Mediagazer: Exclusive: BermanBraun Buys Most of Shelby Bonnie's Whiskey Media (Kara Swisher/AllThingsD)

11:40 PM ET, March 15, 2012

Top News:

Rick Edmonds / Poynter:

Newspaper advertising was down 7.3 percent, almost $2 billion, in 2011 — The Newspaper Association of America has posted its final tally of newspaper advertising statistics for 2011, and as expected, it is not a pretty picture. — Total advertising revenue was down 7.3 percent, a percentage point worse than in 2010.

Discussion: The Buttry Diary, NetNewsCheck Latest and Broadcasting & Cable

Andrew Beaujon / Poynter:

Google engineer goes news-free for a month — Matt Cutts is a self-improvement stuntman. Every month the Google engineer tries to challenge himself to give up or take up something — exercise, vocabulary-building, meat-eating, mustache growth — and then he duly records the result.

Discussion: Matt Cutts

Mona Zhang / 10,000 Words:

Why Studying Journalism Is Still a Good Idea — News of the death of newspapers never stops. A LinkedIn analytics post showed that newspapers are the fastest shrinking industry in terms of job numbers. The Newspaper Association of America released statistics that showed ad sales were down 7.3 percent in 2011.

Discussion: mediabistro.com, GalleyCat and eBookNewser

Newsosaur / Reflections of a Newsosaur: Newspaper sales slid to 1984 level in 2011

Sam Stein / The Huffington Post:

Daily Caller Reporter Gets Into Email War With DNC — WASHINGTON — A private spat between the Democratic National Committee's communications shop and a reporter for the Daily Caller, a conservative-leaning web outlet, erupted publicly on Wednesday after a DNC official leaked a heated email exchange to the press.

Discussion: Gawker

BuzzFeed:

Democrats Accuse Conservative News Outlet Of “Blackmail” — The Caller was, perhaps, leaning into the story a bit. Boyle stands by his warning. — The Democratic National Committee is at odds with the conservative Daily Caller over a reporter's threat as to how he would interpret an unreturned email.

Discussion: Erik Wemple, JIMROMENESKO.COM, FishbowlDC and The Daily Caller

Julie Moos / Poynter:

Guild plans to fight layoffs of 19 Philadelphia journalists, after 21 take buyouts — Journalists at the Philadelphia Inquirer, Daily News and Philly.com are learning this week whether or not they'll be laid off. The deadline for the latest buyout offer was yesterday …

Discussion: The Philly Post, newsworks, JIMROMENESKO.COM, mediabistro.com and The Newspaper Guild

Jim Romenesko:
‘I would have loved to piss on your shoes’

Discussion: DealBook

Press Gazette:

Former Times lawyer Brett admits Nightjack mistakes — Former Times legal chief Alastair Brett today admitted he made a “mistake” by failing to divulge the fact one of the paper's reporters hacked into an email account to reveal the identity of anonymous police blogger NightJack.

Discussion: @lisaocarroll and Guardian

Dominic Ponsford / Press Gazette:
Blog post prompted Thurlbeck ‘witness intimidation’ arrest

Discussion: Guardian, Neville Thurlbeck and London Evening Standard

Andrew Pugh / Press Gazette: Met ‘grades journalists by favourable coverage’

Scotsman:
Evidence from former top auditor at Scotland Yard is delayed after force complaint

Discussion: London Evening Standard and Telegraph

Guardian:

Trinity Mirror raids pension pot — Daily Mirror publisher expected to come under scrutiny after declaring £55m rise in scheme's funding deficit — Trinity Mirror is under fire for using its pension fund to pay off US creditors. The publisher of the Daily Mirror …

Mark Sweney / Guardian:
Trinity Mirror suffers 40% fall in profits

Discussion: Media Week, paidContent:UK and Press Gazette

Roy Greenslade / Guardian:
Trinity Mirror invests £10m in daily deals website

Discussion: Press Gazette

Jeff Bercovici / Mixed Media:

Glenn Beck Closes In On The $100 Million Mark — Leaving Fox News has turned out to be a pretty good business move for Glenn Beck. By the end of this year, 18 months after he got out of the 24-hour cable news business and struck out on his own as an internet broadcasting pioneer …

Discussion: Mediaite, NetNewsCheck Latest and Wall Street Journal

Alex Weprin / TVNewser:
GBTV To Bring in $40 Million in Revenue This Year, Will (Eventually) Go 24/7

Discussion: Business Insider, GalleyCat and FishbowlDC

Tom Cheredar / VentureBeat:

Hulu refreshes its website with a 55% larger video player — Hulu rolled out a huge update to its website user interface today, increasing the size of its video player by 55 percent. — The updated look makes a lot of sense since Hulu's number one draw is current season TV shows …

Discussion: Home Media Magazine, The Next Web, SlashGear, Hulu Blog, SocialTimes and Engadget

Lynne Marek / Chicago Business:

Chicago Tribune cuts 15 journalists — (Crain's) — The Chicago Tribune cut about 15 editorial employees today as the news company continues to shrink its newsroom. — The employees dismissed included reporters, editors and managers, according to sources familiar with the layoffs.

Discussion: @brianboyer

Nat Ives / AdAge:

Two Years Into Tablet Editions, Conde Nast Begins Regular Readership Reports — Additional Information for Premium Advertisers — Almost two years after Conde Nast started putting its magazines on the Apple iPad, its advertisers are finally getting one of the promised benefits …

Discussion: TeleRead, paidContent, Folio, Mashable!, Media, disrupted and eMedia Vitals

Kara Swisher / AllThingsD:

Exclusive: BermanBraun Buys Most of Shelby Bonnie's Whiskey Media — In a deal that was just signed, longtime Silicon Valley exec Shelby Bonnie has sold his social publishing start-up, Whiskey Media, to Santa Monica-based entertainment and interactive production company BermanBraun.

Discussion: The Wrap, Adweek and VentureBeat

Ingrid Lunden / TechCrunch:

Nielsen: U.S. Consumers The Most Likely To Pay For Content On A Tablet... Except When It's News — As developers hunker down and get into the business of trying to work out how to get consumers to buy more of their product on mobile devices, some revealing numbers out from Nielsen on what people …

Discussion: CyberJournalist.net, ZDNet, PC Magazine, blog.nielsen.com and Media Buyer Planner

Ryan Chittum / CJR:

Mad Libs, New York Times Executive Pay Edition — The New York Times likes to inveigh against executive compensation practices on its editorial pages, and its newsroom has done tough work spotlighting the issue, too. Much of the work is not just about huge dollar amounts but misaligned incentives and pay-for-performance issues.