Mediagazer: Vogue Is Ad Age's 2011 Magazine of the Year (Nat Ives/AdAge)

4:30 PM ET, October 5, 2011

Top News:

Roger Ailes: I Hired Sarah Palin Because She Was ‘Hot And Got Ratings’ — NEW YORK — As the most powerful man in the universe, or one of them anyway, Roger Ailes can look back on the first 15 years of his crowning achievement, Fox News Channel, with satisfaction. And he does.

Discussion: The New York Observer, Gawker, Mediaite, TVbytheNumbers, On Media's Blog, Business Insider and New York Magazine

Reuters:

Exclusive: Microsoft considers bidding for Yahoo — (Reuters) - Microsoft Corp is considering a bid for Yahoo Inc, resurfacing as a potential buyer after a bitter and unsuccessful fight to take over the Internet company in 2008, sources close to the situation said on Wednesday.

Discussion: AllThingsD, paidContent, Forbes, Business Insider, ZDNet, Between the Lines Blog, The Wrap, 24/7 Wall St., The Next Web, WinRumors, Electronista, CNET News, Deal Journal, MarketBeat and Tech Trader Daily, more at Techmeme »

Julianne Pepitone / CNNMoney.com:
Should Disney just buy Yahoo?

Discussion: Wall Street Journal, CNET News and MarketBeat

Microsoft:

Xbox 360 Teams Up With Entertainment Leaders to Transform TV — AT&T, BBC, Comcast, HBO, Rogers, Telefónica, Televisa and Verizon are among providers rolling out new TV entertainment services on Xbox LIVE. — A new era in television begins this holiday where your entertainment …

Jay Greene / CNET News:
Microsoft to bring cable programming to Xbox

Discussion: TechNet Blogs and GeekWire

Brian Stelter / Media Decoder:

Hulu to Stream Univision Shows — 11:26 a.m. | Updated | The popular streaming video Web site Hulu is adding Spanish language television shows for the first time. — In a deal to be announced on Wednesday and to be implemented later this year, Hulu will have a selection of telenovelas …

Discussion: MediaPost, rbr.com, paidContent, @brianstelter, Multichannel, Online Video News, Home Media Magazine, Broadcasting & Cable, NetNewsCheck Latest, Deadline.com, Company Town and @brianstelter

Peter Kafka / AllThingsD:

Hulu Says Subscription Service Revenue Climbing — Hulu, the video joint venture which may or may not be sold (a new round of bids hit this week), says that its subscription business is growing at pace that means it will “account for more than half of Hulu's overall revenues within the next 12 months.”

Discussion: GigaOM and Hulu Blog

Katherine Travers / Editors Weblog:

Citizen journalism thrives in Occupy Wall Street coverage — Occupy Wall Street: the American protest movement that seemed to have sprung from nowhere and may have been going nowhere - or so many people thought until Saturday October 1, when protesters marched across the Brooklyn Bridge in New York City and 700 people were arrested.

Discussion: The News About The News

Drew Grant / The New York Observer:
Jesse LaGreca: The Smartest Man on Wall Street?

Discussion: Betabeat, The Atlantic Wire, TPM LiveWire and Chicago Business

Jay Rosen / Quote and Comment:
A CNN Business reporter, Alison Kosik, summarizes what she thinks …

Discussion: The Huffington Post, Business Insider, The Huffington Post, Business Insider and New York Magazine

Lucia Moses / Adweek:

‘Spin’ Magazine Going Bimonthly — Spin is making the move from monthly to bimonthly—it will publish only six issues next year, down from 11 this year, Adweek has learned. The magazine also plans to cut its rate base to 350,000 from 450,000, an acknowledgment that the Web is replacing print for its mainly young, male readership.

Discussion: FishbowlNY, PAPERMAG, Media Decoder, PSFK and Gothamist

Nina Burleigh / Guardian:

Amanda Knox, Meredith Kercher and the media — The Italian media, cowed, lazy and compliant, allowed a bullying prosecutor to frame Knox and Sollecito for the Kercher murder — As an American journalist covering the Knox case for 10 months in Italy, I was surprised by a number of things.

