Mediagazer: A Twitter Chat About Writer Pay Rates in the Digital Age (MediaShift)

7:45 PM ET, March 17, 2011

Top News:

Jeremy W. Peters / New York Times:

The Times Announces Digital Subscription Plan — The New York Times rolled out a plan on Thursday to begin charging the most frequent users of its Web site $15 a month in a bet that readers would pay for news they have grown accustomed to getting free. — Beginning March 28 …

Discussion: New York Times, MediaMemo, Nieman Journalism Lab, The New York Times Company, Felix Salmon, Nieman Journalism Lab, SteveOuting.com, paidContent, Online Journalism Blog, The Wire, Mashable!, The Wire, DealBook, SAI, paidContent, Recovering Journalist, Yahoo! News, MediaFile, Mashable!, Mediaite, Poynter, Daggle, CJR, Yahoo! News, Techdirt, HighTalk, Mixed Media, @rafat, The Daily Dish, @howardkurtz, @penenberg, VentureBeat, Engadget, 10,000 Words, AdAge, L.A. Times Tech Blog, MediaShift, Fast Company, Vanity Fair, Talking Biz News, TVbytheNumbers, Guardian, @pkafka, DigiDave, @natives, Wall Street Journal, @learmonth, The Wrap, TUAW, Technologizer, FishbowlNY, @dannysullivan, Electronista, Switched, @tim, @chanders, MediaFile, Gizmodo, Change of Subject, ReadWriteWeb, Understanding Google …, yelvington.com, @stevenjayl, Marketing Pilgrim, Pulse2, CNNMoney.com, The Register, Tuned In, Media Buyer Planner, Gannett Blog, Gawker, @iwantmedia, @cressman, NPR, Deadline.com, WebNewser, Gothamist, eMedia Vitals, Joho the Blog and Scripting News, more at Techmeme »

Ken Doctor / Nieman Journalism Lab:

The Newsonomics of The New York Times' pay fence — Editor's Note: Each week, Ken Doctor — author of Newsonomics and longtime watcher of the business side of digital news — writes about the economics of news for the Lab. — It's official — and the world still turns.

Cory Doctorow / Boing Boing:

New York Times paywall: wishful thinking or just crazy? — The New York Times just announced a new paywall that will let you see 20 articles a month and thereafter redirect you to a signup for paid access. However, if you follow a NYT link from some search engines and services like Twitter …

Discussion: Nieman Journalism Lab, The Atlantic Online, CJR, @scottros and GalleyCat, more at Techmeme »

Nat Ives / AdAge:

New York Times CEO on Pay Meter: Possible Slight Dip in Traffic Will be Short Term — About 15% of Times Online Visitors Will Hit Gate, Janet Robinson Says in Q+A — The New York Times on Thursday announced its long-gestating plan to charge the heaviest users of its web site …

Discussion: Poynter, FishbowlNY, MediaPost, Epicenter and @johngapper, more at Techmeme »

Leena Rao / TechCrunch:

All You Need To Know About The NYTimes.com Paywall — The New York Times has just put up more information about its much awaited paywall. The digital subscription model was initially announced in January 2010 as an effort to create a second revenue stream while still preserving the newspaper's advertising business.

Justin Ellis / Nieman Journalism Lab:

A promoted New York Times Twitter trend for paywall talk — If you're a journalist on Twitter today, it's probably an understatement to say this morning's announcement of The New York Times' digital subscription plan is blowing up your Twitter stream. But here's something interesting we noticed …

Discussion: Associated Press and New York Times

MG Siegler / TechCrunch:
The Google Loophole Has Become The Facebook/Twitter Loophole

Discussion: paidContent and CJR

Stuart Elliott / Media Decoder:

Last Year Was a Good Year for Ad Spending, Report Finds — The recovery in advertising spending continued in the fourth quarter last year, according to a report that is to be released on Thursday morning, resulting in a solid full-year gain compared with the results of 2009.

Discussion: Poynter

Ray Wert / Jalopnik:

How The Detroit News Sold Its Soul — Scott Burgess resigned today as The Detroit News auto critic after his editors bowed to a request by an advertiser to water down his negative review of the Chrysler 200. This is why we can't have nice reviews anymore. UPDATE More »

Discussion: AdFreak, Poynter and Talking Biz News

Jonathan Seitz / Nieman Reports:

British Libel Law: Its Ripple Effect on Journalists Worldwide — Germany's Duke of Brunswick was an overweight, autocratic paranoiac who was kicked out of his fiefdom by a peasant uprising. — A statement like that might be the reason why the United Kingdom has come to be considered the libel capital of the world.

Discussion: Nieman Journalism Lab

Mike Webb / ProPublica:

Watch The ProPublica Long-Form Storytelling Event — Last night, ProPublica and the New School sponsored a public conversation on “Long-Form Storytelling in a Short-Attention-Span World.” The event featured This American Life's Ira Glass, The New Yorker's David Remnick, Frontline's Raney Aronson-Rath …

Discussion: Nieman Storyboard and Poynter

MediaShift:

A Twitter Chat About Writer Pay Rates in the Digital Age — Business content on MediaShift is sponsored by the weekend MA in Public Communication at American University. Designed for working professionals, the program is suited to career changers and public relations or social marketing professionals seeking career advancement.

Discussion: Soup

Arab Media & Society:

Can Al Jazeera English Leverage its ‘Egypt Moment’ into an American Audience? — Introduction — Al Jazeera English (AJE)1 entered the competitive global news field in late 2006, claiming to give a “voice to the voiceless” as the “world's first English language news channel to have its headquarters in the Middle East.”

Discussion: TVNewser and Media Network

Terry Heaton / Terry Heaton's PoMo Blog:

To what end? The question that kills media reinvention — There's an old church story about a small parish that brought in a new pastor amid certain bickering among the parishioners. The old pastor had retired, and, after some infighting, the church thought a little young blood would be good for everybody.

The Atlantic Wire:

Anna Holmes: What I Read — How do other people deal with the torrent of information that pours down on us all? Do they have some secret? Perhaps. We are asking various people who seem well-informed to describe their media diets. This is from a conversation with Anna Holmes …

Thanks:jaredbkeller

Chicago Sun Times:

Sun-Times Media, Mesirow Financial chief Jim Tyree dies at 53 — James C. Tyree, chairman and CEO of Mesirow Financial and the chairman of Sun-Times Media, died Wednesday afternoon after battling cancer for several months. He was 53. — “With a heavy heart, I am saddened to tell …

Discussion: Poynter

Sophia Pearson / Bloomberg:

Rupert Murdoch, News Corp. Sued by Amalgamated Over Shine Group Purchase — Rupert Murdoch and his News Corp. (NWSA) were sued over claims he is causing the company to pay about $675 million for “nepotism” in its purchase of his daughter's U.K.-based television production company Shine Group Ltd.

Discussion: Company Town