Mediagazer: Why Heather Matters — TechCrunch CEO Heather Harde announced her departure today. (Michael Arrington/Uncrunched)

10:35 PM ET, December 16, 2011

Top News:

Michael Arrington / Uncrunched:

Why Heather Matters — TechCrunch CEO Heather Harde announced her departure today. — I'm so angry. — Drift back to the end of 2006. TechCrunch was a year and a half old. My hobby had turned into a business. Federated Media was selling our standard ads and sent a small check every month.

Discussion: Change The Ratio, @sarahcuda and @paulcarr, more at Techmeme »

Erick Schonfeld / TechCrunch:

Goodbye, Heather — Heather Harde, the business brains behind TechCrunch, will be stepping down at the end of the year as general manager of AOL's technology properties (including TechCrunch, Engadget, Joystiq, and TUAW). AOL GM Jay Kirsch, who oversees Autos, Finance, and Industry on the business side …

Discussion: Business Insider, parislemon, Adweek, VentureBeat, @arrington, MediaPost and WebProNews, more at Techmeme »

Jay Yarow / Business Insider:

ARRINGTON: Arianna Destroyed TechCrunch Because She Was Jealous Of All The Attention It Was Getting — Here's why TechCrunch imploded earlier this year, according to founder Michael Arrington, who has suddenly gone public with his side of the story. — Basically, Arrington …

John Cook / Gawker:

Christopher Hitchens' Unforgivable Mistake — The outpouring of grief, goodwill, and teary encomia that has attended news of Christopher Hitchens' passing would—if he was anything like the persona he presented in print—have turned his stomach. He loathed sentiment, welcomed combat, and delighted in inflicting hard truths.

Discussion: The Huffington Post, Slate, ArtsBeat, Melville House Books and Gothamist

Juli Weiner / Vanity Fair:

In Memoriam: Christopher Hitchens, 1949-2011 — Christopher Hitchens—the incomparable critic, masterful rhetorician, fiery wit, and fearless bon vivant—died today at the age of 62. Hitchens was diagnosed with esophageal cancer in the spring of 2010, just after the publication of his memoir …

Julie Moos / Poynter:

New York Times did not need to stop the presses for Hitchens obit — New York Times Communications Director Danielle Rhoades Ha reports the paper did not need to stop the presses to include a story about Christopher Hitchens' death of cancer Thursday; “The story broke and was confirmed …

Discussion: J-School Buzz, Forbes, @joepompeo, @palafo, Adweek, Business Insider, ArtsBeat, FishbowlDC, The Huffington Post, The Atlantic Online, The New York Observer and Poynter

Christopher Buckley / The New Yorker Blog:
Postscript: Christopher Hitchens, 1949-2011

Joe Pompeo / Capital New York:
Posthumous Hitchens: As readers remember the writer by combing his back-catalog, publishers prepare …

Discussion: Guardian, Slate, Macleans.ca and The Huffington Post

Adam Clark Estes / The Atlantic Wire:

Lawmakers Table SOPA and Say ‘Bring in the Nerds’ — Update (4:30 p.m.): Members of the House Judiciary Committee decided on Friday to table the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) citing the need for more research into the issue and the potential effects of a law with such radical as this one.

Discussion: Guardian, Techdirt, CNET News, Forbes, Adweek and Deadline.com

David Kravets / Threat Level:

Stop Online Piracy Act Vote Delayed — Rep. Jason Chaffetz. Photo J. Scott Applewhite/Associated Press — (This post was updated at 2:55 p.m. EST to reflect new hearing date set for Wednesday.) — The House Judiciary Committee considering whether to send the Stop Online Piracy Act …

Discussion: Betabeat, Hillicon Valley, VentureBeat, Electronic Frontier Foundation, Bloomberg, The Verge, Computerworld, WebProNews, Electronista, The Firewall, Computerworld and MediaFile, more at Techmeme »

Mike Masnick / Techdirt:

SOPA Markup Day 1: We Don't Understand This Bill, It Might Do Terrible Things, But Dammit, We're Passing It Now — So, if you weren't paying attention, yesterday was a marathon session of SOPA amendments... It ran for 11.5 hours, with just one tiny break, and it looks like they didn't even get through half of the amendments.

Discussion: MOTHERBOARD, TechCrunch, Deadline.com, CNET News, Broadcasting & Cable, GigaOM, The Daily What, Washington Post, Policy Blog, CNET News and CNET News, more at Techmeme »

Jeffrey A. Trachtenberg / Wall Street Journal:

E-Book Readers Face Sticker Shock — Cheap new e-readers are expected to be one of the hottest gifts this holiday season. But new owners of Kindles and Nooks may be in for sticker shock on Christmas morning: The price gap between the print and e-versions of some top sellers has now narrowed …

Discussion: GigaOM, paidContent, Digital Book World, The Consumerist and msnbc.com

Nicholas Carlson / Business Insider:

EXCLUSIVE: Now We Know AOL's Patch Revenue - And It's Tiny — AOL's local business, Patch, will lose at least $100 million this year and generate paltry revenues, according to documents we've obtained from a source. — During 2011, AOL CEO Tim Armstrong invested ~$140 million into Patch, a network of 850 or local news blogs.

