Mediagazer: BBC boss in charge of Digital Media Initiative got £140,000 in bonuses (Tara Conlan/Guardian)

7:35 AM ET, August 21, 2013

Top News:

Steven Erlanger / New York Times:

British Newspaper Has Advantages in Battle With Government Over Secrets — LONDON — Alan Rusbridger, the mop-haired, soft-spoken editor of The Guardian newspaper, finds himself in a shadowy battle with the British government over purloined secrets that the government will have a hard time winning in the Internet age.

Discussion: @ewenmacaskill, @stefanjbecket, @dangillmor, @buzzfeedandrew, @arusbridger and @richards1052

Jay Rosen / Pressthink:

Conspiracy to commit journalism — “If sunlight coalitions are to succeed, they won't succeed by outwitting surveillance. Not better technology, but greater legitimacy is their edge.” — The mood toughened just over a month ago, when I received a phone call from the centre of government telling me: “You've had your fun.

Julian Borger / Guardian:

NSA files: why the Guardian in London destroyed hard drives of leaked files — A threat of legal action by the government that could have stopped reporting on the files leaked by Edward Snowden led to a symbolic act at the Guardian's offices in London — Guardian editors on Tuesday revealed …

Christoph Scheuermann / Spiegel Online: The Cozy Relationship between Britain and its Intelligence Apparatus

Tim Ross / Telegraph:
David Cameron accused of sanctioning detention of Glenn Greenwald's partner David Miranda

Discussion: Reuters, @telegraphworld, @telegraphnews, @steveplrose, The Huffington Post, @willblackwriter and @davecameroon

Brian Stelter / New York Times:

Al Jazeera Makes Limited American Debut — There was ample attention in journalistic circles as Al Jazeera America had its premiere on Tuesday — particularly among those who could not watch. — The news channel — which replaced Current TV at 3 p.m. Eastern time — was expected to be carried …

Discussion: Reuters, Poynter, Hollywood Reporter, @rafat, Associated Press, @brianstelter, Politico, Bloomberg, New York Magazine and digiphile

Janko Roettgers / GigaOM:

Al Jazeera hints at new online programming for cord cutters and cable hold-outs — Al Jazeera launched its U.S. cable network Tuesday, but a significant part of its potential audience couldn't tune in: Viewers used to watching Al Jazeera's international channel online found themselves blocked …

Discussion: Deadline.com, The Wrap, @riy, Variety, USA Today, Inside TV and Broadcasting & Cable

Jef Feeley / Bloomberg:
AT&T Sued Over Refusal to Carry Al Jazeera Cable Network

Discussion: @adamgellings, @sherman4949 and @rolandsmartin

Justin D. Martin / Quartz:
One thing Al Jazeera could do to gain credibility: hire an ombudsman

Discussion: @qz, PolicyMic and @digiphile

Vindu Goel / New York Times:

Facebook Leads an Effort to Lower Barriers to Internet Access — MENLO PARK, Calif. — About one of every seven people in the world uses Facebook. Now, Mark Zuckerberg, its co-founder and chief executive, wants to make a play for the rest — including the four billion or so who lack Internet access.

Facebook Newsroom:

Mark Zuckerberg: Is Connectivity a Human Right? — For almost ten years, Facebook has been on a mission to make the world more open and connected. Today we connect more than 1.15 billion people each month, but as we started thinking about connecting the next 5 billion, we realized something important …

Discussion: Business Insider, @evelynrusli, @tcarmody, @thestalwart, @margafret and @brandonbailey

Sara Morrison / The Wrap:

Fox Confirms Brian Lewis Fired for ‘Financial Irregularities’ (Updated) — Executive vice president of corporate communications and longtime employee suddenly leaves the company — Brian Lewis, senior advisor to Roger Ailes and Fox's executive vice president of corporate communications …

Discussion: Hollywood Reporter, Los Angeles Times, Gawker and Variety

Alex Wilhelm / TechCrunch:

New Revelations Detail How The NSA Scans 75% Of The Internet Through Telco Partnerships — Today the Wall Street Journal reported the existence of several NSA programs that were either previously unknown, or little was known about. Meet Blarney, Fairview, Oakstar, Lithium and Stormbrew.

James Waterson / City A.M. Feed:

Exclusive: TV licence offences responsible for a tenth of all UK court cases — TVLICENSINGoffences now account for more than a tenth of all criminal prosecutions in the UK, City A.M. can reveal. — More than 180,000 people - almost 3,500 a week - appeared in front of magistrates during 2012 …

Discussion: Guy Fawkes' blog

Rachel Bartlett / Journalism.co.uk:

A look at Storyful's Open Newsroom verification project — A look at the first two months of the project, which involves a Google+ community working together to verify content shared online — A couple of months ago the team at social newswire Storyful took to Google+ with its Open Newsroom initiative …

Discussion: @grove, @niemanlab and Big News Network.com

Kevin Roderick / LA Observed:

Andrew Blankstein leaving LA Times for NBC News — Andrew Blankstein has been a go-to reporter on the law enforcement beat for the Los Angeles Times for a long time. In all, he has been with the paper for 23 years (and more than 4,000 bylines of various kinds), per today's unusual …

Discussion: @anblanx, The Wrap, @lajourno, @kyoshino, @rungomez, @laobserved and Deadline.com

Andrew Beaujon / Poynter:

Washington Post considered using robot sportswriters — Last year, The Washington Post considered using automated writing to cover the region's many high-school sports, Brook Silva-Braga reports. Currently, the paper has four reporters on that beat, and deputy high school sports editor …

Discussion: @howardkurtz, @nprrussell, @leongettler and @niemanlab

Tara Conlan / Guardian:

BBC boss in charge of Digital Media Initiative got £140,000 in bonuses — John Linwood, on suspension pending an inquiry into scrapped system, got payout as bonuses were not performance related — The BBC paid £140,000 in bonuses to John Linwood, who oversaw the failed Digital Media Initiative.

Roy Greenslade / Guardian:

San Francisco paper took $500,000 with paywall before taking it down — With the San Francisco Chronicle having dropped its paywall after just four months, one of its former executives has been talking about the problems of charging for content. — Phil Bronstein, one-time Chronicle editor …

Laura Hazard Owen / GigaOM:

Bad earnings for Barnes & Noble: Nook revenues plunge 20%; Riggio won't take stores private — In the past quarter, Barnes & Noble's CEO resigned, and the company announced it would stop manufacturing tablets in-house as a way to cut heavy losses in the Nook division.