Mediagazer: Ericsson to buy Microsoft IPTV business (Reuters)

1:45 PM ET, April 8, 2013

Top News:

Roger Ebert's Legacy as a Relentless Empire-Builder — At journalism conferences and online, media strivers talk over and over about becoming their own brand, hoping that some magical combination of tweets, video spots, appearances and, yes, even actual written articles, will help their name come to mean something.

Discussion: ReadWrite

Hollywood Reporter:

Westboro Baptist Church to Picket Roger Ebert's Funeral — The anti-gay group says it will protest outside the movie critic's memorial service Monday in Chicago. — Leaders of Kansas' Westboro Baptist Church, notorious for picketing at the funerals of soldiers and gay teenagers …

Discussion: Business Insider, The Huffington Post, Washington Times, CNET, DNAinfo.com New York, nbcchicago.com, Guardian, Mashable, The Daily Caller, The Raw Story and Softpedia News

Associated Press:

Newspaper revenue fell 2 pct to $38.6B in 2012 — ARLINGTON, Va. (AP) — The newspaper industry's revenue declined at its slowest pace in six years, as publishers turned to new businesses and raised more money from online subscriptions. The industry's total revenue in 2012 fell 2 percent …

Discussion: @rajunarisetti and Washington Post

Rick Edmonds / Poynter:

Deeper data dive finds $5.5 billion in uncounted newspaper industry revenue — Years of negative reports on ad revenue losses could leave the newspaper industry muttering, “I demand a recount.” The Newspaper Association of America has just completed such an exercise and found some solid gains …

Discussion: Newspaper Association …, Reflections of a Newsosaur, Guardian, Erik Wemple, European Journalism Centre and PandoDaily

Joshua Macht / The Atlantic Online:

Running Out of TIME: The Slow, Sad Demise of a Great American Magazine — The weekly was among the first to invest heavily in the Internet. So how come Time.com never figured it out? — I can still remember how jealous I felt. It was the mid-1990s, and I was a reporter at Inc. magazine in Boston.

Discussion: @codybrown

Frank Rich / New York Magazine:

Inky Tears — Time is on the block. The New York Times is teetering. It can get an alumnus down, but the last thing the news business needs is a case of nostalgia. — This spring marks the tenth anniversary of a journalistic scandal that everyone would like to forget, and that many have.

Discussion: @jeffjarvis

Jeff Bercovici / Forbes:

Why Google Should Rethink Its Approach to Sponsored Content — Native advertising is changing the economics of digital journalism, offering publishers an alternative to the ever-more-devalued display ad. And Google doesn't want any part of it. — In recent weeks, the web giant …

Discussion: FOLIO

Tanzina Vega / New York Times:
Sponsors Now Pay for Online Articles, Not Just Ads

Discussion: AdPulp, Beyond Search, eMedia Vitals and Kirk LaPointe's …, Thanks:@steverubel

Andrew Rice / New York Magazine:

Does BuzzFeed Know the Secret? — Jonah Peretti's viral-content machine purports to have solved the problems of both journalism and advertising at once, all with the help of a simple algorithm. — Perhaps you are unfamiliar with the website BuzzFeed—though this is increasingly unlikely, as it's currently enjoying a viral moment.

Discussion: The Corsair, @jeffjohnroberts and @jayrosen_nyu

Hunter Schwarz / BuzzFeed:

A Fox News Reporter Could Be Jailed For Protecting Her Sources, And Nobody Seems To Care — Jana Winter refuses to reveal who leaked information about the Aurora, Colorado shooter. Judith Miller is “surprised and disappointed” at how little attention the case is getting. — Source: foxnews.com

Discussion: Columbia Journalism Review, Fox News, Poynter, Mediaite, TVNewser, The Daily Caller and Politico

Jenna Wortham / New York Times:

Streaming Sites and the Rise of Shared Accounts — LAST Sunday afternoon, some friends and I were hanging out in a local bar, talking about what we'd be doing that evening. It turned out that we all had the same plan: to watch the season premiere of “Game of Thrones.”

Discussion: Fortune, @ericgoldman, @palafo and Business Insider

Guardian:

WikiLeaks publishes 1.7m US diplomatic records — Julian Assange says 1973-76 reports, including many by Henry Kissinger, show vast range and scope of US activity — WikiLeaks has published more than 1.7m US records covering diplomatic or intelligence reports on every country in the world.

Discussion: CNET, Gawker, Fast Company, TechCrunch, Forbes, Yahoo! News, Telegraph, The Independent, Canadian Press, Salon, Sky News, International Business Times, Gizmodo UK, TheAustralian, Wired.co.uk and Vanity Fair

William Turvill / Press Gazette:

Guido Fawkes closes blog for day following death of Margaret Thatcher — The Guido Fawkes blog has closed for the day as a mark of respect to former Conservative Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher. — The blog, www.order-order.com, announced the decision on Twitter shortly after Baroness Thatcher's death was declared.