Mediagazer: With risks multiplying, reporters stay out of Syria (AFP)

10:25 AM ET, October 16, 2013

Top News:

Exclusive: Glenn Greenwald Will Leave Guardian To Create New News Organization — Glenn Greenwald, the lawyer and blogger who brought the Guardian the biggest scoop of the decade, is departing the London-based news organization, for a brand new, large-scale, broadly-focused media outlet, he told BuzzFeed Tuesday.

Mark Hosenball / Reuters:

Exclusive: Greenwald exits Guardian for new Omidyar media venture — (Reuters) - Glenn Greenwald, who has made headlines around the world with his reporting on U.S. electronic surveillance programs, is leaving the Guardian newspaper to join a new media venture funded by eBay founder Pierre Omidyar …

Discussion: Washington Post, New York Magazine, @qhardy, Mediaite, Softpedia News and GigaOM

Michael Calderone / The Huffington Post:

Jeremy Scahill, Laura Poitras Teaming Up With Glenn Greenwald On New Media Venture — NEW YORK — Journalists Jeremy Scahill and Laura Poitras will be working with Glenn Greenwald on a new media venture funded by billionaire eBay founder Pierre Omidyar, according to sources familiar with the matter.

Discussion: Poynter, Gawker, The Switch, @tcarmody, Press Gazette and Pressing Issues

PandoDaily:

$40-million round for Vox seals it: Venture capital likes media — Vox's new mega-round puts a bow on content's holy-s**t moment — Today it was revealed that Vox Media, owner of The Verge, SB Nation, and Polygon has raised another $40 million of funding.

Discussion: @emilybell, @editorialiste, @hsmittman, @codytoshiro, @elegantlywasted, @robpegoraro and @rafat

Eric Eldon / TechCrunch:
Why Accel Is Leading A $40M Round In Vox Media, A Digital Content Company (!)

Discussion: Digital Media Wire, @markos, @reckless and @rafat

Tim Peterson / AdAge:
Vox Media Raises $34 Million to Expand Video Business

Discussion: TechCrunch, Fortune, @hblodget, VentureBeat, bizjournals, Reuters, VideoInk, @pkafka, @jorilallo, @reckless, GigaOM, AllThingsD, @jeffjohnroberts, @agolis, @justinnxt and @mattbuchanan

Georg Szalai / Hollywood Reporter:

BBC to Name Head of VOD Service, Treat It Like Fifth TV Channel — Director of television Danny Cohen discusses possible on-demand offers, expected cost cuts and when broadband delivery of content may supersede broadcasting in the U.K. — LONDON - The BBC is planning to name a controller …

Discussion: Guardian

Andrea Peterson / The Switch:

Aaron Swartz's last gift to journalism and online privacy finds a new home — (Daniel J. Sieradski via Flickr) — Before Aaron Swartz's suicide in January, he had nearly completed work with Wired's Kevin Poulsen on a secure system to accept messages and documents from anonymous sources over the Internet.

Discussion: Freedom of the Press …, Softpedia News, The Verge, Techdirt, Co.Exist and Mashable

The Huffington Post:
SecureDrop: A New Infrastructure for Strong, Secure Investigative Journalism

Discussion: Poynter, GitHub, Forbes, Freedom of the Press …, TechCrunch, TIME, @johncusack, @jcstearns and @jayrosen_nyu

Casey Newton / The Verge:

This just in: why news is Twitter's next frontier — A new ‘experiment’ and a high-profile hire suggest big plans — Twitter is moving more aggressively into the world of journalism, building a new alert system for breaking news and hiring someone to build new partnerships with the media industry.

Discussion: @mcproulx

Joshua Benton / Nieman Journalism Lab:
Twitter's changing its direct messaging policy, some journalists are ready to take advantage

Discussion: Mashable and Pocket-lint

Charlie Savage / New York Times:

Court Rejects Appeal Bid by Writer in Leak Case — WASHINGTON — A federal appeals court on Tuesday declined to hear an appeal by James Risen, an author and a reporter for The New York Times, who was ordered in July to testify in the trial of a former Central Intelligence Agency official accused of leaking information to him.

