Mediagazer: Content economics, part 2: payments (Felix Salmon)

3:35 AM ET, March 4, 2013

Top News:

This Story Stinks — IN the beginning, the technology gods created the Internet and saw that it was good. Here, at last, was a public sphere with unlimited potential for reasoned debate and the thoughtful exchange of ideas, an enlightening conversational bridge across the many geographic …

Discussion: Prof Chris Daly's Blog, @jondenunzio, @bill_gross, Gawker and @jeffjarvis

Brian Stelter / New York Times:

Dennis Rodman in North Korea, With Vice Media as Ringleader — Imagine being the HBO executive who hears this from one of the channel's producing partners: “We think there's an opportunity for us to get into North Korea.” — The executive was Michael Lombardo, and the partner was Vice Media …

Discussion: ABCNEWS, Politico, New York Magazine, Boing Boing and Chickaboomer

Yochai Benkler / New Republic:

The Dangerous Logic of the Bradley Manning Case — After 1,000 days in pretrial detention, Private Bradley Manning yesterday offered a modified guilty plea for passing classified materials to WikiLeaks. But his case is far from over—not for Manning, and not for the rest of the country.

Discussion: paidContent, @antderosa, New York Times, Gawker, The Dish and Guardian

Scott Shane / New York Times: Manning to Face More Serious Charges in Leak

Ken Doctor / Nieman Journalism Lab:

The newsonomics of selling Main Street — Main Street is finally going digital. With the digitization of smaller business, newspaper companies believe they've found that elusive third leg of a business model — a model that could keep them standing, maybe even taller, into the second half of this decade.

Patrick B. Pexton / Washington Post:

Signing off as Post ombudsman — My two-year term as The Post's independent ombudsman has run out. It has been both a privilege to serve Post readers as a pipeline to the staff and an honor to work in a newsroom of such distinguished journalists. I hope I succeeded even a little in explaining …

Discussion: Kirk LaPointe's …, @jbrodkin and Washington Post

Greg Gilman / The Wrap:
Washington Post Eliminates Ombudsman Position

Discussion: Mediactive, NPR Ombudsman, Politico and Washington Post

Erik Wemple:

Ann Romney blames campaign and media for the same thing — Here's a sound bite that's sure to get all kinds of rotation over several news cycles this week. “I'm happy to blame the media.” That's what Ann Romney said to Chris Wallace in a much-anticipated Fox News interview.

Discussion: Fox News Insider, The Huffington Post, Mediaite, Politico, Chickaboomer and Softpedia News

Andrés Cala / Christian Science Monitor:

Spain's economic crisis has an unexpected victim: journalism — The Spanish media has been ravaged by the country's recession, and not just economically. The crisis has also sparked serious challenges to its credibility. — MADRID — In Spain's transformational economic crisis, no industry has escaped unscathed.

Clay Shirky / Columbia Journalism Review:

Dark shadows — In Washington, murder turns out to be color-coded — It's been a big year for Homicide Watch. Last summer's Kickstarter campaign succeeded admirably, raising $47,450. The website went from an almost-fatal hiatus to hiring its first staff members, who could continue …

Felix Salmon:

Content economics, part 2: payments — Apologies for the delay between part 1 and this: I wanted to wait until Amanda Palmer's TED talk appeared online, because it's an important part of the other big aspect of content economics. Part 1 was about the ability of publishers to sell readers to advertisers …

Discussion: BuzzMachine, @mathewi and Fortune

Alex Kantrowitz / Digiday:

The Banner Industrial Complex Under Threat — If you love the sight of Web pages packed with banner ads, take a good look and savor the moment; it may not last for long. Today, the unit is at its peak, ubiquitous and ugly, traded by the trillions, and propelling the indirect-sales ecosystem …

Discussion: FM Signal, paidContent and AdPulp

Elizabeth Jensen / New York Times:

PBS Ponders Weekend ‘NewsHour’ — PBS is close to a decision on adding weekend broadcasts of the “PBS NewsHour” for the first time since the program began in 1975, and producing them in New York, instead of the program's longtime studios in Arlington, Va., according to public television employees.

Marco Arment / Marco.org:

“Did we just rip off Marco Arment and The Magazine?” — That's actually the title of the latest newsletter from TypeEngine, a startup promising a platform to easily make Newsstand magazines a lot like mine. — I don't really know what to think about things like this.

Discussion: @glennf

Barbara Demick / Los Angeles Times:

Live China TV coverage of executions raises outcry — Chinese state TV broadcasts live images of four condemned killers shortly before they are executed. Human rights lawyers and others express outrage at the unprecedented coverage. — Naw Kham, a drug gang leader from Myanmar …

Discussion: The Verge, Mediaite and Gawker