Mediagazer: News Corp. exiting New Zealand, to divest pay-TV service (Meg James/Los Angeles Times)

4:00 PM ET, March 4, 2013

Top News:

Joel Johnson / Gizmodo:

Hold On Tight, Gizmodo Is a TV Show Now — If we made a Top Gear for gadgets, would you watch it? In two weeks, you'll have your chance. — Nearly ten years ago, when I first ran Gizmodo, gadgets were as niche of a topic for news and debate as could be.

Discussion: FishbowlNY, @leshorn, @papapishu, @jennydeluxe, @alexweprin, @kylenw, @joshpetri, @joemfbrown and @justinnxt

Peter Kafka / AllThingsD:

YouTube's Show-Me-the-Money Problem — The big picture for YouTube looks good. The world's biggest video site keeps getting bigger, generating more video views and more ad dollars. — Things are fuzzier for some of YouTube's biggest programming partners. Their views are also increasing.

Discussion: SocialTimes, @rajunarisetti, @happendigital, @mdudas, @rajunarisetti, @pkafka, @brianstelter, The Verge, @osulop and MarketBeat

Rafat Ali / Skift:

Exclusive: BBC selling Lonely Planet to Kentucky cigarette billionaire Brad Kelley — EXCLUSIVE: Lonely Planet, the storied travel guidebooks publisher owned by BBC, is about to be sold, we have learned. And the buyer is a doozy: reclusive Kentucky billionaire Brad Kelley …

Discussion: Guardian, Telegraph, @rafat, @jcstearns and Quartz

Lisa Campbell / The Bookseller:
BBC says no deal done yet for Lonely Planet

Discussion: Skift

Tanzina Vega / New York Times:

Guardian Aims to Turn American Readers' Heads — NEWSHOUNDS have no shortage of resources, particularly on the Web. And whether you define news as the latest updates on the Kardashians or the conflict in Syria, enough digital sources abound to satisfy every taste and to feed the incessant demands of social media.

Discussion: FishbowlNY, @aidanboshea, @lmirani, @mlcalderone, @dannyrogers2001, @froomkin, @jamesrbuk, @edyong209 and @jayrosen_nyu

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: Capital New York, New Yorker, The New Yorker Blog, TVNewser, The Corsair, Media Decoder, ABCNEWS, KBIA, New York Magazine, Boing Boing, Chickaboomer and Gawker

Salvador Rodriguez / Los Angeles Times:
The Pirate Bay claims it is now hosting from North Korea

Discussion: Gizmodo and TorrentFreak

Dylan Byers / Politico:

The battle for Roger Ailes's legacy — Roger Ailes is used to being in control. For almost a half-century — from his days as Richard Nixon's media strategist to his creation and expansion of the Fox News empire — he has exerted incalculable influence over the public image of politicians, presidents, even the Republican party.

Discussion: @mlcalderone and @shawncp92

Chi Chi Izundu / BBC:

Film to be distributed via games console for first time — An independent British film is being released and distributed via a digital games console platform, rather than through the cinema, for the first time. — Pulp, a comedy about a struggling comic book publisher recruited by the police …

Discussion: The Next Web, The Verge, Telegraph, CNET, Engadget, Fast Company, Geeky-Gadgets, ITV News, Pocket-lint, GeekWire, Electronista and WebProNews

Nikki Finke / Deadline.com:

Vanity Fair Pulled Jessica Chastain Criticism While She Chased Best Actress Oscar — EXCLUSIVE: We all know that tensions rise during those final weeks leading up to the Academy Awards as media outlets decide who's worthy and who's not. So this begs the question: with so much money and prestige at stake …

Discussion: Poynter and @buzzfeedben

Christopher S. Stewart / Wall Street Journal:

As Pirates Run Rampant, TV Studios Dial Up Pursuit — By the glow of six flat screens inside a windowless room in a California office tower, three content cops from NBCUniversal watch as pirated versions of the cable-TV drama “Suits” begin popping up on the Internet within minutes of the show's closing credits.

Discussion: paidContent, ZDNet and The Verge

Katherine Rushton / Telegraph:

Tesco gears up for online fight with Amazon — Tesco has hired one of Facebook's most senior European executives and is launching a slew of online entertainment stores as it gears up for battle with Amazon. — Blinkbox's sales model allows it to offer recent box office hits, such as Skyfall, much earlier than its rivals

Discussion: NamNews, Music Week, paidContent, TechCrunch, ITProPortal, ComputerWeekly and The Next Web

Justin Ellis / Nieman Journalism Lab:

Monday Q&A: Raju Narisetti on designing for mobile, the paywall fallacy, and reinventing ads — Last February, Raju Narisetti had just returned to The Wall Street Journal after spending three years working on the integration of print and digital at The Washington Post.

Andrew Beaujon / Poynter:

Washington Post's new ombud replacement ‘sounds like a customer relations person’ — Washington Post Publisher Katharine Weymouth announced Friday that the newspaper would not appoint a new ombudsman, because “The world has changed, and we at The Post must change with it.”

Discussion: American Journalism Review, Kirk LaPointe's …, The Huffington Post, Washington Post and Mediactive

Justin Ellis / Nieman Journalism Lab:

Report: The IRS's “antiquated and counterproductive” rules are hurting nonprofit news orgs — The IRS is applying “an antiquated and counterproductive standard to a dynamic sector” in limiting the growth of nonprofit news outlets, erecting “serious and unnecessary obstacles to critical innovation …

Discussion: Columbia Journalism Review, USA Today, @jeffjarvis and @inn