Mediagazer: Amazon-owned Audible: Hey authors, want $20 million? (Laura Hazard Owen/paidContent)

1:25 PM 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 a comment from Apple spokesman Tom Neumayr: … Apple's response is similar to ones made by Penguin Group and MacMillan …

Discussion: PC Magazine, Fortune, MacStories, WebProNews, CNET, TUAW, The Verge, Business Insider, App Advice, The Next Web, Softpedia News, MacRumors, eBookNewser, 9to5Mac, CNET and New York Times

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

Discussion: Forbes

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

Discussion: NPR and Technology Review

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: Erik Wemple, JIMROMENESKO.COM, The Huffington Post, mediabistro.com, Mediaite, TVNewser, ABCNEWS, The Daily Tar Heel, News14.com, @romenesko, Poynter and Reesenews

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: Poynter, FishbowlNY, mediabistro.com, TVNewser, Guardian, @producermatthew, Business Insider, Mediaite, Deadline.com, New York Magazine, @joemuto, Company Town and Erik Wemple

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

Discussion: Gawker and Erik Wemple

Jeff Bercovici / Mixed Media:
The ‘Fox News Mole’ Only Cost Gawker $5,000

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

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

Discussion: Erik Wemple, Gawker and The Huffington Post

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: New York Times, Journalism.co.uk, AdAge, Press Gazette, Reuters, New Statesman, Associated Press and Bloomberg

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

Laura Hazard Owen / paidContent:

Amazon-owned Audible: Hey authors, want $20 million? — The Amazon-owned digital audiobooks site Audible.com is launching a new program, “Audible Author Services,” that pays audiobook authors $1 per sale through Audible.com, Audible.co.uk, and iTunes, out of a $20 million fund.

Discussion: GalleyCat, The Digital Reader and Guardian

Mark Sweney / Guardian:

Sun's Sunday edition loses 25% of sales — Paper falls to circulation of 2.4m, but remains comfortably ahead of nearest rival, the Mail on Sunday at 1.8m — Rupert Murdoch's Sunday edition of the Sun has reported a drop in sales of almost 25% to just over 2.4m in March …

Discussion: Media Week, Marketing Week, Press Gazette and Journalism.co.uk

Richard Gingras / Nieman Journalism Lab:

Google's Richard Gingras: 8 questions that will help define the future of journalism — Editor's note: At TechRaking 2012 today — a conference at the Googleplex in Mountain View, sponsored by Google and the Center for Investigative Reporting — a group of journalism doers and thinkers …

Discussion: @charlesarthur and @chanders

Ben Popper / VentureBeat:

Ooyala boosts viewer engagement four fold with its new, personalized, video discovery tools — If you've been by the websites of big names like ESPN, Rolling Stone or Victoria's Secret (not guilty) then you've probably watched video powered by Ooyala's white label service.

Discussion: Forbes, Multichannel, Beet.TV and VatorNews

Adam Hochberg / Poynter:

CNN's unedited epithets raise questions about when to use unfiltered hate speech — When Tulsa police arrested two men Sunday in connection with a shooting spree that targeted African-Americans, much of the media drew attention to a racist Facebook post apparently written by one of the suspects.

Discussion: mediaite

David Teicher / AdAge:

Tumblr Tests New Tools for Users and Brands — Can the Company Be a Business Without Traditional Advertising? Founder David Karp Explains — This may be Instagram's week, but through April, it's been the Year of Tumblr. On Wednesday, the social platform announced a partnership with Spotify.

Discussion: Betabeat, Digiday and The Next Web

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: Mashable!, eMedia Vitals, WebProNews and youtubecreator.blogspot.co.uk

Choire Sicha / The Awl:

Surprise! Copy Editors Are Destroying America's Newspapers (with PUNS) — The National Conference of the American Copy Editors Society has announced its headline contest winners and it is now clear who is destroying the media. Among the many talented, hard-working winners …

Discussion: ACES and Poynter