Mediagazer: Chasing Lance Armstrong's Misdeeds From the Sidelines (David Carr/New York Times)

4:10 AM ET, November 1, 2012

Top News:

Heidi Moore / Guardian:

Even a superstorm is no excuse for journalists not to check Twitter trolling — The rage reserved for @ComfortablySmug's mischievous tweet about a flooded NYSE should be aimed at media professionals — “On the internet,” notes one pooch to another in that wise old New Yorker cartoon from 1993, “nobody knows you're a dog.”

Discussion: GigaOM, @cschweitz, @penenberg, @felixsalmon, Big News Network.com, CNN, BtoB Magazine, @moorehn, Gothamist, The Verge, Techdirt, The Daily Caller and The Wall Blog

David Carr / Media Decoder:

How Hurricane Sandy Slapped the Sarcasm Out of Twitter — Twitter is often a caldron of sarcasm, much of it funny, little of it useful. But as a social medium based on short-burst communication, Twitter can change during large events — users talk about “watching” the spectacle unfold across their screens.

Discussion: MediaPost, The Huffington Post, The Editorialiste, CBS News, Real-Time News from Mobile, Business Week, GigaOM, Forbes, Radio & Television …, AMERICAblog, Salon, Betabeat, ABCNEWS and Gawker.com

Cotton Delo / AdAge:

Hurricane Sandy Boosts Local Online News Brands — Companies that sell batteries, bottled water and other goods that people rely on to help ride out a storm have an obvious business opportunity during major weather events such as Hurricane Sandy. Online local news organizations can be added to that list.

Discussion: Street Fight

New York Times: Storm Sends News Media Scrambling

David Carr / New York Times:

Chasing Lance Armstrong's Misdeeds From the Sidelines — The Web is full of outliers who are constantly posting about vast conspiracies, advanced by powerful interests and enabled by the mainstream media. The truth, they say, is out there in plain sight. — Every once in a while, the outliers are right.

Discussion: The Huffington Post and Talking Biz News

Peter Kafka / AllThingsD:

The Math Behind Disney's “Star Wars” Deal — Disney is paying George Lucas $4 billion for his “Star Wars” empire. Did it get a good deal? — That all depends, of course, on whether people want to see the next three “Star Wars” movies Disney says it is lining up.

Discussion: Forbes

Peter Kafka / AllThingsD:

Marissa Mayer Makes a Media Deal — The Marissa Mayer messaging is that Yahoo's new CEO is about product, not media. But that doesn't mean she's shutting down everything her predecessor Ross Levinsohn was working on. — Example: Yahoo has struck a deal with Wenner Media …

Discussion: CNET, Audience Development, AdAge, MediaPost, The Next Web, FishbowlNY, MinOnline and WebProNews

Laura Hazard Owen / paidContent:

How to get your readers to love paywalls — Okay, maybe “love” is too strong a word, but a new study suggests that newspapers enacting paywalls should emphasize financial need, not profit motives, when announcing them to readers. — The study, “Paying for What Was Free …

Discussion: online.liebertpub.com, IU News Room and JIMROMENESKO.COM

Steve Schaefer / Forbes:

Trick Or Treat For Netflix: Carl Icahn Takes Ten Percent Stake — Billionaire Carl Icahn has taken a 9.98% stake in Netflix, according to a disclosure with the SEC Wednesday. — The 13D filing says Icahn Capital owns slightly more than 5.4 million shares (worth just over $465 million at recent prices) …

Discussion: Home Media Magazine, CNBC, TechCrunch, Reuters and AllThingsD

Josh Stearns / Groundswell:

The Missed Opportunity of Newspaper Endorsements — Research, both scholarly and anecdotal, suggests that newspaper endorsements make little difference in the minds of readers. This fact led Edward Morrissey at The Week to argue that “Newspaper endorsements are at best meaningless anachronisms …

Discussion: JIMROMENESKO.COM and Change of Subject

Robert Andrews / paidContent:

The very long tail - how magazines could make their archives sing — If readers won't pay for this month's latest tablet magazine, will they put their hand in their pocket for a title's entire back-issue archive? — To commemorate its ninetieth birthday next year, classical music monthly Gramophone …

Discussion: gramophone.co.uk

Justin Ellis / Nieman Journalism Lab:

Wednesday Q&A: Jake Levine on the fate of News.me, personalized news, and reinventing Digg — News.me's announcement last week that it was pulling its iOS apps for iPad and iPhone surprised more than a few. For over a year, the Betaworks-backed news discovery tool has offered users …

Claire Atkinson / New York Post:

Current TV has low-watt appeal — Current TV's small numbers will make it tough to attract big bids. The cable network, which recently put itself up for sale, is hoping to lure buyers even as it struggles with low ratings and questions about its cable distribution.

Discussion: Los Angeles Times and Chickaboomer

Guardian:

BBC to investigate death of journalist who complained of harassment — Family of Russell Joslin, who died on 22 October, accuses corporation of failing to act on his reports of sexual harassment — Police and the BBC are to investigate the apparent suicide of a journalist who complained …