Mediagazer: Why would anyone pay to read The New York Times online? (Jeff Sonderman/Poynter)

5:50 PM ET, August 16, 2011

Top News:

Nick Davies / Guardian:

Phone hacking: News of the World reporter's letter reveals cover-up — Disgraced royal correspondent Clive Goodman's letter says phone hacking was ‘widely discussed’ at NoW meetings — • Read Clive Goodman's letter to News International — Rupert Murdoch, James Murdoch …

Press Gazette:

MPs ‘likely’ to recall James Murdoch — James Murdoch is “likely” to be recalled before the Commons Culture, Media and Sport Committee as part of its inquiry into phone hacking at the News of the World, Labour MP Tom Watson said today. — Amid continued questions about the extent …

Discussion: Guardian, Press Gazette, AllThingsD and The First Post

Staci D. Kramer / paidContent: Hacking: James Murdoch Replies To Parliament; Yes, No, Maybe

Staci D. Kramer / paidContent:
Hacking: Committee Releases Potentially Devastating NoTW Correspondence

Discussion: Guardian, The Huffington Post, Press Gazette and mediabistro.com

Jillian Rayfield / tpmmuckraker.talkingpointsmemo.com:
News Corp: Phone Hacking Scandal Might Be Bad For Our Rep

Discussion: Press Gazette, Mixed Media and On Media's Blog

Mark Sweney / Guardian:

BBC Worldwide agrees £121m magazine sell-off — Private equity firm Exponent to take over 34 titles including Top Gear, Radio Times and Gardeners' World — BBC Worldwide has agreed the sale of its magazine business, which publishes titles including Top Gear and Radio Times, for £121m.

Discussion: Media Week, Canadian Magazines and Press Gazette

Linda Austin / BusinessJournalism.org Reynolds Center …:

U.S. business journalists' median salary is $56,220, Reynolds Center survey finds — Median salaries for U.S. business journalists varied by place of employment from $50,100 for print to $78,438 for wire services in 2010-11. Photo by Flickr user Roger H. Goun.

Discussion: Poynter, MediaJobsDaily and SAI

Wall Street Journal:

American Media No Longer for Sale — The publisher of the National Enquirer is no longer up for sale, after the media company's owners balked at an offer from Apollo Global Management, said people familiar with the matter. — American Media Inc., which publishes the Enquirer, Men's Fitness …

Discussion: MediaPost, mediabistro.com and Folio

Jeff Sonderman / Poynter:

Why would anyone pay to read The New York Times online? — The New York Times digital subscription program has been live for nearly six months, and it's being called an early success. There were more than 224,000 paid subscribers at the end of June, and the site doesn't seem to have hemorrhaged traffic.

Discussion: eMedia Vitals and NYConvergence.com

Peter Kafka / AllThingsD:

Fox Starts Its Web Pullback, and ABC Gets Ready to Follow — Fox has formally kicked off the The Great Free TV Web Pullback of 2011. Now get ready for ABC to do the same. — Yesterday Fox followed through with its previously announced plans to keep its new shows off the Web for eight days …

Discussion: Lost Remote, Betabeat, VideoNuze, GigaOM, Digital Media Wire and Electronista, more at Techmeme », Thanks:beet_tv

Justin Ellis / Nieman Journalism Lab:

Traffic Report: Why pageviews and engagement are up at Latimes.com — Traffic is undeniably big news in L.A. (Carmageddon anyone?), so it's only fitting that the Los Angeles Times, the city's paper of record, is racking up some fairly impressive traffic numbers of its own.

Discussion: Company Town and Journalism.co.uk

DigiDave:

How Journalists See Each Other — Just having a little fun with the image below. How various types of journalists see themselves and others. — And don't forget, if you are in the Bay Area you can eat at Credo Restaurant all week and a portion of the revenue will go to Spot.Us.

Cal Fussman / Esquire:

C.J. Chivers: What I've Learned — The 46-year-old war reporter on joining the Marines, sleeping at Ground Zero, and the meaning of military — Chivers in Afghanistan in December 2007, on assignment for The New York Times. He was one of the first reporters on the ground when the war began in 2001.

Discussion: Poynter

The New York Observer:

The Free Agent List: 2011′s 50 Media Power Bachelorettes — A COMMON REACTION upon learning some made The Observer's 2011 Media Bachelorettes list? See here. — But there's no need to be embarrassed. After all, as it's been said, girls run the world.

Discussion: FishbowlDC, Runnin' Scared, FishbowlNY and New York Magazine

Roger Simon / The Politico:

Ron Paul remains media poison — I admit I do not fully understand Ron Paul and his beliefs. But I do understand when a guy gets shafted, and Ron Paul just got shafted. — On Saturday, the Ames Straw Poll was conducted in Iowa amid huge media interest and scrutiny.

Discussion: Salon, The Huffington Post, Guardian, Most Recent Home Page Posts …, Gawker, Mother Jones, Mediaite, Associated Press, On Media's Blog, AmSpecBlog and Washington Examiner

Sara Dickenson Quinn / Poynter:

Why writers sometimes work for free & designers don't, as HuffPost contest reminds journalists — The Huffington Post hit a nerve in the professional design community when the website announced a contest to design its new Politics icon. — “To ask designers to work for nothing suggests …

Discussion: NetNewsCheck Latest, Adweek, Mediactive, I'm a design hero … and Gawker

Harry McCracken / Time:

Techmeme — Want to know what's new in the world of tech? You could visit one of the big news sites or blogs. Or you could go right to the site that reporters and bloggers check obsessively throughout the day. Gabe Rivera's Techmeme pulls together articles from around the Web …

Discussion: Beet.TV, more at Techmeme »

Brian Stelter / Media Decoder:

A Slow Start For Anderson Cooper At 8 P.M. — Anderson Cooper moved into the most important time slot on cable news, 8 p.m., last week. But he didn't receive a very warm reception from viewers. — In his first week, Mr. Cooper attracted fewer viewers than the man he replaced, Eliot Spitzer, whose program was canceled on July 6.

Discussion: The Wire, TV Tattle, TVNewser and New York Magazine