Mediagazer: Microsoft Mulling Nook Media LLC Purchase For $1 Billion (TechCrunch)

10:25 AM ET, May 9, 2013

Top News:

Microsoft Mulling Nook Media LLC Purchase For $1 Billion — Microsoft is offering to pay $1 billion to buy the digital assets of Nook Media LLC, the digital book and college book joint venture with Barnes & Noble and other investors, according to internal documents we've obtained.

Discussion: Betabeat, Forbes, DealBook, ValueWalk, Mashable, SlashGear, 24/7 Wall St., Digital Book World, Bookseller news, ZDNet, Electronista, Kindle Review, VentureBeat, Gizmodo, GeekWire, Pocket-lint, Engadget, CNET, The Verge, BGR and Softpedia News

Laura Hazard Owen / paidContent:

In Nook, Microsoft sees a chance to compete against Amazon and Apple — Microsoft already has a stake in Nook Media, and now it is reportedly seeking to buy out the entire company. In Nook, Microsoft sees a shot at competing against Amazon and Apple — in a way it might not be able to do from scratch.

Discussion: ZDNet

Leslie Kaufman / New York Times:

Hearst Hires Digital Chief To Oversee Web Brands — Hearst Magazines, the publisher of such venerable titles as Esquire and Cosmopolitan, said on Wednesday that it was creating a new position, president of digital media. — The job will go to Troy Young, 45, who will be responsible for content …

Discussion: Media Week, The New York Observer, FishbowlNY and eMedia Vitals

New York Times:

A Bid to Thwart Los Angeles Times Sale to Kochs — LOS ANGELES — An effort by two conservative billionaires to take over The Los Angeles Times and seven other newspapers is setting off a firestorm of opposition here. Public employee unions, the leaders of the State Legislature …

Discussion: Poynter, Chicago Business, Guardian, Los Angeles Times, bizjournals, Washington Times, Bloomberg, Progress Illinois, theleafchronicle.com, delmarvanow.com, LAUNION, Orlando Weekly Blogs, LA Observed, The Bakersfield Californian, The Newspaper Guild, Chicago Tribune, FishbowlLA and Chicago Reader

The Huffington Post:

Richard Engel Returns To Syria For First Time Since Kidnapping — NEW YORK — NBC News chief foreign correspondent Richard Engel is back quickly and safely from his first trip to Syria since he and his team were kidnapped and held captive there last December.

Edmund Lee / Bloomberg:

News Corp. Beats Profit Estimates on Higher Licensing Revenue — News Corp. (NWSA), the Rupert Murdoch-led media company that's set to split in two, beat fiscal third-quarter profit estimates on higher licensing fees for television shows such as “American Idol” and “New Girl.”

Discussion: The Huffington Post, @journalismbuzz, Fox Business and Reuters

Joe Pompeo / Capital New York: News Corp. earnings report highlights need for coming corporate crack-up

Ken Yeung / The Next Web:

Flipboard amps up user-generated magazines with Android release and new Web-based editing tool — Flipboard has brought its magazine curation service to Android devices. The popular service has released an update that will now brings in features iOS device owners have been experiencing for the past couple of months.

Discussion: Engadget

Joe Flint / Los Angeles Times:

McCain is prepping legislation to overhaul pay-TV business — Sen. John McCain wants to overhaul the TV industry. — The maverick wants to cook the TV industry's golden goose. — Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) is preparing to introduce legislation perhaps as early as Thursday …

Discussion: AllThingsD, Adweek, TVNewsCheck.com, Hillicon Valley, Bloomberg BNA, Christian News … and Multichannel.com

Justin Ellis / Nieman Journalism Lab:

The Dallas Morning News' paywall is getting a makeover to try to capture digital-only readers — If 2012 was the Year of the Paywall for American newspapers, 2013 is turning into the Year of Paywall Tinkering. — Last month, it was The New York Times that announced it planned to diversify …

Etan Vlessing / Hollywood Reporter:

Canada's Quebecor Halves Profit as Newspaper Losses Mount — Revenues also fall in the Quebec media giant's broadcast and entertainment divisions. — TORONTO - Quebecor's once-mighty tabloid newspapers are bleeding red ink. — The Quebec media giant on Wednesday posted first-quarter earnings …

Discussion: Toronto Sun, Reuters, GlobalPost, Vancouver Sun, Macleans.ca and Globe and Mail

Matthew Panzarino / The Next Web:

The Loop: After 20 years on the web, veteran Apple reporter Jim Dalrymple bets on an iPad magazine — This isn't the first time that Jim Dalrymple has made a bet on the future of publishing. “In 1994, I started publishing on the web, and that was one of the first big modern-day shifts that we saw,” he says.

Discussion: The Loop and MacRumors, Thanks:@max8378

Mathew Ingram / paidContent:

Open interviews and gatekeepers: The media can either open up or sources can go direct — Startup founder Chad Whitacre caused a fuss recently when he suggested that a reporter do an “open interview” that would available to everyone — but why is that approach seen as such a threat by the some media outlets?

Discussion: eMedia Vitals, Co.Labs and 10,000 Words

Kaila Stein / American Journalism Review:

A Digital Guy at the Helm — Trif Alatzas, the new executive editor of the Baltimore Sun, is excited about the opportunities for journalism in a transformative era for newspapers. — Kaila Stein (kstein1010@gmail.com) is a student at the Philip Merrill College of Journalism at the University of Maryland.

Curtis Brainard / Columbia Journalism Review:

A new ‘golden era’? — Nautilus is the latest in a proliferation of science-news sites — Nautilus, a new science magazine whose first issue appeared online April 29, has New York Times reporter Dennis Overbye, one of the beat's veterans, feeling a bit a nostalgic. In a review on Monday, he wrote:

Discussion: bookforum.com