Mediagazer: iTunes launches Breakout Books section to highlight self-published titles (Laura Hazard Owen/paidContent)

3:15 PM ET, February 5, 2013

Top News:

Dylan Byers / Politico:

Chris Hughes hopes TNR will profit by 2015, floats retail spaces — New Republic owner and publisher Chris Hughes said today that he hopes to make the magazine profitable by 2015 — no small feat for a magazine that featured very little advertising when it relaunched last month.

Discussion: @laureni and @lydiadepillis

Mat Honan / Wired:

Why Vine's Going to Grow Into Something Huge — The very best things we make are the things that allow us to make even better things: tools that create connections and empower creativity. The latest of these is Vine, Twitter's remarkable new video sharing app. — Vine lets people shoot and share six-second looped videos.

Discussion: CNET, The Week and The Verge

Bloomberg:

Murdoch Coveting Papers Must Wait as Rift Stalls Media Rules — A move to make it easier for companies to own U.S. daily newspapers and nearby broadcast stations has stalled amid partisan tension that could prevent deals between companies such as Tribune Co. and News Corp. (NWSA)

Discussion: Politico, New York Magazine and @mlcalderone

Press Gazette:

Guardian journalists agree to possible strike action in protest at job cuts — Journalists at Guardian News and Media have voted in favour of possible strike action in protest at feared compulsory redundancies. — The move means they now have the legal authority to walk out on strike …

Discussion: Guardian, @andrew_pugh1, @andrew_pugh1, NUJ, @psmith, @andrew_pugh1 and The Huffington Post

Matt Chaban / Crain's New York:

Daily News is coming home, nearly — The Daily News is coming back to Manhattan. The paper, which was washed out of its offices at 4 New York Plaza downtown by Superstorm Sandy, and has been running the bulk of its operations out of its printing plant in Jersey City, N.J. has signed a short-term lease for space at 1290 Sixth Ave.

Discussion: FishbowlNY and The Huffington Post

Laura Hazard Owen / paidContent:

iTunes launches Breakout Books section to highlight self-published titles — Amazon intensely promotes self-published Kindle books, and now Apple is taking steps toward doing the same thing. The company has launched a new section of the iBookstore, “Breakout Books,” a …

Discussion: Media Decoder, TechCrunch, CNET, App Advice and MacRumors

Dana Rubinstein / Capital New York:

Court rules in favor of NYPD: ‘Times’ can't have addresses of handgun-license holders — Today, an appellate court ruled against the New York Times in a suit about gun permits, and public access to an electronic database containing the addresses of permit-holders, arguing that a lower-court judge had …

Georg Szalai / Hollywood Reporter:

Turner Broadcasting Names Giorgio Stock President of EMEA Region — The former Walt Disney consumer products, publishing and retail executive says he sees opportunity to expand brands and franchises across platforms. — Time Warner's Turner Broadcasting said Tuesday that it has hired …

Discussion: Turner Newsroom, Variety and Digital TV Europe

Justin Ellis / Nieman Journalism Lab:

Better together: Colorado nonprofit news site I-News and Rocky Mountain PBS join forces — The three-year-old I-News leaves the ranks of small nonprofit news startups and finds a broader audience by merging with Colorado's largest public TV station. — Nonprofit news sites have a knack for pairing up.

Kate Holton / Reuters:

Malone eyes Virgin Media in challenge to Murdoch — (Reuters) - John Malone's Liberty Global has opened talks with Britain's Virgin Media over a takeover that would increase the U.S. cable group's dominance in Europe and step up a challenge to media mogul Rupert Murdoch.

Discussion: Home Media Magazine, ZDNet, The Wrap, DealBook, BBC, Bloomberg, Telegraph, Hollywood Reporter, Agence France Presse, Forbes, Virgin Media, Sky News, Wall Street Journal, broadcastnow.co.uk, Cable UK Blogs and standard.co.uk

Jeff Sonderman / Poynter:

Can a Twitter user really prohibit you from republishing tweets? — Tim Cushing explains what happened when Teri Buhl, an “investigative journalist covering finance/Wall Street,” declared in her Twitter bio that “No tweets are publishable.” — A couple people who noticed the disclaimer questioned it.

Discussion: Techdirt and JIMROMENESKO.COM

Jeff John Roberts / paidContent:

“The brain of the New York Times, the body of BuzzFeed” — Slate's third act — Slate started life as as a scrappy web pioneer under Microsoft in 1996. Since then, it has gone on to carve out an enviable perch in the liberal media establishment as part of the Washington Post Company.

Andrew Beaujon / Poynter:

OC Register, investing heavily in print, also readies paywall — The Orange County Register is preparing to launch a metered paywall this year, News & Tech reports. New Register owner Aaron Kushner has made no secret of his plans to charge for online access to the paper …

Discussion: NetNewsCheck Latest and News & Tech

Rebecca Greenfield / The Atlantic Wire:

The Economics of Netflix's $100 Million New Show — With Netflix's foray into original, high quality programming today, the streaming TV network wants to turn into the HBO of Internet TV, but can the network afford it? Putting together a big production with famous actors like House …

Discussion: /Film

Tim Wu / New Yorker:
“House of Cards” and the Decline of Cable

Discussion: Betabeat, Wired and Pocket-lint

Mathew Ingram / paidContent:

Digital First Media is working on paywalls, even though it really doesn't want to — Plenty of newspapers have been jumping headlong into the paywall business recently, and many of them claim that the introduction of subscription plans has been the best thing that ever happened to them.

Discussion: Kirk LaPointe's …

John Paxton / Digital First:
The Subscription Project - Or A Paywall By Any Other Name

Discussion: Poynter, The Buttry Diary and NetNewsCheck Latest

Peter Kafka / AllThingsD:

Why Twitter Is Buying Bluefin — And Why Bluefin Is Selling — As Business Insider reported, Twitter is buying Bluefin Labs, the social analytics company. — My understanding is that the deal isn't done yet, but it will be soon. When it is, Twitter will likely end up spending more than $70 million for the company.

Discussion: GigaOM, Business Insider, Softpedia News, ReadWrite and CNET