Mediagazer: AOL Consolidates 53 Brands Down To 20 “Power Brands;” The Huffington Post Gets Bigger (Erick Schonfeld/TechCrunch)

6:30 PM ET, June 28, 2011

Top News:

Erick Schonfeld / TechCrunch:

AOL Consolidates 53 Brands Down To 20 “Power Brands;” The Huffington Post Gets Bigger — AOL CEO Tim Armstrong likes to streamline things. And he is about to streamline AOL even more. Somewhat reversing the anti-portal strategy he inherited, he will start to consolidate 53 different content brands into 20 “power brands.”

Discussion: Terry Heaton's PoMo Blog, AdAge, The Business Insider, The Wire and Future of Journalism

Kara Swisher / AllThingsD:

AOL Moves the Furniture Around Some More, With Brod to Patch — Here's an internal memo, titled “Platform for Growth,” just sent out by AOL CEO Tim Armstrong, in which he buries the lede by noting the business partner of content czar Arianna Huffington, Jon Brod, will move to work …

Discussion: paidContent, NetNewsCheck Latest, The Business Insider, Digital Trends and mediabistro.com

Lymari Morales / Gallup:

Americans Regain Some Confidence in Newspapers, TV News — Confidence still lags behind levels of trust seen through much of the 1990s and into 2003 — WASHINGTON, D.C. — Americans' confidence in newspapers and television news rebounded slightly in the past year, having been stuck at record lows since 2007.

Discussion: MediaPost, CJR, On Media's Blog, TVWeek.com, Poynter, Media Buyer Planner, Forbes.com, TVNewser, Free Press and Hot Air

Joe Pompeo / Yahoo! News:

Chris Suellentrop joins Yahoo! News blog network from New York Times Magazine — Chris Suellentrop, an editor at the New York Times Magazine, has joined Yahoo's network of news blogs, where he will become deputy editor starting August 8. — “We're very excited that Chris is coming on board …

Discussion: Adweek and Poynter

Simon Dumenco / AdAge:
Not That New York Magazine Is Gloating About Poaching Frank Rich From The New York Times or Anything...

Discussion: New York Magazine, The New York Observer, mediabistro.com and FishbowlNY

Ed Yong / Discover Blogs:

Am I a science journalist? — I've just spoken at the opening plenary of the second day of the World Conference of Science Journalists at Doha, Qatar. It's a panel called “Am I a science journalist?"with myself, my fellow Discover blogger Chris Mooney, Mo Costandi, Homayoun Kheyri, and Cristine Russell.

Discussion: Adam Westbrook and Poynter

Johann Hari:

Interview etiquette — I've recently been asked to clarify something about a few of the interviews I've done in the past. When I've interviewed a writer, it's quite common that they will express an idea or sentiment to me that they have expressed before in their writing - and, almost always …

Discussion: Metamedia, Guardian, blogs.journalism.co.uk, blogs.independent.co.uk, brianwhelan.net, FleetStreetBlues, Big News Network.com, Salon, One Man & His Blog, Journalism.co.uk, The Wire, Guy Fawkes' blog and themediablog.typepad.com

Megan Garber / Nieman Journalism Lab:

Google plans for “the second phase of the display ad revolution” with a focus on smartphones and tablets — Google is known primarily for its work in search advertising. But it's making an investment — a big one — in another area: display ads. — This month's acquisition of AdMeld …

Peter Kafka / AllThingsD:

Amazon Starts an Ad Network, Powered by Your Data — You can buy just about anything on Amazon.com, including advertising. Now Amazon is selling ads on other people's sites, too. — The e-commerce giant has started what is effectively an ad network* where it buys Web advertising inventory and resells it to marketers at a premium.

Discussion: PC Magazine and Techland, more at Techmeme »

Mark Joyella / Mediaite:

CNN Names Jessica Yellin Chief White House Correspondent — CNN has named Jessica Yellin its new chief White House correspondent, replacing Ed Henry. A CNN insider tells Mediaite Yellin has been the network's choice since Spring. Yellin had been serving as the network's national political correspondent …

Discussion: mediabistro.com, TVNewser, MediaPost, The Wire, FishbowlDC, On Media's Blog, Adweek, Broadcasting & Cable and Multichannel

Jeff Sonderman / Poynter:

How you can use social machinery to power personalized news delivery — People have spent the past five years in Social Networking 101. We figured out what social networks are, created our profiles and connected with friends. We rethought fundamental aspects of human relationships …

Discussion: 10,000 Words

The Real Voice:

STRIKE LOOMS AT VILLAGE VOICE — The current three-year contract between Village Voice Media and UAW Local 2110, representing the workers of The Village Voice, expires midnight June 30. The membership has unanimously passed a strike authorization vote. — Over the past three years …

Discussion: The Huffington Post and New York Magazine

Jim Romenesko / Poynter:

Rohde quits NYT to become Reuters columnist — Romenesko Misc. — David Rohde's writing will focus on foreign affairs and globalization, says a Reuters memo. Rohde, who escaped the Taliban in 2009 after seven months in captivity, “is one of the most brilliant and consequential journalists …

Discussion: Forbes.com

Florence Pichon / Editors Weblog:

Sylvain Parasie investigates where data journalists fit in at a traditional paper — Where exactly does data journalism fit in a traditional press organization? Sylvain Parasie from Paris-Est University conducted research on this question, taking the case of the Chicago Tribune.

Discussion: Bloomberg

Kristen Purcell / Pew Internet:

E-reader ownership doubles in six months — e-Reader ownership surges since last November; tablet ownership grows more slowly — The share of adults in the United States who own an e-book reader doubled to 12% in May, 2011 from 6% in November 2010. E-readers, such as a Kindle or Nook …

Mindy McAdams / Teaching Online Journalism:

Journalists, take another look at Tumblr — For a long time I had trouble appreciating Tumblr, but I think I finally understand its strengths — and I must not be the only one. — Tumblr is now one of the top 25 websites in the U.S., according to data from Quancast, as reported in a new article at TechCrunch.

Discussion: GigaOM, TechCrunch and Softpedia News