Mediagazer: Crowdsourcing in manhunts can work (Philip Ball/Nature)

12:15 AM ET, April 27, 2013

Top News:

Alexander C. Kaufman / FishbowlNY:

AOL Music Shuttered, Staff Laid Off [Updated] — AOL has shuttered its AOL Music division and laid off its staff, according to pink-slipped employees on Twitter. — Spinner.com, a rock-music news site under the AOL Music banner, announced suddenly on Thursday afternoon that it was shutting down.

Discussion: AllThingsD, Mashable, The Verge, AllAccess.com, RapFix, Fast Company, Radio & Television … and CNET

David Folkenflik / NPR:

Koch Brothers Could Buy Tribune Papers To Add Media Division … David and Charles Koch control what is believed to be the nation's largest privately held company, Koch Industries. They share a strong libertarian bent against high taxes and government regulation.

Discussion: JIMROMENESKO.COM, Hit & Run and FishbowlNY

Garance Franke-Ruta / The Atlantic Online:
Why Big Cities Make Media Liberal—and Why the Koch Brothers Can't Do Anything About It

Discussion: Nieman Journalism Lab, msnbc.com, Wonkblog, JIMROMENESKO.COM and Le·gal In·sur·rec· tion, Thanks:@underoak

Jim Romenesko:

Meet Michelle Boatley, fake Thomson Reuters legal publication reporter — A few years ago, Boatley was cranking out stories left and right — short pieces about law firm layoffs, merger deals, and firm expansions. — Then she vanished. — People who knew the secret about Boatley thought she had been killed — by her editors.

Jeff John Roberts / GigaOM:

Banned in China: Bloomberg and New York Times say they had no choice — Media outlets operating in China face an unpleasant dilemma: self-censor or else lose access to millions of readers and a valuable news market. Both the New York Times and Bloomberg News chose the second option, and don't regret the decision.

Discussion: The Official Google Blog

Andrew Wallenstein / Variety:

New Reality Show to Skip TV, Play Entirely on Social Media (EXCLUSIVE) … Who says a reality show has to air on TV? — The Chernin Group is producing an audacious new unscripted series that will be distributed entirely on social-media platforms instead of having a home on TV, according to sources familiar with the production.

Discussion: Los Angeles Times

Jeff Bercovici / Forbes:

Glenn Beck on the CNN ‘Pit of Despair’ and Why He Got Out of Cable TV — Glenn Beck thinks the television industry as we know it is dying, but that's not why he left it to start his own digital network, The Blaze. He's making a lot more money now than he did at Fox News, but that wasn't it either.

Discussion: Mediaite

Philip Ball / Nature:

Crowdsourcing in manhunts can work — Despite mistakes over the Boston bombers, social media can help to find people quickly. — The social news website Reddit was left red-faced last week after misidentifying suspects in the bombings at the Boston Marathon in Massachusetts …

Discussion: Poynter

Joe Pompeo / Capital New York:

Powerhouse reporter Bob Hennelly to leave WNYC; station suffers a digital divide — WNYC has lost one of its heavyweights: Bob Hennelly, a longtime investigative reporter who's been with the National Public Radio affiliate for more than a decade, is leaving the station.

Tom Lavell / Bloomberg:

Murdoch to Get $28.3 Million Pay When News Corp. Splits — Rupert Murdoch, the billionaire founder of News Corp., will receive $28.3 million in combined compensation next year from the two businesses created by the breakup of his media empire. — Murdoch's base pay in 2014 will amount to $8.1 million …

Discussion: Hollywood Reporter, Los Angeles Times, Guardian, Seeking Alpha, Reuters and FishbowlNY

Mark Sweney / Guardian:

Financial Times faces weak advertising market, says parent company — Pearson predicts difficult first quarter for newspaper, with total group revenues down 1% year on year to £1.2bn — Pearson has said that the Financial Times faced a “weak” advertising market in the first quarter of this year …

Discussion: Media & Entertainment, Talking Biz News and The Drum

Paul Farhi / Washington Post:

White House Correspondents' Association dinner isn't costly, but the parties are — Figure on paying big time for a semi-glamorous locale; an embassy will do (but only one for a major country). Then, add in food and booze — about $100 a head. Plus entertainment, security, cleanup, insurance.

Discussion: The Atlantic Wire, Mediaite, The Huffington Post and Chickaboomer

Joe Coscarelli / New York Magazine:

New York Times Going Back to Not Caring About Blogs — As part of its looming redesign, the New York Times is moving away from what the Internet calls “blogs,” starting with the Media Decoder section of the site, home to the quicker, sassier musings of Bill Carter, Brian Stelter, David Carr …

Discussion: New Republic, Media Decoder and Capital New York

Casey Newton / The Verge:

Kindle TV: why does Amazon need a set-top box? — With competitors swarming the biggest screen in the house, Amazon makes a move of its own — News that Amazon is building a set-top box to rival offerings from Apple, Google, and Roku arrived yesterday as a surprise — but not a shock.

Discussion: ReadWrite, VatorNews, Wall Street Journal, GigaOM and The Next Web