Mediagazer: LinkedIn buying Flipboard killer. Interesting... RT @karaswisher: http://dthin.gs/ZfN8UB (Henry Blodget/@hblodget)

2:50 PM ET, March 11, 2013

Top News:

Matt Lauer Finally Talks — The Today host tells Howard Kurtz that NBC mishandled Ann Curry's ouster and describes how the network is rebuilding the show. Plus, his secret talks with Katie Couric. — One day last fall, Matt Lauer walked out of his 30 Rock office and took the elevator …

Discussion: TVNewser, Mediaite, Guardian, New York Post, @bobbymacreports, @moorehn, Chickaboomer, @steph_griff, @brianstelter, @howardkurtz, The Huffington Post and Softpedia News

Kara Swisher / AllThingsD:

Who's About to Acquire News Reading App Pulse? Try an Unlikely New Content Powerhouse: LinkedIn — According to several sources close to the situation, the nifty news reading app Pulse is in advanced talks to be acquired by a major “platform” company. — I've been trying to track …

Henry Blodget / @hblodget: LinkedIn buying Flipboard killer. Interesting... RT @karaswisher: http://dthin.gs/ZfN8UB

Bill Keller / New York Times:

Private Manning's Confidant — In early 2010, Pfc. Bradley Manning methodically uploaded a digital mother lode of classified United States military and diplomatic documents to the Internet insurgents of WikiLeaks. As everyone knows, WikiLeaks made these secret archives available to a few major news outlets, including this one.

Discussion: Poynter, @mlcalderone and Pressing Issues

Margaret Sullivan / New York Times:

The Danger of Suppressing the Leaks — IMAGINE if American citizens never learned about the abuse of prisoners at Abu Ghraib. Imagine not knowing about the brutal treatment of terror suspects at United States government “black sites.” Or about the drone program that is expanding under President Obama …

Discussion: @katehnyc and @mlcalderone

Tim Peterson / Adweek:

YouTube Co-founder Prepping Possible Rival — YouTube has had its share of competition over the years. Companies like Vimeo and DailyMotion (plus copyright lawsuits and crushing overhead costs) led Chad Hurley and the video-sharing site's co-founders to sell YouTube to Google.

Discussion: The Verge, SocialTimes, Fast Company, Tubefilter, The Next Web, T3, NetNewsCheck Latest, WebProNews, Gizmodo and App Advice

Laura Hazard Owen / paidContent:

Where WordPress is headed: Longform content, curation and maybe even native ads — WordPress is a content company, CEO Matt Mullenweg stressed in a panel Saturday at SXSW Interactive — and longform content is an area that the company is especially interested in. That could include native ads.

Discussion: AllThingsD, TechCrunch and AllThingsD

Jeff Jarvis / BuzzMachine:

Hyperlocal cooties — Another hyperlocal venture is struggling, and each time this happens, I fear hyperlocal gets more cooties. But I refuse to give up hope because there's a reason for each fall, there's much still to do, and it's still early. — The latest: Carll Tucker's Daily Voice …

Discussion: NJ News Commons

Andrew Beaujon / Poynter:

Mail Online expands, has bigger audience in U.S. than in U.K. — The Daily Mail's Web presence is “putting more firepower behind expanding its international digital media empire, hiring teams of reporters and ad executives across the US,” Emily Steel and Andrew Edgecliffe-Johnson report.

Discussion: Financial Times

Wall Street Journal:

Al Jazeera in Site Hunt — Broadcaster Looks at Former New York Times, Other Offices for U.S. Operations — Al Jazeera has taken a look at the former New York Times building as part of its hunt for a New York headquarters for the U.S. cable channel it plans to launch in July, according to multiple people familiar with the matter.

Discussion: Politico, TVNewser, Gothamist and Business Insider

Mayer Nissim / Digital Spy:

Ceri Thomas named BBC News head of programmes — Ceri Thomas has been promoted to head of programmes at BBC News. The current editor of Radio 4's Today programme will assume the role from March 18, taking over from Stephen Mitchell who is leaving the corporation.

Discussion: Guardian, Radio Today and MediaTel

Jim Romenesko:

WSJ staffers told to ‘stay the course - and accelerate’ — From: Narisetti, Raju — On an average weekday in the last 12 months, our total circulation was 2.3 million for all three print editions of The Wall Street Journal combined. We should all be very proud of the great print offerings we provide …

Brooks Barnes / Media Decoder:

From YouTube to the Cineplex — LOS ANGELES — How fast is YouTube building new media companies? Consider the case of AwesomenessTV, a YouTube-based channel for teenagers. — Last year at this time, Awesomeness had not introduced its MTV-esque programs. Now the channel has about 400,000 subscribers and 80.6 million video views.