Discussion: Guardian, New York Times, newsfeed.time.com, The Week and Telegraph

Erik Lacitis / Seattle Times:
Media scramble to get in, get a view (or a ladder)

Discussion: Poynter

Nick Denton / @nicknotned:

Gawker Media monthly pageviews hit 510m — but four days too late for my bet with @fimoculous. Argh! http://t.co/ELhYVdGA

Noah Davis / Business Insider:
Nick Denton Loses Bet That The Gawker Redesign Wouldn't Hurt Traffic

Discussion: Poynter

Nat Ives / AdAge:

Vogue Is Ad Age's 2011 Magazine of the Year — Monocle, Time, Garden & Gun, Food Network Magazine and Others Make the Annual A-List — Every year Advertising Age recognizes magazines that have excelled on one front or many — meeting a challenge, turning things around …

Discussion: Poynter, The Huffington Post and FishbowlNY

John Koblin / WWD:

Publishers: Tablet Business Is Picking Up — TABLET TALK: All these months later, with some decent subscription numbers and a possible antidote to the iPad in the Kindle Fire, publishers are beginning to find a business out of tablets. On a panel Tuesday morning at the American Magazine Conference …

Discussion: MediaPost, FishbowlNY and Poynter

Ryan Lawler / GigaOM:

Are web originals finally ready for primetime? — The creation of a viable business model based on video that originates online rather than on TV or from the Hollywood studios has been a long time coming. Our earliest NewTeeVee posts appeared five years ago, back in 2006, and in that time …

Discussion: rbr.com, ClickZ, Mixed Media and MarketingVox News & Trends

James Taranto / Wall Street Journal:

The Gray Lady's True Colors — The proof of the pudding is in the tweeting. — Some readers thought we were too generous to Kate Zernike of the New York Times last January. Zernike had come under attack for a story titled “Bloodshed Puts New Focus on Vitriol in Politics,” …

Discussion: GalleyCat, Capital New York and Poynter

Robert Booth / Guardian:

Downing Street ‘did not record who knew’ about Andy Coulson vetting — Freedom of information request for names of ministers or officials involved in background check decision is refused — Downing Street has claimed there is no record of which ministers or officials knew …

Discussion: @nero

The Independent:

Hugh Grant: ‘The phone-hacking scandal has only just scratched surface’ — The actor tells Oliver Wright there's worse to come on politicians, police and the press — Corrupt policemen tipped off journalists about celebrity victims of crime before other officers had time to respond …

Discussion: Press Gazette, Mediaite, Deadline.com, Jon Slattery and Guardian

Rebecca Shapiro / The Huffington Post:

Reporter Claims White House Officials Screamed And Cursed At Her Over Story — A reporter for CBS claimed that White House and Department of Justice officials screamed and cursed at her due to a story she was pursuing about a controversial DOJ program. — Sharyl Attkisson …

Discussion: Business Insider, Weekly Standard and mediabistro.com

Joe Pompeo / Capital New York:

Yahoo suits tout new reporting focus, but what about the old one? — After Monday's splashy announcement that Yahoo News and ABC News are teaming up in the name of worldwide web-traffic domination, The New York Times followed up with a piece about how Yahoo executives are redirecting their efforts to original reporting.

Discussion: Poynter, msnbc.com, Search Engine Land and FishbowlNY

Roy Greenslade / Guardian:

NI faces more than 60 phone-hacking claims — Father of Josie Russell, who survived murder attempt, Sara Payne and 7/7 hero Paul Dadge among 13 new writs this week — The father of Josie Russell, the girl who survived a hammer attack in which her mother and sister were killed …

Discussion: New York Magazine, Digital Spy, Guardian and Financial Post

Daniel de Vise / Washington Post:

What if the rankers ranked newspapers? — Here we are in the middle of ranking season. The signature U.S. News & World Report rankings came out last month, and the Times Higher Education global university rankings are due later this week. — Lots of people rank colleges these days, and most of the rankers are in the news business.

Discussion: Poynter