Mediagazer: Barbara Walters Apologizes for Helping Aide to Assad of Syria (Bill Carter/Media Decoder)

9:30 AM ET, June 6, 2012

Top News:

About GOOD and on to TOMORROW — On March 8, 2011, the day after I accepted the job as executive editor of GOOD, I sent a 5:15 a.m. Gchat message to my core lady: “woke up at 5am in a sweat about how hard it's gonna be to actually run a magazine.” — While it certainly wasn't the easiest year …

Andrew Beaujon / Poynter:

How things went bad at GOOD magazine, what's next for fired staff and the company they left — Max Schorr isn't interested in engaging in what he calls “he said/she said back and forth” with the former staffers of GOOD, the magazine he cofounded that laid off most of its editorial staff last Friday.

Discussion: @editorialiste, The Informer, Erik Wemple and The Raw Story

Alysia Santo / CJR:

GOOD Mag to be ‘a Reddit for social good’ (updated) — Ex-staffers at work on a new publication — GOOD magazine fired six of its nine-person editorial staff on Friday—and two others accepted buyouts—as part of a move from being a journalism-focused outlet to a community engagement platform.

Discussion: The Atlantic Wire, @clarajeffery and Poynter

TOMORROW:

Hello Tomorrow — “What is best in life?” This is our colleague Cord Jefferson's refrain. This brilliant little rhetorical question has a way of stopping everyone in the moment—usually a drunken moment, always a really great moment—to make sure we all recognize and remember it.

Discussion: Megan Greenwell, Newsweek and The Other NWA

Jim Romenesko:

Warren Buffett buys 3.2% stake in Lee Enterprises — Warren Buffett hoped Berkshire Hathaway could keep quiet about its investment in struggling Lee Enterprises, but the SEC wouldn't allow it. On Tuesday, the billionaire investor disclosed that Berkshire purchased 1.66 million shares of Lee …

Jack Shafer:

The great newspaper liquidation — In his 2004 book The Vanishing Newspaper: Saving Journalism in the Information Age, Philip Meyer imagined “the final stages” of a “squeeze scenario” by a newspaper owner who wanted to exit the business but didn't want to actually sell the title …

Discussion: The Daily Beast

Bill Carter / Media Decoder:

Barbara Walters Apologizes for Helping Aide to Assad of Syria — In the months after her exclusive interview last year with President Bashar al-Assad of Syria, Barbara Walters tried to intercede to get a job for a former aide of his, who Ms. Walters acknowledged helped arrange the interview.

Discussion: Telegraph, The Daily Beast, The Lede, Chickaboomer, Daily Mail and Deadline.com

Telegraph:

Barbara Walters: the key emails — Following her exclusive interview with Bashar al-Assad, Barbara Walters tried to use her influence to help one of the Syrian dictator's former aides. Here are the key emails. December 8, 2011 - Sheherazad Jaafari to Barbara Walters …

Discussion: New York Post, New York Magazine, Daily Mail, Guardian, Mediaite, TVNewser, The Huffington Post and Big News Network.com

Howard Owens / CJR:

How David Simon is wrong about paywalls — Let me count the ways. Ten, in fact. — David Simon is a talented writer and storyteller, but is he qualified to give advice to publishers about how to save their dying industry? — As qualified as anybody else, I suppose.

Discussion: Poynter, THE OUTSIDER, The Buttry Diary, @jeffjarvis, @palafo, NetNewsCheck Latest, @jasonhirschhorn, @jeffjarvis, @palafo, @mathewi, @froomkin and @stevebuttry

Salvador Rodriguez / Los Angeles Times:

Pandora is lobbying Congress to keep online radio royalties low — Pandora has reportedly spent more than $50,000 during the first quarter alone on two lobbying firms to keep royalties for online radio low. — Pandora has reportedly spent more than $50,000 this year lobbying Congress …

Discussion: Free Press and Hillicon Valley

Mathew Ingram / GigaOM:

What happens when a newspaper is just another digital voice? — The fact that print is declining as a medium for journalism, and that newspapers are going to have to deal with that in a variety of ways, was brought home with a thud recently when Advance Publications and Postmedia announced …

David Carr / Media Decoder:
Rally and Open Letter Signal Pushback to a Less-Than-Daily Times-Picayune

Discussion: CJR, JIMROMENESKO.COM, AJE, MediaPost, Gambit New Orleans News … and Forbes

Joe Pompeo / Capital New York:

‘New Yorker’ digital editor Nicholas Thompson on the rapidly expanding newyorker.com — The New Yorker's website is starting to take shape under the direction of Nicholas Thompson. — “We are indeed expanding,” said Thompson, who made a rare move from the magazine's print side several months ago to a job as editor of newyorker.com.

Discussion: Wired and GalleyCat

Erik Maza / WWD:
David Remnick Looks Into the Future

Discussion: The Huffington Post and Capital New York

Julie Moos / Poynter:

Donald Trump is done with USA Today — Donald Trump tweeted this afternoon: … We have made it easy to comment on posts, however we require civility and encourage full names to that end (first initial, last name is OK). Please read our guidelines here before commenting.

Discussion: @peterlauria3, Gannett Blog and Politico

Dylan Byers / Politico:

The American Prospect doesn't need angels — GQ's Marin Cogan reports today on the fate of The American Prospect, which recently told readers that if it couldn't raise $200,000, it was going to die. — It's not a terribly pretty picture: “On a recent Monday afternoon …

Marin Cogan / GQ:
“I'm sort of fatalistic ... It's in rich peoples' hands now”: The Last Days of The American Prospect?

Discussion: bookforum.com and Politico

Kat Stoeffel / The New York Observer:

Shake Up Shack: New York Times Has New Police Bureau Chief — After more than a half a decade as police headquarters bureau chief for The New York Times, Al Baker has vacated the mouse-infested reporters' “shack” at One Police Plaza, making way for some rare new blood at the Times.