Mediagazer: Former White House National Security spokesman assails Rolling Stone cover (Jake Tapper/The Lead)

8:35 PM ET, July 17, 2013

Top News:

The NSA Admits It Analyzes More People's Data Than Previously Revealed — As an aside during testimony on Capitol Hill today, a National Security Agency representative rather casually indicated that the government looks at data from a universe of far, far more people than previously indicated.

Discussion: GigaOM, Guardian, Fast Company, Foreign Policy, @jeffjarvis, @jeffjarvis, Techdirt, The Verge, @ioerror, @dustinslaughter, @billpollock and @normative

John Paczkowski / AllThingsD:

Apple, Google, Facebook, Microsoft, Twitter and Others Call for More NSA Transparency — Apple, Google, Facebook, Microsoft are part of a broad alliance of technology companies and civil liberties groups that will tomorrow demand dramatically increased transparency around U.S. government surveillance efforts.

Discussion: CNET, Washington Post, AppleInsider, @emilybell, SocialTimes, The Next Web, The Verge and Electronic Frontier Foundation

Cynthia Littleton / Variety:

Turner Shuffle: John Martin to Succeed Phil Kent as CEO in January — After a dozen years at the helm, Phil Kent will step down from his post as CEO of Turner Broadcasting in January and will be succeeded by Time Warner chief financial officer John Martin. — Kent will remain chairman of TBS for a period in 2014.

Discussion: MediaPost, Business Wire, Los Angeles Times, Los Angeles Times, The Huffington Post, New York Times, TVNewser, Home Media Magazine, AdAge, Radio & Television … and FTVLive

Peter Lauria / BuzzFeed: Money Men Are Taking Over Time Warner

Ian Crouch / News Desk:

The Inconvenient Image of Dzhokhar Tsarnaev — The magazine cover retains its unique cultural power—to amuse, to inform, to agitate, or, as is the case with the forthcoming August 1st issue of Rolling Stone, to enrage. That cover, unveiled on Tuesday night, features a photographic self-portrait …

Discussion: Erik Wemple, The Huffington Post, Fox News, @clarajeffery and msnbc.com

Jake Tapper / The Lead:

Former White House National Security spokesman assails Rolling Stone cover — Former White House National Security Council spokesman Tommy Vietor expressed concern on Wednesday about Rolling Stone magazine putting Dzhokhar Tsarnaev on its cover, tweeting that “A disaffected US kid …

Jack Shafer:

From Tom Paine to Glenn Greenwald, we need partisan journalism — I would sooner engage you in a week-long debate over which taxonomical subdivision the duck-billed platypus belongs to than spend a moment arguing whether Glenn Greenwald is a journalist or not, or whether an activist can be a journalist …

Discussion: @ggreenwald, @palafo, Kirk LaPointe's …, @froomkin, @ericuman, @johnmcquaid, @mccanner and @clarajeffery

American Journalism Review:

American Journalism Review To Become Online Only Publication — The American Journalism Review will end production of its print edition and launch a redesigned website in Fall 2013 as it becomes an online-only publication, the University of Maryland's Philip Merrill College of Journalism announced Wednesday.

Discussion: JIMROMENESKO.COM, NEWS.com.au, @jbenton, @saramorrison, @merrillcollege, @cfstraumsheim, @billmon1, @romenesko, @davidfolkenflik and @ombudsman

Larry Dailey / Mediashift:

Are Traditional News Operations Really Ready for Innovation? — Fewer than half of Middle East residents think it's safe to express political opinions online, according to a study by sponsor Northwestern University in Qatar. Explore the data on this interactive site and watch a recent MediaTwits chat about the study.

Discussion: eMedia Vitals

Jeff Bercovici / Forbes:

Keith Olbermann Is Returning To ESPN. Can He Help Himself? — The television career of Keith Olbermann can be understood as a an endless cycle of network executives first deciding his prodigious talent outweighs his considerable red flags, then coming to think otherwise. Lather, rinse, repeat.

Discussion: TVNewser, Variety and Politico

Marisa Guthrie / Hollywood Reporter:
Keith Olbermann Finalizes Deal With ESPN

Discussion: New York Times, Forbes, ESPN MediaZone, LA Observed, Variety, @jbflint, Hollywood Reporter, Hot Air, FishbowlNY, The Week, The Atlantic Wire, BuzzFeed, The Huffington Post, ParisLemon, New York Magazine, Gawker, @brianstelter and @antderosa

Aisha Harris / Slate:

What Is “BlackBuzzfeed”? — For much of today, the hashtag #BlackBuzzfeed was trending nationally on Twitter. What is BlackBuzzfeed, you ask? — It is “Taye Diggs, and 8 More Celebrities White People Haven't Realized Black People Don't F*ck With Anymore.” Or “33 Dogs Who Wish a Motherf*cker Would.”

