Mediagazer: Politico to Test a Pay Wall With Some Readers of Its Site (Leslie Kaufman/New York Times)

7:15 PM ET, May 9, 2013

Top News:

Top Editors Abruptly Leave Village Voice — Will Bourne, who became editor in chief of The Village Voice in November, and Jessica Lustig, the deputy editor since January, are leaving the weekly publication. — They met with the staff at 11 p.m. on Thursday and said that Christine Brennan …

Discussion: Gawker, Poynter, Capital New York, mediabistro.com, The Huffington Post, @simondumenco, FishbowlNY, New York Magazine and Melville House Books

TechCrunch:

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.

Laura Hazard Owen / paidContent:
In Nook, Microsoft sees a chance to compete against Amazon and Apple

Discussion: Forbes, ZDNet and Softpedia News

Joe Pompeo / Capital New York:

‘New York Post’ offers buyouts; seeks 10-percent staff reduction in attempt to avoid layoffs — The New York Post is offering voluntary buyouts to newsroom employees, editor-in-chief Col Allan informed the staff today in a memo obtained by Capital. — The paper is aiming to reduce …

Discussion: JIMROMENESKO.COM

Chris Grosso / AOL Blog:

Cyndi Stivers Joins AOL as Editor-In-Chief of AOL.com — It's my pleasure to announce that AOL has hired Cyndi Stivers, a decorated journalist and digital media expert, to join our team as Editor-in-Chief of AOL.com. — In her new role reporting to me, she will drive all editorial …

Discussion: Adweek, FishbowlNY and The New York Observer

Janko Roettgers / paidContent:

YouTube launches its paid subscription channels with select partners — YouTube's long-rumored paid channels are live: The Google-owned service started its new subscription offering with select partners Thursday. — YouTube has officially launched a paid subscription offering …

Discussion: YouTube Blog, Deadline.com, Variety, TechCrunch, Forbes, Home Media Magazine, VentureBeat, New York Times, Broadcasting & Cable, AdAge, Washington Post, Pocket-lint, The Verge and Gizmodo

Anthony Ha / TechCrunch:

Say Media Lays Off 10 Percent Of Staff, Aims For Profitability In Second Half Of 2013 — Matt Sanchez, co-founder and CEO of Say Media (which owns xoJane, ReadWrite, and Dogster), just told me that the company has laid off about 10 percent of its 400-person staff.

Discussion: The Wall Blog and Reuters

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 …

Leslie Kaufman / New York Times:

Politico to Test a Pay Wall With Some Readers of Its Site — Politico, the media organization that covers Washington in minute detail, said Thursday that it would start experimenting with a pay wall on its Web site. — “Starting this week, we are going to test a metered system for subscriptions …

Discussion: Politico and Nieman Journalism Lab

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

Adweek:

Digital Sales Chief Out at Turner: Walker Jacobs departs after six years — Walker Jacobs is out at Turner. — The veteran digital executive, who most recently held the title of evp of Turner Digital, resigned today, according to sources. Jacobs had been with the company since 2007.

Discussion: AllThingsD

Eric Deggans / Poynter:

Is Truth-O-Meter the real issue in Maddow's latest blast at PolitiFact? — The Tampa Bay Times' fact-checking site PolitiFact has drawn another heated rebuke from MSNBC anchor Rachel Maddow, who accuses it of “ruining fact checking” and being “truly terrible.”

Discussion: Mediaite, The Huffington Post and The Raw Story

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.

Don Jeffrey / Bloomberg:

Google Says Authors Can't Sue Over Digital Books as Group — Google Inc. (GOOG) asked an appeals court to deny class status to a group of authors who claim in a $3 billion lawsuit that the company's project to digitally copy millions of books from libraries violates their copyrights.

Discussion: Plagiarism Today