Mediagazer: YouTube opens Partner program to all: every creator in 20 countries can now monetize video (Sean Hollister/The Verge)

9:50 AM ET, April 13, 2012

Top News:

Peter Kafka / AllThingsD:

Apple Fires Back at the Feds, Amazon — Nearly two days after the Department of Justice filed antitrust charges against Apple and major book publishers, Apple is responding. Here's comment from Apple spokesman Tom Neumayr: … Apple's response is similar to ones made by Penguin Group and MacMillan …

Discussion: TUAW, CNET, The Verge, Business Insider, The Next Web, App Advice, MacRumors, eBookNewser, Softpedia News, 9to5Mac, MacStories and CNET

Jeffrey A. Trachtenberg / Wall Street Journal:

Antitrust Settlement Hits Barnes & Noble Shares — Barnes & Noble Inc. bore the brunt of Wednesday's antitrust settlement between the U.S. government and three major book publishers, losing 6.4% of its market value on Thursday alone and tumbling 17% this month.

Discussion: Media Decoder, Thad McIlroy, SlashGear and eBookNewser

Michael Bobelian / Forbes: The Irony Of The Government's Antitrust Case Against Apple And Five Publishers

Economist:
A too-cosy world? — Readers may not be the ultimate winners in an e-book antitrust case

Discussion: NPR, Technology Review and New York Times

John Cook / Gawker:

Here's a Picture of Bill O'Reilly With a Topless Woman Along With the Fox News Legal Threat Meant to Quash It — Hey, look what just came in through the Gawker mailbag from the good people at Epstein Becker & Green P.C.: “Gawker should immediately stop publishing information and videos …

Discussion: mediabistro.com, TVNewser, Guardian, @producermatthew, Business Insider, Deadline.com, Mediaite, @joemuto, New York Magazine, Forbes and FishbowlLA

Jeff Bercovici / Mixed Media:

The ‘Fox News Mole’ Only Cost Gawker $5,000 — What's the going rate for inducing someone to commit career suicide? Apparently you can do it for five grand, as long as that person has a sufficiently large ax to grind against his employer. — Gawker's John Cook tells …

Discussion: NY Daily News, Associated Press, Yahoo! News, Deadspin, Mashable!, Media & Entertainment, Company Town, TVNewser, WebProNews, Show Tracker, Forbes, Business Insider, Mediaite, Ricochet Conversations Feed, Vanity Fair and FishbowlNY

Foster Kamer / The New York Observer:
The Annotated Gawker Legal Threat: What Fox News Lawyers Fired Off at Their ‘Mole’ Problem

Discussion: Gawker, Erik Wemple and Mediaite

Eriq Gardner / Hollywood Reporter:
Why Fox News Shouldn't Sue Over the ‘Fox Mole’ (Analysis)

Discussion: Gawker, The Huffington Post and Erik Wemple

Melody Guyton Butts / Durham Herald-Sun:

Ailes lectures young journalists — CHAPEL HILL - Fox News chief Roger Ailes offered more than a few words of advice Thursday in a room filled mostly with young journalists, starting with a recommendation that elicited at least a few eye rolls: “I think you ought to change your major.”

Discussion: The Huffington Post, Erik Wemple, ABCNEWS, @romenesko, Poynter, The Daily Tar Heel and News14.com

Dan Watson / CJR:

Unpublishing Requests Are on the Rise — As more content shifts from print to web, journalists are seeing rising requests from sources to remove stories — I recently encountered a sticky conundrum as editor of a student-run digital news website at the University of Southern California.

Discussion: eMedia Vitals and NetNewsCheck Latest

Josh Halliday / Guardian:

‘NightJack’ sues Times over email hacking — Detective seeks aggravated damages from paper for breach of confidence, misuse of private information and deceit — The Lancashire detective exposed by the Times as the author of the NightJack police blog has filed a legal claim against Times Newspapers at the high court.

Discussion: Press Gazette, Associated Press and New Statesman

Steve Myers / Poynter:

Study: 7 in 10 local news readers wouldn't greatly miss their hometown paper — Pew Research Center's Project for Excellence in Journalism and Internet & American Life Project — Pew's latest report, a deep dive into the characteristics of people who closely follow local news, is one of those glass-half-full/half-empty situations.

Discussion: Street Fight and Pew Internet

Pew Internet:
72% of Americans follow local news closely

Discussion: FishbowlNY

Michael Holden / Reuters:

UK police judgment poor in News Corp hacking case: report — (Reuters) - Senior London police staff linked to the News Corp phone hacking scandal showed poor judgment, took bad decisions and got too close to journalists working for Rupert Murdoch's newspapers, an independent watchdog said on Thursday.

Discussion: Bloomberg

Khristopher Brooks / The Huffington Post:

How to Get Fired Before Your First Day — Most college students hope to land a nice-paying job in their field of study immediately after graduation. — And for the most part, I was headed in that direction. I finished my last two classes of graduate school at New York University …

Discussion: 10,000 Words and B2B Memes

Hamilton Nolan / Gawker:
Newspaper Fires Reporter for Showing Mild Sense of Enthusiasm

Discussion: Gannett Blog, MyFoxPhilly.com, @yurivictor, @stevebuttry and @mattderienzo

Sean Hollister / The Verge:

YouTube opens Partner program to all: every creator in 20 countries can now monetize video — YouTube's long been a good friend to video producers who create popular content. They become Partners, gain exclusive privileges, and can choose to run advertising on their videos for a cut of the resulting profit.

Discussion: eMedia Vitals, Mashable! and YouTube Creator Blog

Pingdom:

WordPress completely dominates top 100 blogs — WordPress is no doubt a very popular web publishing platform for blogs and other types of websites. But just how popular is it? — We just completed a study and found that WordPress is in use by 48% of the top 100 blogs in the world.

Discussion: PandoDaily, The Next Web, Shareaholic Blog, WebProNews and CNET

Ken Wheaton / AdAge:

Court Declares Public TV's Ban on Political Ads Unconstitutional — Says There Is No Evidence It Would Harm Programming — Will your children be accosted by ads from Mitt Romney and Barack Obama while watching “Sesame Street”? A court ruling today makes it a possibility (even if it isn't a strong one).