves as an overarching tag.”

Discussion: Poynter and @dangillmor

Maureen O'Connor / Gawker:
Men's Health Editor Plagiarizes His Own Writers

Discussion: FishbowlNY

Jason Horowitz / Washington Post:

Before meeting the press, they met Mr. Aly — There is a tradition on “Meet the Press,” television's longest-running news program, to follow the political grilling and roundtable conversation with a friendly off-the-record breakfast. The show this past Sunday seemed no different.

Discussion: FishbowlDC, Poynter and CJR

Megan Garber / Nieman Journalism Lab:

State of the Union: Whitehouse.gov as a media outlet — Every State of the Union can be called “the most technologically advanced State of the Union in history” — at least until the next year's comes along. And last night's speech was no exception: Coverage across outlets was an explosion …

Discussion: Fast Company

Tom Junod / Esquire:

Roger Ailes on Roger Ailes: The Interview Transcripts, Part 1 — TALENT SCOUT /// “I thought Glenn at Headline News was not doing what he could do. I thought Bill O'Reilly at Inside Edition was not doing what he could do. I thought Sean Hannity on radio — good-looking guy, why not put him on television?

Discussion: The Huffington Post, Mediaite, FishbowlNY, The Atlantic Wire, Yahoo! News, Ben Smith's Blog and New York Magazine

Ben Smith / Ben Smith's Blog:
Dear commenters, Steve Doocy is reading

Discussion: On Media's Blog, Yahoo! News, Mediaite, Media Matters for America, The Atlantic Wire, @tolles, Gawker and Swampland

Jeff Bercovici / Mixed Media:
News Corp. Showdown: Roger Ailes vs. Rupert Murdoch's Kids

Discussion: Media Matters for America, The Wire, VentureBeat and TVNewser

Wall Street Journal:

Hulu Reworks Its Script as Digital Change Hits TV — Just as the digital wave transforms the television industry, Hulu, a pioneer of Internet TV, is in internal discussions to dramatically transform itself. — The free online television service has become one of the most-watched online video properties …

Discussion: Electronista

David Lipke / WWD Media Headlines:

Memo Pad: GQ's Menswear Finalists... Bill Keller's New Column... THE FUTURE LOOKS BRIGHT: GQ has revealed the finalists for its fourth annual Best New Menswear Designers in America competition, with the talent pool this year including Patrik Ervell, Alexander Wang for his T by Alexander Wang line …

Dan Frommer / SAI: Silicon Alley Insider:

Netflix Passes 20 Million Subscribers But Doesn't Give Full-Year Guidance — Netflix's Q4 subscriber growth beat the Street, passing 20 million subscribers for the first time, but revenue was a little weak. — Notably, Netflix is NOT providing full-year revenue or subscriber growth guidance …

Discussion: MacStories, Macgasm and CNET News, more at Techmeme »

Paul Bradshaw / Online Journalism Blog:

Investigations tool DocumentCloud goes public (PS: documents drive traffic) — The rather lovely DocumentCloud - a tool that allows journalists to share, annotate, connect and organise documents - has finally emerged from its closet and made itself available to public searches.

Discussion: DocumentCloud and Future of Journalism

Rachel McAthy / Journalism.co.uk:

Q&A: Bloomberg's Francine Lacqua at the World Economic Forum — Francine Lacqua, host of Bloomberg's “On the Move with Francine Lacqua”, is currently on the ground in Davos, Switzerland, at the site of the World Economic Forum, an annual gathering of heads of state, business leaders and economists which opened today.

Discussion: TVNewser

Paul Bradshaw / Online Journalism Blog:

Content, context and code: verifying information online — When the telephone first entered the newsroom journalists were sceptical. “How can we be sure that the person at the other end is who they say they are?” The question seems odd now, because we have become so used to phone technology …