Mediagazer: Ghostwriting Accusation Leveled at Fareed Zakaria (Daniel D'Addario/The New York Observer)

7:45 AM ET, August 22, 2012

Top News:

Craig Silverman / Poynter:

Newsweek ditched its fact-checkers in 1996, then made a major error — “We, like other news organisations today, rely on our writers to submit factually accurate material,” Newsweek spokesman Andrew Kirk told Politico's Dylan Byers. — Byers had asked whether Newsweek has fact-checkers.

Discussion: The Week, bookforum.com, The Maddow Blog, PopWatch, Salon and Politico

Paul Krugman:

Kinds Of Wrong — Looking at the comments on my Niall Ferguson takedown (see Ezra Klein, Matthew O'Brien, James Fallows, and Noah Smith for more), I found my memory jogged about a point I've been meaning to make about the nature of error in economics. It seems to me that when readers declare …

Discussion: CJR, SECONDED, The Atlantic Wire, @juliemmoos, FAIR Blog, The Huffington Post and Pressing Issues

Tom McGeveran / Capital New York:
Is Tina Brown serious about Newsweek anymore?

Discussion: The Daily Beast, Eamonn Fitzgerald's Rainy Day, JIMROMENESKO.COM and Mediaite

Ta-Nehisi Coates / The Atlantic Online:
In Praise of Fact-Checkers — In the wake of Niall Ferguson's …

Discussion: GigaOM

Dylan Byers / Politico:
Newsweek: Niall Ferguson story ‘opinion’

Discussion: The Huffington Post

Dylan Byers / Politico:
Niall Ferguson ducks, nitpicks, vilifies

Discussion: @evgenymorozov, @jonathanshainin, Bloomberg, Capital New York, CJR and The Daily Beast

Dylan Byers / Politico:
Niall Ferguson: ‘Credibility’ not undermined

Discussion: The Daily Beast, The Daily Dish, New York Magazine, Business Insider, Guardian, The New Yorker Blog and New York Magazine

Reuters:

Exclusive: Barry Diller's IAC offers $300 million for About.com — (Reuters) - Barry Diller's IAC/Interactivecorp submitted an offer in excess of $300 million to buy the About.com information website from the New York Times Co, according to people with knowledge of the situation.

Discussion: The Wrap, AllThingsD, Media Decoder, CNET, Deadline.com, New York Magazine and Forbes

Rob Wong / Hulu Blog:

Launching a New Hulu: A Fresh Look for the Shows You Love — In 1992, the great comedian Phil Hartman threw on his Arkansas sweatshirt and walked into a McDonald's. He was on the set of “Saturday Night Live” and doing his best Bill Clinton impression, continuing the show's grand tradition of Presidential lampoons.

Discussion: Fast Company, CNET, The Verge, The Next Web and GigaOM

Mallary Jean Tenore / Poynter:

ABC News wants to talk to Tony Scott's family before deciding about retraction — ABC is waiting to hear back from Tony Scott's family or a family representative before determining whether its initial report about Scott was incorrect, a network spokesperson told Poynter.

Discussion: The Huffington Post, Slate and The Daily Beast

Craig Silverman / Poynter:
After Tony Scott error, will news orgs now think twice about following ABC News scoops?

Discussion: ABCNEWS, newsfeed.time.com, Business Insider and Media Decoder

Lucia Moses / Adweek:

Conde Nast Booms Overseas But Future is Unclear — Luca Dini, the editor in chief of Italian Vanity Fair, faces difficulties his peers in the U.S. would welcome. The Milan-based magazine has grown so much since launching as a newsweekly nearly 10 years ago that it's hard to imagine it getting any fatter …

Andrew Beaujon / Poynter:

Huffington Post, Newsweek use coat-hanger imagery for GOP platform — On Tuesday the Republican Party approved a plank to its convention platform opposing abortion in all cases. — Newsweek acknowledged Huffington Post's homepage — “Whoa there, Huffington Post!” — on its Tumblr.

Discussion: Mashable!, Rob Delaney, CNN, Erik Wemple and Gawker

Charlie Warzel / Adweek:
‘Newsweek’ Tumblr Adds to Publication's Woes

Discussion: Newsweek, Mediaite and Daily Dot

Ryan Lawler / TechCrunch:

Xbox Live Adds NBC News, Bringing Rachel Maddow, Hardball, And Meet The Press To The Game Console — Microsoft continues to add content partners for Xbox, pushing the game console into the center of the living room as more of a digital entertainment hub. The latest update, which goes live today …

Discussion: Beet.TV, PC Magazine and WebProNews

Bill Carter / Media Decoder:

Jimmy Kimmel to Move to 11:30 in January, ABC Announces — Jimmy Kimmel will jump to the big stage in late-night television in January, moving to 11:35 p.m. where he will take on the two titans of that time slot, David Letterman and Jay Leno. — ABC announced the move Tuesday …

Discussion: Poynter, TVNewser, Los Angeles Times, Splitsider, Tampa Bay Times, BuzzFeed, Speakeasy, LA Observed, Radio & Television …, USA Today, Mediaite, The Huffington Post, ExtraTV.com, Broadcasting & Cable, AdAge and FishbowlNY

Hazel Sheffield / CJR:

Local news sites form new trade association — “We are the future” says LION chairman Dylan Smith — Next month, at the annual Block by Block conference for local news sites, around 100 independent publishers will celebrate the launch of a new nonprofit trade group that will offer support for the growing hyperlocal news industry.

Discussion: Street Fight

Janko Roettgers / GigaOM:

Web TV needs to have captions starting next month, the FCC rules — TV networks and web video sites will have to start providing closed captions for any TV content available online by the end of September, the FCC ruled a few days ago (PDF of the ruling). The ruling reaffirmed the Twenty …

Discussion: SocialTimes

Heather Ford / MediaShift Idea Lab:

How Wikipedia Manages Sources for Breaking News — Almost a year ago, I was hired by Ushahidi to work as an ethnographic researcher on a project to understand how Wikipedians managed sources during breaking news events. — Ushahidi cares a great deal about this kind of work …

Alec MacGillis / The New Republic:

Say It Ain't So, Morning Joe — Nearly one week ago, I made a plea of sorts: for the political press to do its job when it comes to the basic task of calling out blatant, repeated dishonesty on the campaign trail. What got me going was watching Mitt Romney deliver this riff to hundreds of white coal miners in Ohio:

Discussion: The Fix, GOP 12 and Washington Post

Michael Calderone / The Huffington Post:

Michael Grunwald Compares Stimulus Coverage To Pre-Iraq War Media ‘Groupthink’ — NEW YORK — After two years reporting on President Barack Obama's nearly $800 billion stimulus package, a piece of legislation long derided by Republicans and barely discussed now by Democrats …