Mediagazer: New Result in ‘Today’ and ‘Good Morning America’ Rivalry: Too Close to Call (Bill Carter/Media Decoder)

1:15 PM ET, July 26, 2012

Top News:

Peter Kafka / AllThingsD:

No News for the New York Times: Circulation Up, Ad Sales Down — New quarter, same news for the New York Times. — That is, the publisher says that over the last three months it saw circulation revenue increase, and both print and digital ads decrease. — Growth in circulation …

Discussion: Forbes, Guardian, FishbowlNY, paidContent, The New York Times Company, New York Times, Poynter, @pkafka and @edmundlee

Joe Pompeo / Capital New York: The Times Company's search for a new C.E.O. hits the final stretch

Chris Ariens / TVNewser:

Norah O'Donnell Replacing Erica Hill on ‘CBS This Morning’ — Breaking: Six months into its run, “CBS This Morning” is making an anchor change. CBS News Chief White House Correspondent Norah O'Donnell has been named co-host of “CBS This Morning” replacing Erica Hill who first came to CBS News in 2008 …

Discussion: Media Decoder, The Wrap, Mediaite, Broadcasting & Cable and The Huffington Post

Janko Roettgers / GigaOM:

Roku gets $45M in funding from News Corp., BSkyB — Roku announced late Wednesday that it has secured $45 million in additional funding from new investors News Corporation and BSkyB as well as existing investors Menlo Ventures and Globespan Capital Partners.

Discussion: TechCrunch, Home Media Magazine, Multichannel, AdAge, PC Magazine, Los Angeles Times, VentureBeat, Forbes and Business Insider

Mark Sweney / Guardian:

BSkyB reports 17% rise in profits — The satellite broadcaster's pre-tax profit rises to almost £1.2bn as its customer base grows to 10.6m households — BSkyB has reported record pre-tax profits up 17% to £1.19bn in the year to the end of June, and revealed that it intends …

Discussion: AllThingsD and Beet.TV

Joanne Ostrow / Denver Post:

Theater shooting: Media outlets covering Aurora paying for information — Television producers quickly locked up eyewitnesses, legal experts and others in the wake of the Aurora shootings, competing with other media outlets and, in some cases, paying a fee for exclusive access.

Discussion: Erik Wemple and KDVR.com

Tim Stenovec / The Huffington Post:
James Taranto, WSJ Editor, Tweets Controversial Aurora Shooting Comment, Issues ‘Mea Culpa’

Discussion: Chickaboomer

Andrew Beaujon / Poynter:
Jessica Ghawi scholarship raises more than $30,000 in a day

Discussion: KXAN-TV and MySanAntonio.com

Mathew Ingram / GigaOM:

The NYT's Bill Keller on why we should defend WikiLeaks — In a post on Tuesday entitled “First they came for WikiLeaks, then the New York Times,” we wrote about how there is growing evidence that Congress and the Justice Department may be considering legal sanctions against traditional journalists …

Discussion: Techdirt, NetNewsCheck Latest and GigaOM

Paul Lewis / Guardian: Ecuador seeks to stop ‘evil’ of Julian Assange US extradition

Staci D. Kramer / paidContent:

NBC Sports Chairman Lazarus: London Olympics are a ‘grand experiment’ — Mark Lazarus is no stranger to big sports events but the 2012 Olympics trumps them all. Lazarus, the chairman of NBC Sports Group, joined NBC Universal as part of the Comcast merger, becoming chairman of the NBC Sports Group …

Discussion: The Huffington Post, GigaOM, MediaPost and eMedia Vitals

Richard Sandomir / New York Times:
With Ebersol Gone, NBC Passes Broadcast Baton to ‘Today’ Producer

Discussion: Cable Tech Talk, ZDNet, PopWatch and Forbes

Andrew Beaujon / Poynter:

Saints owner offers to buy Times-Picayune — New Orleans Saints owner Tom Benson has offered to buy The Times-Picayune, WWLTV.com reports. He writes in a letter to Steven Newhouse, head of Advance.net: … A handwritten note at the bottom of the page reads, “In 1985, the Saints were leaving …

Bill Carter / Media Decoder:

New Result in ‘Today’ and ‘Good Morning America’ Rivalry: Too Close to Call — LOS ANGELES — The increasingly intense competition between NBC's “Today” show and ABC's “Good Morning America” took its latest twist last week when the shows produced — in the Nielsen rating sample anyway …

Discussion: TVNewser and Broadcasting & Cable

Janko Roettgers / GigaOM:

Google TV will get its own version of AirPlay — Google will bring AirPlay-like functionality to its Google TV platform, allowing users to play and control media directly from their Android tablet or handset, GigaOM has learned. The functionality will first be available via Google's YouTube app …

Discussion: Forbes, Business Insider and NetNewsCheck Latest

Nick Bilton / NYT Bits:

Is Twitter a Media or Technology Company? — If it looks like a duck, quacks like a duck and walks like a duck, then it's a duck — right? — One question many seem to be wondering about Twitter: is this duck a media or technology company? — In a meeting at The New York Times offices in New York …

Discussion: GigaOM, NetNewsCheck Latest, @jayrosen_nyu, VentureBeat and Adweek

Andrew Beaujon / Poynter:

Brauchli: Washington Post reporters will need editor's approval to share drafts with sources — Washington Post Executive Editor Marcus Brauchli says the paper's policy on sharing drafts with sources will get more restrictive after the Texas Observer reported that a Post reporter sent drafts of a story to the University of Texas.

Discussion: Erik Wemple, Washington Post and City Desk

Elon Green / The Awl:

Maureen Dowd, Cub Reporter — It's easy to look at our media industrial complex and forget that its members were once young and hungry, that they had to hustle, grease sources and report stories within an inch of life. One can imagine these scrappers delirious just to see a byline buried on B4 or, God forbid, a sidebar.

Discussion: Erik Wemple, New York Magazine, The Corsair and JIMROMENESKO.COM