Mediagazer: The Huffington Post Has a ‘No Writing Books’ Rule (Joe Coscarelli/New York Magazine)

3:30 PM ET, February 19, 2013

Top News:

Tim O'Brien leaves the Huffington Post; editor was a driving force in the site's pursuit of ‘capital J’ journalism — Tim O'Brien, the executive editor of The Huffington Post and Arianna Huffington's main deputy in the newsroom, is leaving the site to work on his next book.

Discussion: The New York Observer, Politico, @joepompeo, @ryantate, Erik Wemple and @tmcgev

Joe Coscarelli / New York Magazine:

The Huffington Post Has a ‘No Writing Books’ Rule — The Huffington Post executive editor who left the New York Times and helped bring the blog empire a Pulitzer Prize is vacating his job to write historical fiction. In a memo to staff today, Arianna Huffington explained that Tim O'Brien …

Discussion: Adweek and @jackshafer

Sarah Marshall / Journalism.co.uk:

DMS13: 32% of WSJ traffic coming from mobile — Raju Narisetti from the Wall Street Journal explains why mobile first presents a ‘profound challenge’ for publishers, and lessons learnt from The Daily and AllThingsD — Almost one third of the Wall Street Journal's online readers access …

Discussion: Journalism.co.uk and Talking Biz News

Jasper Jackson / TheMediaBriefing: Digital Media Strategies: WSJ digital managing editor Raju Narisetti on the intersection between tech and content

Jeff Bercovici / Forbes:

Attention, Publishers: ‘Iconic’ Is Not A Business Model — Let's review what the year 2013 hath wrought so far in the media industry. — Reader's Digest, staggering under $1.2 billion in debt, has filed for bankruptcy for the second time in four years. Rolling Stone owner Jann Wenner managed …

Discussion: DealBook and Guardian

Andy Plesser / Beet.TV:

The New York Times Launches Real-Time Ad Serving with Twitter Data — The New York Times has launched “Spark,” a product created by the Times' R&D lab that serves display advertising into stories as they are trending on Twitter, matched with the demographics of the users who “touch” …

Discussion: AdAge, Journalism.co.uk and paidContent

Andy Plesser / Beet.TV:

Vivian Schiller: NBC News is Readying “Rich Journalism Destination” — NBC News is in the midst of the “reinvention” of its Web site which will launch this spring as a “rich journalism destination,” with enterprise, investigative reporting and a significant increase of “Web native video” …

Discussion: NetNewsCheck Latest, Thanks:@beet_tv

C. Custer / Tech in Asia:

A Shocking Expose of China's Black PR Industry Implicates Government Officials, is Quickly Deleted from the Web — Almost everyone knows about the public relations industry, but fewer people know about what in China is referred to as Black PR, the underground internet industry that has evolved with the spread of web 2.0 through China.

Discussion: The Next Web, @herecomesnow and @mcfeelyp

Columbia Journalism Review:

Where the jobs are — How WYNC's data journalism efforts show new opportunities for journalists — There are probably few things that intimidate journalists like reams of data. Unemployment might be high on that intimidation list, but you could argue that that's a numbers issue, too.

Discussion: Kirk LaPointe's …

William Turvill / Press Gazette:

Broadsheets back Sunday Times decision to decline freelance submissions from Syria — Broadsheet newspapers have backed The Sunday Times' decision not to accept freelance submissions from Syria. — Press Gazette revealed this month that the News International title had told a photographer …

Discussion: Editors Weblog

Michael Depp / NetNewsCheck Latest:

For Times-Pic Digital Play, ‘So Far, So Good’ — The New Orleans Times-Picayune came under fire last year when it decided to cut back its print product to three days per week, but according to the newspaper, the change's positive effects have outweighed the negative.

Discussion: Poynter

Mark Suster / Both Sides of the Table:

The Most Interesting Online Video Trend — This article originally appeared on TechCrunch. — By now many of you know the Harlem Shake but what you may not appreciate is the broader trend behind the video and it has mirrored my general views on how TV will work in the future

Discussion: The Verge, Techdirt, @royrubin05, @infoarbitrage, Forbes, BuzzFeed and TechCrunch

Daniel Eran Dilger / AppleInsider:

Google asks journalists to tone down story of “massive” Google Play security flaw — After reporting that Google Play now distributes Android app buyers' location and contact information to developers, a journalist was contacted by the search giant with a request to tone down the story, its headline and its SEO information.