Discussion: BuzzFeed and The Huffington Post

Alyson Shontell / Business Insider:

BeachMint's Board Members Have Signed A Scathing Letter Ripping PandoDaily Article To Shreds — It's best to admit when you're wrong. Otherwise, you could end up being the subject of a scathing public letter, like the one BeachMint's board members just published in the LA Times about PandoDaily.

Discussion: bizjournals, Los Angeles Times, PandoDaily and @mikenobi

Mallary Jean Tenore / Poynter:

AP's Carroll: ‘An attack on a journalist is a proxy for an attack on the people’ — Kathleen Carroll, senior vice president and executive editor of the Associated Press, briefed the United Nations Security Council on the protection of journalists today. — She explained that the AP's headquarters …

Discussion: ap.org and @froomkin

Caroline O'Donovan / Nieman Journalism Lab:

Independent news orgs in Latin America band together in search of new business models — A loose federation of independent news organizations in Latin America have decided to make it official. — Rosental Alves of The University of Texas' Knight Center for Journalism in the Americas …

Julie Makinen / Los Angeles Times:

China says it'll relax film, TV censorship; directors unimpressed — Director Jia Zhangke, shown with actress Tao Zhao at the Cannes Film Festival, says China's easing of restrictions on film, TV and radio content isn't a revolutionary step forward. (Pascal Le Segretain / Getty Images / May 26, 2013)

Janko Roettgers / GigaOM:

Televisor wants to become your TV recommendation engine — So you just finished binge-watching the last season of Mad Men, and now you're wondering: What's next? That's exactly the type of question a new site called Televisor was built for. — Televisor offers the type of “you may also like” …

Discussion: PC Advisor and AppNewser

Joe Pompeo / Capital New York:

Daily Beast to launch a new weekend title, ‘Beast Weekend’ — The Daily Beast is launching a weekend title to debut this fall along with a homepage makeover, editor-in-chief Tina Brown told staff today. — “Beast Weekend will refresh and refocus our weekend content towards culture as well as longer reads …

Discussion: FishbowlNY, eMedia Vitals and FishbowlNY

Devindra Hardawar / VentureBeat:

Inkling scores $16M, partners with Pearson and Elsevier for its digital book platform — With another hefty round of funding, Inkling's plans to dominate the e-book world are one step closer to reality. — Back in February, Inkling announced Inkling Habitat, an all-encompassing publishing environment for digital books.

Discussion: CNET, Fortune, TechCrunch, PublishersWeekly.com, Digital Book World, Venture Capital Dispatch, GigaOM and AllThingsD

Burgess Everett / Politico:

Chuck Schumer, Lindsey Graham introduce new media shield law — Chuck Schumer and Lindsey Graham have rounded up another bipartisan gang, this time to pass a media shield law that would enact recent Justice Department guidelines. — The New York and South Carolina senators have written …

Discussion: Capital New York and @brickhouse143

Helienne Lindvall / Guardian:

Can PledgeMusic's direct-to-fan approach unlock untapped revenue? — The platform is attracting interest from labels, and stars such as Amanda Palmer, by involving fans in the making of albums — Record labels are leaving billions of pounds in revenue on the table every year by only offering music fans …

Discussion: hypebot and PledgeMusic for brand …

Bronwen Clune / Guardian:

Are fact-checking sites a symptom of the media not doing its job? — ‘Fact-checking’ sites are on the rise in Australia. Are those new ventures suggesting that journalism is failing to adequately perform its functions? — The Guardian's data journalism workflow. Illustration: Mark McCormick for the Guardian

Rebecca Shapiro / The Huffington Post:

BuzzFeed Launches Fellowship Program In Late Reporter's Memory — BuzzFeed will honor the legacy of the late Michael Hastings through a yearlong fellowship program. — The news site announced on Wednesday that it was launching the Michael Hastings Fellowship for national security reporting:

Discussion: buzzfeed.com, FishbowlNY, @fieldproducer, @ggreenwald and @joepompeo

Jason Clampet / Skift:

Lonely Planet to Cut Staff and Relocate Digital Offices to Nashville — Four months after buying Lonely Planet from BBC Worldwide, new owner NC2 Media will announce staff reductions and structural changes as soon as this week, Skift has learned. The changes involve layoffs across existing offices in Melbourne, London, and Oakland.

Anna Clark / Columbia Journalism Review:

Michigan's ‘free-market’ media machine — The Mackinac Center for Public Policy is a major player in state media. What to make of it? — DETROIT, MI — In a time of upheaval for both politics and media, state-level think tanks sit at a peculiar nexus of influence: they both shape the news and report it.