Mediagazer: ‘Daily’ Publisher Disputes Subscription Numbers; Says 5,000 Far Too Low (Staci D. Kramer/paidContent)

7:10 AM ET, March 19, 2011

Top News:

Sharon Waxman / The Wrap:

Confirmed: The Hollywood Reporter IS for Sale (updated) — The Hollywood Reporter and its four sister publications — Billboard, AdWeek, MediaWeek and Brandweek — are up for sale, an individual with knowledge of the proposed transaction told TheWrap on Friday.

Joe Pompeo / Yahoo! News:

CEO says Hollywood Reporter, Adweek and sister mags not for sale — The Hollywood Reporter and its sister magazines Adweek, Billboard and Backstage are up for sale again, according to sources who leaked an item to Claire Atkinson in Friday's New York Post. — Not so, insists Richard Beckman …

Discussion: WWD Media Headlines, Runnin' Scared, FishbowlNY, TVWeek.com, New York Post, paidContent, MediaPost and New York Magazine

Nat Ives / AdAge:

Lincoln Ad Offers Free Access to New York Times Online for Rest of 2011 — One More Loophole in Pay Scheme, to the Benefit of an Advertiser — The New York Times built in one more loophole to its online pay meter scheme than it mentioned yesterday: Interstitial ads from Lincoln …

Discussion: paidContent, MediaPost, Poynter, Felix Salmon and Future of Journalism

LAT Blogs / The Big Picture:
The war between Fox News and the New York Times hits the bestseller list

Discussion: Poynter

Bill Mitchell / Poynter:
New York Times subscription plans all about one challenge: Reader migration

Discussion: New York Times, American Journalism Review and Daring Fireball

Jeff Bercovici / Mixed Media:

Huffpo Claims Its Bloggers Aren't Writers. Is That True? — Accused by the Newspaper Guild of undermining journalism and victimizing journalists, the Huffington Post says it's not the case. No surprise there. What's interesting is how the news-and-blogs site chose to justify itself …

Discussion: Poynter

Courtney Boyd Myers / The Next Web:
Faced with a strike, The Huffington Post says: “Our bloggers are happy.”

Discussion: Top Digital Journal News, Cision and The Daily Caller, Thanks:cbm

Staci D. Kramer / paidContent:

‘Daily’ Publisher Disputes Subscription Numbers; Says 5,000 Far Too Low — The folks at The Daily aren't ready to talk real numbers but they are upset enough about one set making the rounds now to try to set the record straight. A piece we republished from our sibling MediaGuardian ends …

Discussion: NYConvergence.com

Peter Kafka / MediaMemo:

Netflix Bets Big On “House Of Cards” But Swears It's Not a Strategy Shift: Q&A With Content Boss Ted Sarandos — Netflix has bought its first TV show which doesn't exist yet. The company has finalized a deal to distribute two seasons of “House Of Cards”, a yet-to-be produced political drama directed …

Discussion: The Official Netflix Blog, GigaOM, TechCrunch, VideoNuze, Media Decoder, paidContent, The Wrap, rbr.com, Electronista, Technologizer, The Wire, Multichannel, AdPulp and parislemon

Chris Roush / Talking Biz News:

VentureBeat executive editor leaving — TALKING BIZ NEWS EXCLUSIVE — Owen Thomas, the executive editor of the VentureBeat tech news site, is leaving after about a year with the California-based news service. — Thomas is leaving to become founding editor of a new media start-up, sources told Talking Biz News.

Discussion: VentureBeat, more at Techmeme »

Spiersblr:

HOW NOT TO INTERACT WITH THE MEDIA 101, courtesy of Hashable CEO, Mike Yavonditte: — 1. See a negative op-ed about your company wherein the author uses a metaphor describing you being a velvet rope telling people they're not “Hashable” enough. — 2. Utterly fail to grasp metaphor.

Discussion: Betabeat and tag me with a spoon

Ian Cobain / Guardian:

US spy operation that manipulates social media — Military's ‘sock puppet’ software creates fake online identities to spread pro-American propaganda — Jeff Jarvis: Washington shows the morals of a clumsy spammer — The US military is developing software that will let it secretly …

Discussion: Mediaite, The First Post, Crikey and Boing Boing

David Kirkpatrick / New York Times:

Libya Says It Will Release Times Journalists — TRIPOLI, Libya — Four New York Times journalists missing in Libya since Tuesday were captured by forces loyal to Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi and will be released Friday, his son, Seif Islam el-Qaddafi, told Christiane Amanpour in an ABC News interview.

Sarah Lacy / TechCrunch:

Can HighGear Media Turn Lousy Blog Economics into a Huge Exit? (TCTV) — Earlier today, we posted an interview with Matt Heist, CEO of HighGear Media, an auto blog that hit four million uniques last month. That may not sound too jaw-dropping but gearheads are a surprisingly neglected online audience …

Thanks:jbirk

Adam Ostrow / Mashable!:

AP Stylebook Finally Changes “e-mail” to “email” — The AP Stylebook, the de facto style and usage guide for much of the news media, announced on Friday that the abbreviated term for “electronic mail” is losing a hyphen, and with it, a relic of a simpler time when Internet technology needed to be explained very carefully.