Mediagazer: The fight gets dirty: Sun accuses rival of using ex-MI6 men to tail civil servant (Ian Burrell/The Independent)

1:15 PM ET, April 18, 2012

Top News:

Lisa O'Carroll / Guardian:

Ofcom: press self-regulation could work — TV and radio regulator tells Leveson inquiry that successor to PCC may need more robust powers and recognition in statute — Newspaper proprietors and editors hoping to stop David Cameron introducing statutory regulation of the press won support today from the broadcasting regulator Ofcom.

Discussion: Journalism.co.uk

Ian Burrell / The Independent: The fight gets dirty: Sun accuses rival of using ex-MI6 men to tail civil servant

Bloomberg:
Prosecutors Weigh Phone-Hacking Charges for Journalists, Police

Discussion: Guardian, New York Times, Journalism.co.uk, ITV News and @benfenton

Lisa O'Carroll / Guardian: AG warns MPs to be ‘cautious’ in report

Brian Stelter / Media Decoder:

Current TV to Hire Gavin Newsom, California's Lieutenant Governor — Updated Gavin Newsom, the lieutenant governor of California, is getting a second job: as a talk show host on Current TV, the progressive cable television upstart. — “The Gavin Newsom Show” will be shown weekly starting in May, the channel announced on Wednesday.

Discussion: Mediaite and TVNewser

Jeff Bercovici / Mixed Media:

Satirical iPad App Punch Hires Vanity Fair Veteran Jim Windolf as Editor — The Punch “shelf.” — The makers of Punch started with the idea that creating media for a brand-new medium, tablet computers, requires a whole new approach. They've certainly turned convention on its head in their hiring …

Discussion: Forbes and Fast Company

Daniel Frankel / paidContent:

NBC's London Olympics strategy: If it moves, stream it — Yes, you will be able to see men's doubles table tennis live this summer on nbcolympics.com, right after you finish watching those premiere swimming and track & field events. — Speaking to the New York Times Tuesday, Rick Cordella …

Discussion: Poynter, TVNewser, VentureBeat, NetNewsCheck Latest, the Econsultancy blog, The Verge and WebProNews

Jeff Sonderman / Poynter:

How The Tuscaloosa News' post-tornado tweeting helped bring home a Pulitzer Prize — When the Pulitzer Prize Board announced last year it would emphasize real-time reporting for the Breaking News category starting in 2012, some speculated whether we would someday see a Pulitzer Prize for tweeting.

Discussion: The FJP and LA Observed

Dan Gillmor / Guardian: Don't take me to your leader: the Pulitzer and the lost art of editorials

Julie Moos / Poynter:

LA Times publishes graphic front page photo of US soldiers with Afghan corpses — The Los Angeles Times published graphic photos in print and online this morning of U.S. soldiers posing with Afghan corpses. — Eighteen such photos were provided by an anonymous soldier in the 82nd Airborne Division …

Discussion: New York Times, Los Angeles Times, Mediaite, Guardian and New York Magazine

Robert Andrews / paidContent:

Mail Online is about to turn its first profit — Having quickly become the world's most-read newspaper website, Mail Online now looks like turning profitable earlier than expected. — “Last year, our revenues were £16 million. This year, Mail Online is very close to breaking …

Reuters:
Falling ad revenues to hit Daily Mail profits

Discussion: This Is London and Guardian

New York Times:

Pandora Courts Local Advertisers, by Offering Well-Defined Listeners — The music was pumping and the finger food laid out in abundance one recent evening in a subterranean Manhattan bar, as executives of Pandora Media, the Internet radio service, mingled with some of their most prized new advertisers.

Discussion: iMediaConnection Blog

Om Malik / GigaOM:

Physical media is dead — long live the app — Over the weekend, Hunter Walk (a friend of mine who works for YouTube) tweeted about brands offering apps built on the Spotify platform. Spotify is likely to introduce these branded apps from the likes of Intel, AT&T, Reebok and McDonalds at an Ad Age event this week.

Discussion: AllThingsD and eMedia Vitals

Brittany Darwell / Inside Facebook:

Facebook tests ‘trending articles’ feature to encourage users to try social reader apps — Facebook appears to be testing new feature to highlight social reader articles within users' News Feeds. — Some users now see a “trending articles” section of their feeds that includes headlines …

Discussion: Poynter

Andrew Beaujon / Poynter:

Labor Dept.'s new policies for journalists may affect market-moving data — The United States Department of Labor is changing the way journalists can prepare stories based on embargoed data, and news organizations are concerned that the new policies could keep them from filing stories with this data …

Discussion: Bloomberg and Talking Biz News

Jim Romenesko:

Where is TV critic Aaron Barnhart? Is it anybody's business? — Kansas City Star TV critic Aaron Barnhart (@TVBarn) hasn't tweeted since early December. His last Star column was published on Christmas Day, a year-in-review piece. It appears he hasn't been on Facebook since January.

Discussion: TVNewser