Mediagazer: F.C.C. Nominee Favors Competition Over Regulation (Edward Wyatt/New York Times)

11:10 AM ET, June 19, 2013

Top News:

Tim Dickinson / Rolling Stone:

Michael Hastings Dead at 33 — The bold journalist died in a car accident in Los Angeles — Michael Hastings, the fearless journalist whose reporting brought down the career of General Stanley McChrystal, has died in a car accident in Los Angeles, Rolling Stone has learned. He was 33.

Discussion: PublishersWeekly.com, FishbowlNY, Slate, WorldViews, The Huffington Post, Business Insider, KTLA 5, Publishers Lunch, Los Angeles Times, @7im, BuzzFeed, @romenesko, LAist, Newsy, Gawker, Mother Jones, The Daily Caller, Digital Spy, Corey Pein, GalleyCat, msnbc.com, Daily Mail, USA Today, CBC News, LA Observed, Capital New York, Guardian, Vanity Fair, @idreamin4d, @mariamdena, @mollyknefel, @tommyxtopher, The Atlantic Wire, @joseiswriting, @gillianmae, @antwoabboud, @varyagi, @britmccandless, @peterlauria3, @buzzfeedandrew, @rachelsklar, @emptywheel, @trevortimm, @robsondan, @skippable, @scottstenholm, @dtxjoe, @hprynne, @freedomofpress, Mediaite, Pressing Issues, The New York Observer, Mashable, Yahoo! News, Politico, The Wrap, @tobyharnden, @ariannahuff, The Maddow Blog, @buzzfeedandrew, Hollywood Reporter, @ggreenwald, @trevortimm, @chrisgeidner, @zekejmiller, @adamserwer and Democracy Now

Ben Smith / BuzzFeed:

Missing Michael Hastings — One of the great reporters of his generation died Tuesday at 33. The stories he wrote, and the ones he didn't live to write. — Michael Hastings was really only interested in writing stories someone didn't want him to write — often his subjects; occasionally his editor.

Discussion: Poynter, Slate, FishbowlDC, Business Insider, Rolling Stone, BBC, msnbc.com and The Huffington Post

Josh Halliday / Guardian:

Michael Hastings - journalists pay tribute to ‘fearless’ war correspondent — Reporter who was killed in a car accident on Tuesday had little time for ‘spinmeisters’ and an incredible instinct, say colleagues — Tributes have poured in for the award-winning journalist and war correspondent …

Discussion: The Week, Mediashift, BuzzFeed and Business Insider

Adam Haigh / Bloomberg:

News Corp. Spinoff Falls in Sydney After Murdoch Split — News Corp. (NNC), the Wall Street Journal publisher spun off by Rupert Murdoch, fell in its Sydney debut as stock in the billionaire's newspaper assets started trading separately in a split from his entertainment businesses.

Discussion: Guardian, Hollywood Reporter, Sydney Morning Herald, Guardian, Wall Street Journal, TheAustralian and Business Spectator

Guardian: Rupert Murdoch donates $50,000 in memory of late correspondent

Dominic Rushe / Guardian:
Rupert Murdoch splits empire but keeps faith in tomorrow's newspapers

Discussion: Big News Network.com

Beth Healy / The Boston Globe:

At least 8 potential purchasers may give offers to Times Co. — At least eight potential buyers, ranging from former newspaper executives with local roots to private equity investors from the West Coast, are weighing bids for The Boston Globe as the June 27 deadline for submitting offers approaches …

Discussion: FishbowlNY, Poynter and The Huffington Post

Craig Timberg / Washington Post:

Google challenges U.S. gag order, citing First Amendment — Google asked the secretive Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court on Tuesday to ease long-standing gag orders over data requests the court makes, arguing that the company has a constitutional right to speak about information it is forced to give the government.

Salvador Rodriguez / Los Angeles Times:
Yahoo discloses how much government data requests it gets

Discussion: Business Insider, Engadget, Valleywag, Christian Science Monitor, TechRadar.com, Bloomberg, The Register, The Independent, ZDNet, CNN, CNNMoney.com, BBC, Reuters and Guardian

Georg Szalai / Hollywood Reporter:

U.K. Regulator Launches Review of BT Competition Complaint Against BSkyB — The telecom giant has argued that the pay TV company, in which Rupert Murdoch's News Corp. owns 39 percent, has abused its market power in sports channel carriage talks. — U.K. media regulator Ofcom said Wednesday …

Discussion: Guardian and Reuters

Ben Woods / The Next Web: BT chief steps down to take UK government role as Sky Sports battle intensifies

John Reynolds / Guardian:

P Diddy to launch cable music channel Revolt TV — US hip-hop star aims to fill gap left when MTV stopped playing music videos with the ‘first channel of the social media age’ — Sean “P Diddy” Combs is to launch a cable music channel, Revolt TV, which he claims will be the …

Discussion: Business Insider and @peterlauria3

Darrell Etherington / TechCrunch:

Apple TV Finally Gets HBO GO And WatchESPN, iTunes Shoppers Now Buying 800K TV Shows Per Day — Apple has added two major new content sources to Apple TV today, via HBO GO and WatchESPN integration. The new streaming services adds a considerable selection of content to the company's streaming …

Discussion: Apple, Variety, AdAge, GigaOM, The Next Web and The Verge

Reuters:

Dish abandons Sprint bid for now to focus on Clearwire — (Reuters) - Dish Network Corp said it would not make a new offer to buy No. 3 U.S. wireless provider Sprint Nextel in time for a Tuesday deadline and will instead focus on its tender offer for Clearwire Corp.

Discussion: AllThingsD, VentureBeat, The Verge and Engadget

Josh Sternberg / Digiday:

How PBS Won at Digital — Millions of Americans can point to PBS as a third parent, as the network that helped raise them with programs like “Sesame Street” and “Mr. Rogers' Neighborhood.” — But PBS is not immune to the transition from analog to digital and needs to continually reinvent itself.

Ryan Chittum / Columbia Journalism Review:

The Advance Publications name game — The old Newhouse Pledge and the company's corporate shuffle — The Oregonian is about to get Newhouse'd. — As the billionaires' Advance Publications has rolled out its newspaper-liquidation plan across the country, it has engaged in a curious bit of corporate name-shuffling.

Mark Sweney / Guardian:

UK newspapers' print ad revenue ‘to shrink by £400m by the end of 2014’ — Group M forecasts digital media will help drive rise in overall UK ad spend - but regional press in particular will suffer — Almost £400m in print advertising is forecast to be lost from the UK newspaper market …

Discussion: HoldTheFrontPage

Telegraph:

BBC spent £28m of licence-fee payers' money gagging 500 staff — The BBC has used licence fee payers' money to buy the silence of more than 500 staff with payouts of up to £500,000 each. — According to figures released under Freedom of Information, in the past five years 539 staff …

Discussion: Guardian and London News