Mediagazer: Web journey complete, FT switching off iOS app (Robert Andrews/paidContent)

8:15 AM ET, May 2, 2012

Top News:

MPs clash over Murdoch criticisms — Two MPs on the culture, media and sport select committee have clashed in the deepening row over whether the committee had discussed the fitness of Rupert Murdoch to run an international company before the devastating criticism was tabled on Monday by the Labour MP Tom Watson.

Jeff Bercovici / Forbes:

Barry Diller Backs Rupert Murdoch as ‘Honorable,’ ‘Morally Fit’ — Barry Diller at Allen & Co.'s annual media get-together in Sun Valley, Idaho. Rupert Murdoch was there, too. (Image credit: Getty Images via @daylife) — To the six members of British Parliament's culture committee …

Discussion: Guardian, Media Decoder, Company Town, The Huffington Post and Company Town

Guardian:

Rupert Murdoch's Fox broadcast licences targeted by US ethics group — FCC called on to revoke licences in wake of British parliamentary report as phone hacking scandal widens abroad — A Washington-based ethics watchdog is calling on federal regulators to revoke News Corporation's 27 Fox …

Discussion: CREW and Tech Daily Dose

Jim Romenesko:
Murdoch's letter to Dow Jones employees

Discussion: Guardian, CJR, FishbowlNY, Politico, National Updates and New York Times

News Corp:
News Corporation Statement of UK's Parliamentary Select Committee of Culture, Media and Sport's News of the World Report

Discussion: Journalism.co.uk, Crikey, Guardian and Guardian

Andrew Pugh / Press Gazette:
‘Les Hinton was complicit in cover-up at News Int’

Discussion: Guardian, @davidfolkenflik, Company Town, FishbowlNY, paidContent and Media Week

Ed Pilkington / Guardian:
NY Daily News editor Colin Myler misled MPs over hacking, report finds

Discussion: Media Decoder, Jack Shafer, Mixed Media, Capital New York, Guardian, Press Gazette, Tom Watson MP and Guardian

Kate Holton / Reuters:

BSkyB uses record results to defend role in Britain — (Reuters) - Satellite broadcaster BSkyB sought to distance itself from the controversy over phone hacking at its biggest shareholder on Wednesday after British lawmakers suggested the ties to Rupert Murdoch's News Corp might endanger its licence.

Sky News:

Sky News to Enter United States & Canada via Livestation — LONDON, 2nd May 2012: From today Sky News will be available in the United States and Canada for the first time via Livestation, the largest aggregator of live television news online. Viewers in the US and Canada will have access …

Discussion: Beet.TV

Robert Andrews / paidContent:

BSkyB acquires Acetrax to be its connected TV Trojan Horse — While pundits prefer to focus on phone hacking, News Corp's part-owned UK pay-TV operator BSkyB is buying further in to internet TV. — Last Wednesday, the operator quietly acquired Acetrax, a service that offers …

Discussion: Guardian

Mark Sweney / Guardian:

BSkyB posts profit of almost £1bn — Satellite broadcaster reports 25% surge in operating profit and grows total customer base to 10.5 million — BSkyB has delivered profits of almost £1bn in the nine months to the end of March, fuelled by £31m that Rupert Murdoch …

Discussion: Journalism.co.uk

Zeke Miller / Buzzfeed:

How The White House Smothered The News Of Obama's Trip To Afghanistan — Shortly before 9:19 a.m. this morning the Afghanistan-based 24-hour broadcast news station TOLONews tweeted that President Barack Obama had landed in Afghanistan. The surprise trip was a closely guarded secret …

Discussion: Associated Press, New York Times, Online NewsHour, Mashable!, Broadcasting & Cable, Politico, Gothamist, The Week, Mediaite, TVNewser, Infowars and New York Magazine

Robert Andrews / paidContent:

Web journey complete, FT switching off iOS app — The Financial Times is preparing to kill off its iPad and iPhone app for good, signalling its final conversion from executable-app to web-app publishing. — The news publisher launched a HTML5 web app and pulled its iOS app off iTunes Store …

Discussion: eMedia Vitals, NetNewsCheck Latest, TUAW and MacRumors

John Koblin / Deadspin:

Is An ESPN Columnist Scamming People On The Internet? [UPDATE] — A few weeks ago, ESPN columnist Sarah Phillips concluded her weekly “Junk Mail” column with a question from an unnamed reader: … Phillips responded: … Is Sarah Phillips for real? Thirteen months ago …

Discussion: Deadspin, @weareyourfek, @nicknotned and @ryanchittum

Rasmus Kleis Nielsen / MediaFile:

The irrational imitation of the online news industry — All across Europe, journalistic online startups are launching, aiming to produce and disseminate news in new ways. In our brave new world, the nimble startups of tomorrow were supposed to be overtaking the lumbering dinosaurs of yesterday online.

Laura Hazard Owen / GigaOM:

Soon you'll be able to use your Nook to buy books in Barnes & Noble stores — On the heels of yesterday's news that Microsoft is investing $300 million in Barnes & Noble's Nook and college businesses, B&N CEO William Lynch says that the company plans to embed NFC (near field communication) chips into Nooks.

Discussion: Fortune, TeleRead, PC Magazine and Betabeat

Andrew Beaujon / Poynter:

ABC: Newspaper circulation rose in last six months, 5% on Sundays — Newspapers across the country gained readers in the last six months, compared to the same period a year ago. Nationally, daily circulation was up .68 percent for digital and print at the 618 papers reporting …