Mediagazer: Murdoch's Papers Fight the Guardian (and Free Speech) (Peter Jukes/The New Republic)

6:35 AM ET, September 1, 2013

Top News:

NSA Spied On Al Jazeera Communications — Arab news broadcaster Al Jazeera was spied on by the National Security Agency, according to documents seen by SPIEGEL. The US intelligence agency hacked into protected communication, a feat that was considered a particular success.

Discussion: Washington Post, The Verge, The Next Web, @csoghoian, @pasternack, VentureBeat, ABC News and The Daily Caller

Mark Hosenball / Reuters:
UK asked N.Y. Times to destroy Snowden material

Discussion: Techdirt, Mediaite, @emilydparker, @jimsharpe, @jesselynradack, Joshua Foust, @mattwaite, @jayrosen_nyu, @nycjim, @paleofuture, The Independent, Guardian, Rosie Gray and Telegraph

Margaret Sullivan / New York Times:

A Year in the Life of a Watchdog — IT'S a Monday morning in August — last Monday, to be precise — and more than 500 e-mails have arrived in the public editor's in-box. Some are spam. Some are requests for corrections or assignments, which can be sent to another desk.

Discussion: @bmitch, @jayrosen_nyu, @sulliview and Pressing Issues

Felix Salmon:

Do online business models matter? — Nick Bilton has an odd column up about Business Insider and NSFWCorp — two publications which he has picked to represent the “reliant on ad revenue” and “reliant on subscription revenue” business models, respectively. He's particularly interested …

Discussion: @thelepathy and @mathewi

Ben Sisario / New York Times:

For News From Syrian Battleground, a Reliance on Social Media — When Secretary of State John Kerry delivered the United States' report on Friday about the use of chemical weapons in Syria, he noted that “all hell broke loose in the social media” just 90 minutes after the alleged attack.

Discussion: @maryvale, @amlwhere, Foreign Policy, @sukille, @jncatron and @kirstinestewart

Margaret Sullivan / The Public Editor's Journal:
In News Coverage and Editorials on Syria, How Much Skepticism in The Times?

Alex Weprin / TVNewser:
Network Correspondents Converge On Syria And Surrounding Countries

Discussion: @saramorrison and @yancyfaith

Sara Morrison / The Wrap:
Syria Crisis: How the Networks Are Covering

Discussion: TVNewser and @huffpostmedia

Peter Jukes / The New Republic:

Murdoch's Papers Fight the Guardian (and Free Speech) — Journalism's circular firing squad, UK edition — While it might be a mite too early to assess the historic and political impact of Edward Snowden's leaks of top secret NSA documents, the first casualty is already clear: journalism.

Discussion: Mediashift

BBC:

Sir David Frost, broadcaster and writer, dies at 74 — Veteran broadcaster Sir David Frost has died at the age of 74 after a suspected heart attack. — Sir David's career spanned journalism, comedy writing and daytime television presenting, including The Frost Report and That Was The Week That Was.

Ken Doctor / Nieman Journalism Lab:

The newsonomics of big and little, from NBC News and GlobalPost to Thunderdome — Ah, the joys of big and of little. — In media businesses, little means few if any layers of bothersome decision-making. Agility. Nimbleness. Independence. All great and positive values.

Discussion: @kdoctor, @jayrosen_nyu and @niemanlab

Matt Buchanan / The New Yorker Blog:

Syria's Other Army: How the Hackers Wage War — At 5:41 P.M. on Tuesday, a tweet from the account of the hacker collective known as the Syrian Electronic Army, which supports the regime of Syria's President, Bashar al-Assad, said, “Media is going down...” It had been a couple of hours since …

Discussion: Krebs on Security, Crikey, BBC and Softpedia News

Caroline O'Donovan / Nieman Journalism Lab:

AIR's Localore is putting down roots and trying to build a more networked public media — Freelancing new ideas in radio is hard. NPR has its own substantial staff to generate ideas and projects, and most individual radio stations lack the resources or infrastructure to support many new ideas.

Discussion: @jbenton

Meg James / Los Angeles Times:

L.A. City Council to debate Time Warner Cable-CBS blackout — The Los Angeles City Council plans to wade into the contentious contract dispute between Time Warner Cable and CBS Corp., which has led to a four-week blackout of local CBS stations in more than 1 million homes in Los Angeles.

Discussion: @megjameslat

Joshua Benton / Nieman Journalism Lab:

New York Times improves its recommendations engine — Discussions about the future of news often feature a dystopian, filter-bubbly argument: Let people personalize the news they consume and it'll kill the common conversation essential to democracy. — I've always been suspicious of that argument.

Discussion: The Next Web and @niemanlab

The Media Briefing:

WPP's Sorrell: No media sector is safe from digital disruption — No media business is immune from serious disruption as the growth of digital, data-driven advertising continues unchecked, says Sir Martin Sorrell, the sloganeering leader of advertising and marketing giant WPP.

Discussion: @drewb, Thanks:@mediabrief

insideradio.com:

Townsquare Media buys 53 stations from Cumulus. — In deal-making that will solidify its position as the third-biggest radio group, Townsquare Media is adding 71 stations in 15 markets. It'll do that a series of three deals, valued at a combined $281 million.

Discussion: radioworld.com