Mediagazer: At the ‘Times,’ the future of blogs is uncertain: Some shuttered, some dormant, all under review (Joe Pompeo/Capital New York)

5:55 PM ET, April 25, 2013

Top News:

Jeff Bercovici / Forbes:

NY Times Overhauls Its Strategy With Tiered Pricing, Live Events and...Games? — Two years ago, the conventional wisdom in the newspaper business said people wouldn't pay for online news. — By a year ago at this time, the consensus had shifted, largely thanks to the success of The New York Times's …

Discussion: Business Wire, FishbowlNY, Poynter, Guardian, Capital New York, Mashable, Media & Entertainment, The Wrap, paidContent, NetNewsCheck Latest and Kirk LaPointe's …

Zachary M. Seward / Quartz:

The New York Times paywall has hit a growth wall — The New York Times just announced weak first-quarter results as advertising revenue slipped, but if you're trying to gauge the future health of America's preeminent newspaper, this is the key figure: 676,000 digital subscribers as of March 31 …

Discussion: paidContent, New York Magazine, AdExchanger, VentureBeat and The Huffington Post

Joe Pompeo / Capital New York:

Times Company sees sale of ‘Boston Globe’ in second half of 2013 — The New York Times Co. expects to have a buyer for its New England Media Group, which includes The Boston Globe, sometime in the second half of the year, a company executive said on today's first-quarter earnings call with Wall Street analysts.

Edmund Lee / Bloomberg:
New York Times Co.'s Sales Miss Estimates as Ad Revenue Dives

Discussion: The New York Times Company and New York Times

Peter Kafka / AllThingsD:

SpinMedia Adds Vibe Magazine to Its Digital Portfolio, Minus the Magazine — Last year, Steve Hansen bought Spin magazine, killed the print edition, and kept the website. — Now he's singing the same song with a new title: Hansen's SpinMedia is buying Vibe, the 20-year-old hip-hop and R&B magazine …

Discussion: Folio, New York Times, AdAge and FishbowlNY

Matt Buchanan / New Yorker:

The Medium of the Moment — After the Boston Marathon bombings, the process by which breaking news and information are generated and disseminated looked more ragged and exposed than ever: CNN stumbled, the New York Post painted a target on a high-school track athlete; Reddit launched …

Doug Stanglin / USA Today:
Student wrongly tied to Boston bombing found dead

Discussion: Poynter, The Week, The New Yorker Blog, Fox News, The Independent, Le·gal In·sur·rec· tion and The New Yorker

John Cook / Gawker:

A Judge Told Us to Take Down Our Hulk Hogan Sex Tape Post. We Won't. — Yesterday the Hon. Pamela A.M. Campbell, a circuit court judge in Pinellas County, Fla., issued an order compelling Gawker to remove from the internet a video of Hulk Hogan f**king his friend's ex-wife …

Discussion: @gerryshih

Lisa O'Carroll / Guardian:

Newspapers' alternative regulation plans: the key differences — There are seven key differences between the government and industry plan for a royal charter — In a surprise move a large bulk of the newspaper industry has announced it is rejecting the government's plans for press regulation agreed …

BBC:
Leveson report: Newspapers reject press regulation plans

Discussion: Guardian, politics.co.uk, BelfastTelegraph.co.uk, Telegraph and Sky News

Joe Pompeo / Capital New York:

At the ‘Times,’ the future of blogs is uncertain: Some shuttered, some dormant, all under review — The New York Times is deciding what to do with its dozens of blogs. — Sources tell Capital that a review of the blogs is underway ahead of the paper's planned web relaunch later this year.

Discussion: @mlcalderone, @buzzfeedben and @jayrosen_nyu

BuzzFeed:

Lisa Tozzi Joins BuzzFeed As News Director — New York Times Veteran To Lead News Coverage For The Social Web — Social news site BuzzFeed announced today it has hired Lisa Tozzi as News Director. Joining BuzzFeed from The New York Times, Tozzi will lead the site's news coverage …

Discussion: JIMROMENESKO.COM, The Atlantic Online, FishbowlNY, @bydanielvictor and @buzzfeedben

Laura Hazard Owen / paidContent:

Startup BookShout raises $6M; no longer lets users import their Kindle and Nook books — Dallas-based book startup BookShout has raised $6 million in its second funding round. When the company launched, it allowed users to import their Nook and Kindle books onto the platform, but that function has been turned off.

Discussion: VentureBeat

Joe Pompeo / Capital New York:

First, the good news: ‘Daily News’ promotes two in digital — Daily News editor Colin Myler has announced two high-level promotions on the digital side of his newsroom. — The first is Lauren Johnston, promoted from digital managing editor to digital editorial director …

Jeff John Roberts / GigaOM:

Google: government censorship requests jumped 20% in last six months — Google has published its latest Transparency Report and the results are not encouraging for free speech advocates: governments around the world are asking it to remove more content than ever before.

Discussion: The Official Google Blog, Engadget, ZDNet, CNET and TechCrunch

Ken Yeung / The Next Web:

Amazon beats Wall Street estimates with $0.18 EPS, sales at $16.07B in Q1 2013, a 22% growth YoY — Amazon announced its first quarter financial performance and it has $16.07 billion in net income and earnings per share of $0.18. Its sales were up 22 percent from last year.

Discussion: TechCrunch, Amazon.com and GigaOM