Discussion: Poynter, Politico, @charlie_savage, @ggreenwald, @mattapuzzo and New York Magazine

AFP:

With risks multiplying, reporters stay out of Syria — Journalists in Syria have been killed by snipers, accused of spying, and kidnapped by gunmen, and with the threats growing, many say the conflict is now too dangerous to cover. — The risks have increased the challenge of reporting from the country …

Shalini Ramachandran / Corporate Intelligence:

In Aereo Fight, Are Comcast and NBCUniversal at Odds? … Are Comcast Corp.'s cable business and its NBCUniversal entertainment unit on the same page when it comes to the Aereo legal battle? That's a question worth asking in the wake of Friday's petition by major broadcasters seeking …

Discussion: Los Angeles Times

Zach Bergson / Digiday:

NowThis: Snapchatting the News — NowThis News, the mobile video news organization whose push onto Instagram made headlines this summer, is now moving onto a new social video frontier: Snapchat. — Stories, Snapchat's latest feature, allows users to take a series of videos and images that can be viewed and shared within 24 hours.

Discussion: Mashable and @digiday

AdAge:

Effort to Split Murdoch From Chairman Role Resumes at 21st Century Fox — Similar Drives Have Fallen Short Before — 21st Century Fox Inc. investors backing a resolution to strip the chairman job from CEO Rupert Murdoch said they have won the support of shareholder-advisory firm Glass, Lewis & Co.

Discussion: Bloomberg

Nellie Andreeva / Deadline:

Marvel Preps 60-Episode Package Of Four Series & A Mini For VOD & Cable Networks — EXCLUSIVE: The notorious secrecy that surrounds Marvel's projects has been heightened to the nth degree for this one. No one would breathe a word, with rumors that everyone from top to bottom is bound …

Discussion: Wired, The Huffington Post, Digital Spy, /Film and The Verge

Todd Spangler / Variety:

Univision to Debut ‘Flama,’ Its First Online-Only Video Network, on YouTube — Hispanic broadcaster forms joint venture with Bedrocket for online Latin culture network aimed at millennials — Univision Communications has formed a joint venture with digital media producer Bedrocket Media to launch Flama …

Discussion: VideoInk and Tubefilter

Kara Swisher / AllThingsD:

Earnings and Revenue Down — Yahoo Delivers on Expected Lackluster Third Quarter — Yahoo met weak financial expectations, turning in what can only be described as lackluster performance in its third-quarter earnings report today. — The Silicon Valley Internet giant said it earned 34 cents …

Discussion: Forbes, NetNewsCheck Latest, AllThingsD, AllThingsD, Softpedia News, @pkafka, MediaNama, Reuters, The Wrap, Globe and Mail, AdAge, Hollywood Reporter, bizjournals, Mercury News, The Wrap, ZDNet, Business Wire, VentureBeat and Digits

Andrew Beaujon / Poynter:

Report: Stories about politics inspire best, worst comments — Researchers from the World Association of Newspapers and News Publishers (WAN-IFRA) spoke with online editors and community managers at 104 news organizations from 63 countries to help assemble a report written by Emma Goodman …

Discussion: Kirk LaPointe's …

Ben Quinn / Guardian:

New York Times editor defends journalists over Snowden leaks — Jill Abramson says on BBC's Newsnight that Guardian articles on NSA files are ‘very much in the public interest’ — Jill Abramson, executive editor of The New York Times, has mounted a defence of the ability of journalists …

Karen Fratti / 10,000 Words:

CIR Reaches Out To New Audiences With ‘Redaction’ Campaign — The Center for Investigative Reporting has launched a re-branding campaign with advertising agency Goodby Silverstein & Partners. — The campaign includes a new logo, along with recent projects like ‘Reveal’ …

Ira Teinowitz / The Wrap:

FilmOn Threatened With Contempt of Court — A district court judge on Tuesday threatened to find FilmOn X in contempt of court for beginning to air network affiliates from Boston despite her injunction barring the company from airing network stations outside New York and Massachusetts.

Discussion: GigaOM, Variety, Hollywood Reporter and Deadline.com