Mediagazer: Inquirer publishes investigation of possible future owner; also, a report of more layoffs (Andrew Beaujon/Poynter)

8:05 AM ET, March 27, 2012

Top News:

David Gambacorta / Philly.com:

35 more jobs in jeopardy at papers, website — If misery does indeed love company, it would probably be right at home at Philadelphia Media Network Inc. — Managers of the company, which owns the Daily News, Inquirer, philly.com and SportsWeek, have proposed cutting 35 jobs within the next six months …

Andrew Beaujon / Poynter:

Inquirer publishes investigation of possible future owner; also, a report of more layoffs — Cooper University Hospital in Camden, N.J., is the state's largest hospital. Its chairman is George E. Norcross III, who is also part of a consortium of investors looking to buy the Inquirer, the Philadelphia Daily News and Philly.com.

Discussion: Philly.com

Dave Davies / newsworks: More layoffs coming at Philly papers?

Justin Ellis / Nieman Journalism Lab:

Mohamed Nanabhay on Al Jazeera's online growth and the future of news distribution — Mohamed Nanabhay likes to talk about something he calls “distributed distribution,” which, aside from being delightfully alliterative, might be a kind of rallying cry for the future of media.

David Jolly / New York Times:

Al Jazeera Receives Video of French Gunman's Rampage — PARIS — Al Jazeera has received a video of the murderous rampage in southwest France and is now considering whether to air it over the objections of President Nicolas Sarkozy, the cable news network's Paris bureau chief said on Tuesday.

Discussion: BBC

Mathew Ingram / GigaOM:

Don't build a paywall, create a velvet rope instead — As the newspaper industry continues to flounder, paywalls and other subscription models are becoming more common, with everyone trying to imitate the New York Times or the Wall Street Journal. Is there any other other option to putting up a turnstile around the news?

Discussion: @carr2n, Guardian and Noted, Thanks:@mathewi

Patrick B. Pexton / Washington Post: Is a paywall coming to The Washington Post?

Dan Sabbagh / Guardian:

Investigation will have made interesting viewing for Ofcom's News Corp team — Panorama's computer-hacking revelations come at a time when News Corporation's relationship with the satellite broadcaster BSkyB is already under scrutiny from the broadcast regulator, Ofcom.

BBC:

Murdoch firm used hacker site to target pay-TV rival — ITV Digital was plagued by piracy of its smartcards and went into administration in 2002 — A News Corporation company recruited a pay-TV “pirate” to post hacked details of a rival's secret codes online, BBC Panorama has found.

Discussion: Pocket-lint, The Verge, Gizmodo and Guardian

Mike Janssen / Current.org:

Digital journalists look for lessons in work of NPR's one-man newsroom … On a recent afternoon at NPR, Andy Carvin was watching a video of a protest purportedly shot in the Syrian city of Homs, a locus of that country's uprising against its repressive regime.

Ryan Chittum / CJR:

Sourcing Trayvon Martin “Photos” From Stormfront — Business Insider runs a linkbait post with a graphic of Trayvon Martin images it found on the neonazi website Stormfront. — It doesn't run them to debunk them, mind you, but to back up its thesis that “The Media Is Getting the Trayvon Martin Story Wrong …

Discussion: Riptide 2.0, Business Insider and Strollerderby

Howard Kurtz / The Daily Beast:
Al Sharpton's Conflicting Roles in the Trayvon Martin Case

Discussion: Mediaite, Gawker, Forbes, TVNewser, The Raw Story and Tampa Bay Times

Jeff Sonderman / Poynter:
ESPN drops ban on staff posting pics in hoodies

Discussion: The Wrap and The Maynard Institute

Brian Stelter / New York Times:
For Martin's Case, a Long Route to National Attention

Discussion: The Daily Caller, Erik Wemple, Mashable!, Media Decoder, Gannett Blog, Chickaboomer, The Huffington Post and Mediaite

Hamish McKenzie / PandoDaily:

The Future of Magazines Should Look a Lot Like Spotify — The options we have for reading magazine journalism in the digital format are pretty sad. We live in an era of self-driving cars, augmented reality, and we can keep a map of the entire planet in our pocket, but we are stuck reading …

Discussion: TechNodeTechNode

Emil Protalinski / Zero Day Blog:

Al Arabiya Facebook Page hacked, fake Syria news posted — Summary: Al Arabiya saw its English Facebook Page hacked and defaced today. The company has regained control of the Facebook Page, but not before a slew of fake news was posted. — Al Arabiya, a Saudi-owned television news channel …

Discussion: The Next Web

Elana Zak / 10,000 Words:

How The Wall Street Journal Uses Pinterest — While Pinterest is taking many newsrooms by storm, there may still be some editors who are hesitant or unsure about how to go about using the online scrapbooking site. Why not take a page — or in this case a board — from The Wall Street Journal?

Discussion: SocialTimes, Poynter and Talking Biz News

Joe Flint / Company Town:

Tribune threatens to pull stations from DirecTV — Tribune Co., owner of 16 television stations across the country including KTLA-TV Los Angeles, is threatening to pull its channels from satellite broadcaster DirecTV. — At issue are fees that Tribune, which is also the parent of the Los Angeles Times …

Discussion: Adweek, The Wrap and Radio & Television …