Mediagazer: Tabloid Tangle: Jim Dolan Accuses Mort Zuckerman of Extortion (Jeff Bercovici/Mixed Media)

2:00 PM ET, April 3, 2012

Top News:

Peter Kafka / AllThingsD:

News Corp. Still Backing James Murdoch — News Corp. is making a show of publicly backing James Murdoch, its deputy chief operating officer, after he stepped down as chairman of BSkyB. — Here's the full statement the company (which also owns this Web site) just released:

Discussion: Telegraph

Dominic Rushe / Guardian:

News Corp shareholders renew call for Rupert Murdoch to step down — Calls for Murdoch to be replaced are reignited following James Murdoch's resignation from British pay-TV giant BSkyB — Shareholder activists have renewed their call for Rupert Murdoch to quit as chairman of News Corporation …

Discussion: Guardian and AllThingsD

Lisa O'Carroll / Guardian:

Rupert Murdoch and son James expected at Leveson inquiry — Rupert Murdoch and James Murdoch are expected to be summoned to the inquiry into press ethics within weeks after Lord Justice Leveson announced he would be calling in newspaper owners to give evidence between now and the middle of May.

Lisa O'Carroll / Guardian:
Ex-Met police boss John Yates attended News of the World reporter's wedding

Discussion: Press Gazette and Journalism.co.uk

Sarah Marshall / Journalism.co.uk:
Leveson inquiry: Rebekah Brooks reapplies for core participant status

Discussion: Press Gazette

Robert Andrews / paidContent:
James Murdoch quits another News Corp group to spare BSkyB from fall-out

Discussion: Media Matters for America, Sky News, @mediaguardian, Guardian, Sky News, Broadcasting & Cable, Company Town, Media & Entertainment, Free Press, Press Gazette, Radio & Television …, Poynter, The Wrap, BBC, CNN and Globe and Mail

Katherine Fung / The Huffington Post:

‘Today’ Tops ‘Good Morning America’ With Katie Couric On First Day — The ratings for the first day of the intense morning show war between the morning shows and the winner is... “Today.” The NBC morning show came in 333,000 viewers ahead of “GMA” on Monday, according to Nielsen.

Eric Deggans / Tampa Bay Times:

Sarah Palin knocks lamestream media while getting two hours free publicity on NBC's Today — Now I know why Sarah Palin calls it the lamestream media. Halfway through the first two hours of Palin's “guest hosting” stint on NBC's Today show this morning, I was still waiting …

Jack Mirkinson / The Huffington Post:
Sarah Palin Co-Hosts ‘Today’

Discussion: New York Magazine, Mediaite, TVNewser and Chickaboomer

Joe Pompeo / Capital New York:

2012 National Magazine Awards nominees announced — After years of refining its unique blend of irreverent hipster screeds and hard-hitting international journalism, it seems that Vice is officially all grown up: The title will go head-to-head with industry stand-bys Bloomberg Businessweek …

Discussion: FishbowlNY, The New York Observer and @lilianasegura

Brian Stelter / New York Times:

Robert Redford to Produce a Documentary About Watergate — Rarely does reality intersect with role playing the way it did two Sundays ago in Bob Woodward's living room. — Meeting him there were Carl Bernstein, his writing partner at The Washington Post during the Watergate scandal in the 1970s …

Discussion: JIMROMENESKO.COM, Media Decoder, Inside TV and BBC

Bill Carter / Media Decoder:

Letterman and Ferguson Extend Runs on CBS — CBS, closing the lid on any speculation that change might be coming for its late-night lineup, announced Tuesday that both David Letterman and Craig Ferguson have agreed to continue in their shows for at least two more years.

Discussion: Radio & Television …, The Wrap, Broadcasting & Cable and Splitsider

Jeff Bercovici / Mixed Media:

Tabloid Tangle: Jim Dolan Accuses Mort Zuckerman of Extortion — Publishing a tabloid newspaper in New York is not for the timid, but the accusation Cablevision CEO Jim Dolan just leveled against New York Daily News owner Mort Zuckerman is strong stuff even by those standards.

Discussion: Media Decoder, Forbes, New York Magazine, Forbes, The New York Observer, Newsday, New York Post, BuzzFeed, The Big Lead and Runnin' Scared

Matt Chaban / The New York Observer:

T-Squared Off: With Paul Goldberger Leaving for Vanity Fair, Is This the End of Architecture Criticism at The New Yorker? — There are two great thrones in American architectural criticism, that of The New Yorker and The New York Times. It was at these two journalistic institutions …

Discussion: UnBeige, JIMROMENESKO.COM, Capital New York, The Huffington Post, FishbowlNY and LA Observed

Rupal Parekh / AdAge:

Many Magazines Racing to Capitalize on Pinterest — Publishers Exploring Platform, Watching Rivals' Moves — Last month, digital executives from Hearst's 20 or so titles were summoned for an important meeting at the company's Manhattan headquarters. — The pressing subject was Pinterest …

Discussion: New York Times and Adweek, Thanks:@matt_creamer

Paul Smalera / Reuters:

The recession killed journalism - and saved it — Over the last few years, thanks to the global economic crisis - encapsulating everything from the 2008 housing crash to today's ongoing euro zone sovereign-debt debacle - much ink has been spilled about the reshaping of the world's economy, especially about the domestic job market.

Discussion: Capital New York, newsplexer and WWD

Alex Sherman / Bloomberg:

DirecTV Asks Who Makes Decisions at Tribune as Blackouts Extend — DirecTV (DTV), the largest U.S. satellite- TV company, still doesn't know whether it should negotiate with Tribune Co. management or its creditors to end a blackout of 23 local stations, DirecTV's head of programming said.