Mediagazer: The one bright spot for the music labels: Digital (Paul Sloan/CNET)

9:35 AM ET, March 27, 2013

Top News:

Paul Sloan / CNET:

The one bright spot for the music labels: Digital — The financial picture of the music industry is still bleak, but YouTube, Spotify, and other services are helping. — The music industry is still in rough shape, based on data released today by the Recording Industry Association of America.

Discussion: Billboard, Tone Deaf and The Verge

Andrew M. Barker / Variety: RIAA Reports Year of Relative Stability in Record Biz

Mike Shields / Adweek:

Bloomberg Wants to Win at Video — It's time for Bloomberg TV's noon news meeting on this Thursday, a meeting that is sandwiched around two momentous events; the day after the new Pope was announced and the day Samsung will release its new Galaxy s4 phone. — The packed conference room …

Daniel Victor / Nieman Journalism Lab:

Hashtags considered #harmful — The noble hashtag is cursed by a problem Yogi Berra could appreciate: Too many people use it, so no one goes there. — Presumably, most Twitter users use hashtags intending to add their tweet to a river of similar information and to expose their own thoughts to a wider, interested audience.

Discussion: @jbenton, @mykola, @marksluckie, @aschweig, @pwthornton, @chanders, @caseymcdermott, @smalera, NetNewsCheck Latest, @digiphile, @michaelroston, @kev097 and @jaredbkeller

Nellie Andreeva / Deadline.com:

Anderson Cooper Approached For Matt Lauer's ‘Today’ Job — Embattled Today anchor Matt Lauer, already the focus of blistering criticism for the ouster of co-anchor Ann Curry and the ratings slide at NBC's morning show, has long been rumored to be on the chopping block …

Discussion: mediabistro.com, Mediaite, The Huffington Post, Contactmusic.com, The Hollywood Gossip, New York Magazine and Inside TV

Guardian:

The Sun joins Telegraph in charging website users — News International says offering free content is ‘just untenable’, while Telegraph announces erection of metered paywall — Britain's biggest selling daily newspaper, The Sun, is to start charging for its online content in the second half …

Discussion: Media Week, The Independent, Globe and Mail, NetNewsCheck Latest, Agence France Presse, TechRadar.com, The Next Web, imediamonkey, UK News and Opinion, London News, HEXUS.net Business …, The Week UK, atvtoday.co.uk, CMU, the Econsultancy blog, TheMediaBriefing, Shiny Shiny and Digital Spy

Keith J. Kelly / New York Post:

Scratch Freston from Time Inc. CEO derby — Scratch Mtv founder Tom Freston from the list of potential Time Inc. CEOs. — Even before the search begins in earnest, Freston told Media Ink he isn't interested in the job. — That is sure to dash the dreams of Time Inc.'ers.

Discussion: Guardian

Bloomberg:

Ericsson Said to Discuss Buying Microsoft's TV-Software Unit — Ericsson AB (ERICB) is in talks to buy Microsoft Corp. (MSFT)'s IPTV business, which makes software used by phone companies such as AT&T Inc. (T) to deliver television over the Internet, people with knowledge of the matter said.

Discussion: GigaOM, Reuters, IP&TV News, Digital TV Europe, Engadget, ZDNet and The Verge

Mackenzie Weinger / Politico:

USA Today announces ‘two big changes’ — USA Today is making “big changes” by putting the cover story in the newspaper “on hiatus” and keeping story jumps to a “bare minimum, if at all,” editor in chief Dave Callaway announced to staffers in a memo on Tuesday.

Discussion: @andreastonez and @mathewi

Jenna Wortham / NYT Bits:

Instagram and the New Era of Paparazzi — Earlier this week, a rare and new photo of the pop star Beyoncé and her daughter, Blue Ivy, quickly spread around the Internet, on various celebrity and gossip sites. — There was nothing particularly unusual about the photo itself …

Foo Yun Chee / Reuters:

EU regulators to approve Random House, Penguin deal: sources — (Reuters) - Bertelsmann and Pearson are set to win unconditional EU regulatory approval for a plan to merge their publishers Random House and Penguin, two people familiar with the matter said on Wednesday.

Discussion: paidContent

Joe Pompeo / Capital New York:

Media start-up hatched at Columbia, ‘The Big Roundtable,’ looks for a new long-form business model — Anyone who has experience writing for magazines can tell you that pitches tend to be approved or rejected based on the whim of any number of editors on the masthead.

Discussion: Kickstarter

Patrick Brzeski / Hollywood Reporter:

Study: China Surpasses Japan to Become Second-Largest Pay TV Market Behind U.S. — A new report says the Asia-Pacific region will add 420 million pay TV households by 2018, more than triple the number of households in the entire United States. — A new study released by a U.K.-based …

Discussion: Broadband TV News and Rapid TV News