Scott Shane / New York Times:

Manning Hearing Halted as Investigator Considers Recusal Request — FORT MEADE, Md. — A defense lawyer for Bradley Manning, the Army private accused in the most famous leak of government secrets since the Pentagon Papers, began a frontal attack during Private Manning's first court appearance …

Discussion: Associated Press, Fox News, Threat Level, Online NewsHour and CNN

Ed Pilkington / Guardian:
Bradley Manning hearing - updates

Discussion: Guardian and Guardian

Somini Sengupta / New York Times:

Judge Dismisses Twitter Stalking Case — SAN FRANCISCO — In a case with potentially far-reaching consequences for freedom of expression on the Internet, a federal judge on Thursday dismissed a criminal case against a man accused of stalking a religious leader on Twitter …

Discussion: VentureBeat, Digits, Gawker, Forbes, WebProNews, PC Magazine, Mashable!, Techdirt, Hillicon Valley, CNET News and Electronic Frontier Foundation, more at Techmeme »

Timothy B. Lee / Ars Technica:

UMG claims “right to block or remove” YouTube videos it doesn't own — Universal Music Group has responded to Megaupload's request for a temporary restraining order barring the music giant from further interference with the distribution of its “Mega Song.” UMG insists that it had a right …

Discussion: Techdirt, The Verge, Plagiarism Today, Techland, Electronista, Policy Blog, Boing Boing, Fast Company, CNET News and TeleRead, more at Techmeme »

Alex Weprin / TVNewser:

Karl Rove: ‘Debates transfer power to the media, draining it from the campaigns’ — Former George W. Bush staffer and current Fox News contributor Karl Rove has written an op-ed in the Wall Street Journal today focusing on Donald Trump and televised debates. Rove has mixed opinions on debates.

Discussion: Media Matters for America, Big Journalism, Karl Rove, FishbowlDC, GalleyCat and eBookNewser

Chris O'Shea / FishbowlNY:

Al Jazeera English Launches ‘Inside Story Americas’ — Al Jazeera has launched a new TV show designed to both get people talking about the headlines in a different way and examine the news that has slipped through the cracks. Titled “Inside Story Americas,” the 30-minute debate show features interviews …

Discussion: GalleyCat and eBookNewser

Associated Press:

The ‘Great Channel Squeeze’ Coming? — NEW YORK — Call it the Great Channel Squeeze. — Congress is considering letting cellphone companies pay television stations to give up their frequencies so they can be put to better use for wireless broadband. — The idea is to squeeze …

Jack Shafer:

Are you reading the best magazine in America? — My original commitment to Bloomberg BusinessWeek was so small it was almost negative. — About this time last year, US Airways, Delta, or some other crappy airline notified me that my soon-to-expire frequent flyer miles could be exchanged …

Discussion: Media Nation and CJR

Brian Stelter / New York Times:

As ‘Joy Behar Show’ Ends, Its Host Speaks With Candor — When the cable channel HLN announced in November that it was going to end the comedian Joy Behar's 10 p.m. talk show, she played along, releasing a simple statement about how proud she was of the two-year-old program.

Discussion: Media Decoder, Mediaite, TVNewser, The Huffington Post and TVWeek.com

Jim Romenesko:

Newspaper Guild of New York blasts Robinson's $4.5M consulting fee — The Times contract expired on March 30, “and we have not had serious negotiations for months now. Our last official bargaining session was in June.” — The union chief adds that subcommittees have been meeting with the Times …

Discussion: Thomson IR, FishbowlNY, JIMROMENESKO.COM, Poynter, The Jane Dough, The Huffington Post, Gawker, Business Insider, paidContent, Business Insider and Poynter

Andrew Phelps / Nieman Journalism Lab:

NPR stations see big growth for Argo blogs as the pilot winds down — How much of an impact can one blogger make? — A little more than a year ago, 12 public radio stations set a goal: Hire a reporter, teach him or her how to blog, and create the most authoritative local source of news on a single topic — a vertical.

Lucia Moses / Adweek:

‘Time’ to Resurrect ‘Style & Design’ — Time magazine is resurrecting Time Style & Design, but this time with a less fashion-y focus and bigger online complement. — Time published the fashion spinoff from 2003 until it pulled the plug in 2009, blaming the ad recession.

Discussion: FishbowlNY

Ingrid Lunden / paidContent:

More Digital-First Downsizing: The Guardian's Print Edition Shrinks Again — We've been covering already how the Guardian's digital-first strategy has resulted in some sections of the printed newspaper shrinking. Today brings a fresh wave of downsizing moves, with the sports and film …

Discussion: Journalism.co.uk, Telegraph, Guardian and Editors Weblog