Mediagazer: Armstrong Confession Draws 4.3 Million Viewers to Oprah's Network (Brian Stelter/Media Decoder)

6:45 PM ET, January 18, 2013

Top News:

Gawker Media sets traffic record with Deadspin's Manti Te'o blockbuster — For the first time ever, Gawker Media drew more than 10 million U.S. visitors in one week. The memo to Gawker staff: … * Te'o story is still on top of the Gawker Media Big Board (gawker.com/stats)

Discussion: JIMROMENESKO.COM

Jason Del Rey / AdAge:

With All Eyes on Manti Te'o Hoax Story, Deadspin Doesn't Immediately Cash In — Scoop Highlights Difficulty Publishers Face When Traffic Spikes — Deadspin's blockbuster article revealing that the girlfriend of star Notre Dame linebacker Manti Te'o never existed eclipsed 3.5 million views Thursday evening.

Discussion: Poynter, Adweek, blogs.bostonmagazine.com, L.A. NOW, The Wrap, UPROXX and Politicker

Simon Dumenco / AdAge:
So the Manti Te'o Scandal Is Some Sort of Indictment of Online Culture? Nonsense!

Discussion: The Buttry Diary, Sports Illustrated and Adweek

Jen Doll / The Atlantic Wire:
Manti Te'o and the New Burden of Internet Truth

Discussion: Forbes, The New Yorker Blog and NPR

Christine Haughney / Media Decoder:

John Geddes, Managing Editor, Is Leaving The New York Times — John M. Geddes, left, with the executive editor of The New York Times, Jill Abramson, and a fellow managing editor, Dean Baquet. — 2:37 p.m. | Updated John M. Geddes, a managing editor for The New York Times for the last decade …

Discussion: JIMROMENESKO.COM, FishbowlNY, Politico and The Huffington Post

Kara Bloomgarden-Smoke / The New York Observer:
Alice DuBois Takes Times Buyout to Go to BuzzFeed

Discussion: Politico and FishbowlNY

Brian Stelter / Media Decoder:

Armstrong Confession Draws 4.3 Million Viewers to Oprah's Network — The first part of Lance Armstrong's doping confession to Oprah Winfrey drew about 4.3 million viewers to OWN on Thursday night, according to preliminary Nielsen ratings released on Friday.

Discussion: Forbes, The Wrap and TVNewser

Andrew Pugh / PressGazette:

Sunday Times: £1m fraud claim ‘strengthened’ after Lance Armstrong's Oprah confession — Sunday Times: 'We watched Lance Armstrong's interview with interest' Paper seeking to recoup 2006 costs plus interest Case is ‘stronger’ after Oprah confession The Sunday Times today warned Lance Armstrong it will …

Discussion: Forbes, AdAge, Yahoo! News, TVNewser, The Wrap, Broadcasting & Cable, Adweek, Guardian and FishbowlNY

Brian Stelter / New York Times:
Winfrey's Low-Rated Channel Is Poised to Break Through

Discussion: The Huffington Post and Media Decoder

John R. MacArthur / Harper's:

Google's Media Barons — I had to cheer when I read the news the other week about a French company that's selling an ad-blocking service on the Internet. Xavier Niel, the entrepreneurial owner of the web-service provider Free, is threatening to smash the advertiser-supported “free-content” model.

Discussion: @alexismadrigal, New York Magazine, @waxpancake, The Verge, @waxpancake, @clarajeffery, Hit & Run, paidContent, Boing Boing and Beyond Search

Dean Starkman / Columbia Journalism Review:

Major papers' longform meltdown — No one equates story-length with quality. Let's start with that concession. — But still. Story-length is hardly meaningless when you consider what it takes to explain complex problems, like say, the financial crisis, to the broader public.

Discussion: JIMROMENESKO.COM and NetNewsCheck Latest

Andrew Beaujon / Poynter:

Publicist sues FishbowlDC for libel — Washington, D.C., publicist Wendy Gordon has filed a lawsuit over a series of unflattering photos that the media-gossip site FishbowlDC ran of her, Zoe Tillman reports. … Gordon's complaint says she isn't a public figure, and the posts …

Discussion: The BLT, Politico, The Huffington Post and The Daily Caller

Will Sommer / City Desk:
The FishbowlDC Lawsuit Is a Work of Art

Discussion: The Huffington Post

Dylan Byers / Politico:

POLITICO interview: Piers Morgan — To Piers Morgan, the answer is simple: pro-gun advocate and conservative radio show host Alex Jones was the best guest he ever had. — “The best thing about Alex Jones is that 8 million people watched that video on YouTube,” Morgan told POLITICO …

Discussion: Chickaboomer, Guy Fawkes' blog, Mediaite, New York Magazine, The Huffington Post, Capital New York and The Daily Dish

Dylan Byers / Politico:

Journal News removes gun map, citing New York's new gun law — Ed Tagliaferri, the executive vice president of DKC Media, forwards this statement from Janet Hasson, Publisher of the Journal News, the New York state-based newspaper that published the “gun map” featuring the names and addresses …

Jeff Sonderman / Poynter:

How news organizations can sell sponsored content without lowering their standards — Advertisers want to be let out of the box. — They want to break out of the constrained 300-pixel display ad box that everyone's eyes have learned to ignore, and leap into the stream of engaging content that readers actually pay attention to.

Discussion: Kirk LaPointe's …, SPEAKEASY and Gawker

Mike Farrell / Multichannel News:

Time Warner Cable Bans Some Gun Ads — Company-wide Initiative Comes Weeks After Sandy Hook Tragedy — Just weeks after the mass shooting at the Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Con., Time Warner Cable has initiated a company-wide ban on certain gun ads.

Discussion: Mediaite

Al Jazeera English:

Al Jazeera reporter killed by sniper in Syria — Qatar-based media network says freelance journalist Mohammed al-Horani was killed by a sniper in the province of Deraa. — A sniper has shot dead Al Jazeera freelance reporter Mohamed Al-Massalma in the southern Syrian province of Deraa, the Qatar-based media network has said.

Agence France Presse:
Sniper kills French journalist in Syria's Aleppo

Discussion: Alarabiya.net English and Radio Free Europe/Radio …

Guardian:

John Witherow named acting editor of the Times — Publishing directors refuse to endorse appointments amid a standoff with Rupert Murdoch's News Corp over merger plans — John Witherow has been named acting editor of the Times after a bizarre standoff between Rupert Murdoch's News Corporation …

Discussion: The Times, pressgazette.co.uk and Telegraph