Mediagazer: A Radio Merger in New York Reflects a Shifting Industry (Ben Sisario/New York Times)

12:00 AM ET, May 2, 2012

Top News:

Rupert Murdoch ‘not fit’ to lead major international company, MPs conclude — Select committee also says James Murdoch showed ‘wilful ignorance’ of extent of phone hacking at News of the World — Rupert Murdoch is “not a fit person” to exercise stewardship of a major international company …

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

Jim Romenesko:

Murdoch's letter to Dow Jones employees — In a memo to employees, Rupert Murdoch says of the UK Parliament panel's phone hacking report: “I recognize that for all of us - myself in particular - it is difficult to read many of the report's findings. But we have done the most difficult part …

Discussion: Guardian, FishbowlNY, Politico and National Updates

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: Tech Daily Dose

Paul Hoskins / Reuters:

BSkyB hopes results can outshine hacking headlines — LONDON, May 2 (Reuters) - Probes into phone hacking and the legacy of a failed bid by Rupert Murdoch to seize full control look likely to overshadow a resilient set of results from satellite broadcaster BSKyB on Wednesday.

Andrew Pugh / Press Gazette:

‘Les Hinton was complicit in cover-up at News Int’ — Ex-News International chief executive Les Hinton sanctioned a series of “extraordinary” payments to former News of the World royal editor Clive Goodman after his phone-hacking conviction in a bid to buy his silence …

Discussion: Guardian, @davidfolkenflik, Company Town, paidContent, Media Week and Journalism.co.uk

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

Discussion: Crikey

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

Discussion: New York Times, Capital New York and Mixed Media

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: New York Times, Mashable!, Online NewsHour, Associated Press, Mediaite, Broadcasting & Cable, Washington Post, Politico, TVNewser, Hit & Run, msnbc.com, The Week, Gothamist and New York Magazine

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 …

Discussion: AdAge, Tampa Bay Times, WebProNews, Media Decoder, Forbes, Capital New York, BtoB Magazine, DCist, FishbowlNY, NewsBulletin Connection, Gannett Blog, The Huffington Post, paidContent and The Newspaper Guild

Dylan Byers / Politico:
New York Times rising, WaPo struggling

Discussion: Crain's New York Business, NetNewsCheck Latest and Adweek

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: @ryanchittum, @weareyourfek and @nicknotned

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, Betabeat and PC Magazine

Kevin C. Tofel / GigaOM:
A brief history of Microsoft's e-reader efforts

Discussion: CNET, Digital Book World, Wired and TechCrunch

Ben Sisario / New York Times:

A Radio Merger in New York Reflects a Shifting Industry — On its surface, the merger last week of WRKS and WBLS, longtime rivals in the R&B radio format in New York, was business as usual for the broadcast industry. Two struggling competitors combined operations, and a deep-pocketed third party …

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: MacRumors