Mediagazer: CBS expands ‘Face the Nation’ to 1 hour on Sunday (David Bauder/Associated Press)

6:15 PM ET, March 31, 2012

Top News:

Keith Olbermann / TwitLonger:

My full statement: — I'd like to apologize to my viewers and my staff for the failure of Current TV. Editorially, Countdown had never been better. But for more than a year I have been imploring Al Gore and Joel Hyatt to resolve our issues internally, while I've been not publicizing my complaints …

Discussion: Mediaite, The Huffington Post, Show Tracker, Business Insider, Adweek, RumorFix, The FJP and TVbytheNumbers

Brian Stelter / Media Decoder:

Current TV Dismisses Keith Olbermann — 5:13 p.m. | Updated Current TV said Friday afternoon that it had terminated the contract of its lead anchor, Keith Olbermann, scarcely a year after he was hired to reboot the fledgling channel in his progressive political image.

Current TV:

Open letter to the viewers of Current — To the Viewers of Current: — We created Current to give voice to those Americans who refuse to rely on corporate-controlled media and are seeking an authentic progressive outlet. We are more committed to those goals today than ever before.

Discussion: Radio & Television …, Gawker, Speakeasy, Top Digital Journal News, Gothamist, Forbes, Media & Entertainment, Guardian, The Daily Caller, Mediaite, AdAge and paidContent

Jack Mirkinson / The Huffington Post:
Keith Olbermann Out At Current TV, Replaced By Eliot Spitzer

Discussion: TMZ.com, Business Insider and Forbes

Matt Sanchez / AdAge:

Take a Lesson from Print Media: Clean Up Web Layouts — Amid the Clutter, With Too Many Entry Points, Viewers Can't Focus on the the Content — 5,000. That's the average number of ads and marketing messages Americans are exposed to each day, and if you're online reading this, I'd skew that number higher.

Jonathan Stempel / Thomson Reuters News …:

Unpaid bloggers' lawsuit vs Huffington Post tossed — AOL Inc on Friday won the dismissal of a lawsuit by unpaid bloggers who complained they were deprived of their fair share of the roughly $315 million that the company paid last March to buy The Huffington Post website.

Discussion: Associated Press, Politico, Bloomberg, Forbes and @dangillmor

Jim Romenesko: Huffington Post reacts to judge's ruling

Farhad Manjoo / Slate:

Apple Doesn't Need To Make the TV of the Future — The revolution is already here—and it's called the Xbox. — If the rumors are true, Apple will release a television set later this year that it will tout as the most amazing boob tube ever invented. Apple's TV will be able to access shows …

Discussion: TechNet Blogs

David Bauder / Associated Press:

CBS expands ‘Face the Nation’ to 1 hour on Sunday — NEW YORK (AP) — Five years ago, just off a bout from cancer, Bob Schieffer was set to retire from CBS's “Face the Nation.” That never stuck, and now he's doubling his workload. — Starting Sunday, the public affairs program expands to an hour.

Discussion: TVNewser

Jeane MacIntosh / New York Post:

Soccer Mom madam and The Post — Anna Gristina, the notorious soccer mom madam, does have a relationship with someone at the New York Post. It's me. — Gristina has been a source on several stories I've written at the paper, most notably on Page Six. — This week, the New York Observer published …

Discussion: The New York Observer, Gawker, @dylanbyers, @mlcalderone and Politico

Joe Pompeo / Capital New York:
Tale of the tape: ‘Observer’ won't retract story about ‘Post’ editor Col Allan and soccer-mom madam Anna Gristina

Discussion: Gothamist, JIMROMENESKO.COM, New York Magazine and Guardian

Walter Shapiro / CJR:

Why is the Press So Ready to Count Santorum Out? — Voters think their primary choices still matter — The front-page story in the March 18th New York Times seemed a case of political life imitating art. A revival of The Best Man—Gore Vidal's 1960 ode to the drama of a brokered convention—was in previews on Broadway.

Discussion: Washington Wire

Rick Edmonds / Poynter:

Healthy snacks, ‘digital first’ and the speed of the news industry's transformation — Reading stories about the travails of non-media companies, I find myself drawn to analogies to the plight of the newspaper industry. — Thus I was stopped short a few weeks back by a New York Times report on a strategy shift at PepsiCo.

Discussion: @jayrosen_nyu

Laura Hazard Owen / paidContent:

E-Book Sales For Kids And Teens Surge — New monthly stats from the Association of American Publishers show strong growth for both print and e-books in January 2012. — The AAP is beefing up its monthly reports with data from many more publishers—1,149 for January 2012 compared to under 100 …

Discussion: the Econsultancy blog and The Verge

Andrew Beaujon / Poynter:

8 great newspaper April Fools' hoaxes — The Great Wall of China hoax of 1899 was so excellent that it engendered a separate hoax: Some have claimed since that it helped kick off the Boxer Rebellion. Even better, the hoax was perpetrated in June, well after everyone had let their guard down.

Discussion: JIMROMENESKO.COM

Tom Kington / Guardian:

Twitter hoaxer comes clean and says: I did it to expose weak media — Tommaso De Benedetti faked the identities of world leaders and fooled editors into publishing false stories — First it was the death of the pope - tweeted to the world from an account that belonged to the holy father's number two.