Mediagazer: The slow but inevitable decline of Netflix's DVD business (Janko Roettgers/GigaOM)

5:10 PM ET, October 21, 2013

Top News:

Jordan Crook / TechCrunch:

Yahoo To Launch Consumer Tech Site With Help Of New York Times' David Pogue — Yahoo is planning to launch a consumer tech website with the help of long-time NYT columnist David Pogue. — The news comes by way of Brian Stelter, long-time NYT writer, who reports via Twitter that Pogue announced …

David Pogue / A Note from Pogue:

Goodbye—and Hello — It's true: After 13 years at the New York Times, I've accepted a new job. Leaving The Times is a big deal. My years there coincided with the explosion of just about everything important in today's tech — the Web, social media, e-books, smartphones, tablets, duck-faced selfies.

Ben Dimiero / Media Matters for America:

Fox News Reportedly Used Fake Commenter Accounts To Rebut Critical Blog Posts — NPR media reporter David Folkenflik writes in his forthcoming book Murdoch's World that Fox News' public relations staffers used an elaborate series of dummy accounts to fill the comments sections of critical blog posts with pro-Fox arguments.

Geneva Overholser / Los Angeles Times:
'Murdoch's World' is a complicated one

Discussion: Huntington News and Media Law Prof Blog

Ryan Lawler / TechCrunch:

Netflix's Q3 Beats Analyst Estimates With 1.3M New Domestic Subscribers, $0.52 Earnings Per Share — Netflix's third-quarter earnings report just came out, with the company beating analyst expectations on higher-than-expected subscriber numbers. For the third quarter …

Discussion: The Wrap, Bloomberg, VentureBeat, Forbes, AllThingsD, Broadcasting & Cable, Bloomberg, Hollywood Reporter, Business Insider, MoneyBeat, The Verge, @poniewozik, @pkafka, @brianstelter and @zseward

Zachary M. Seward / Quartz:

Netflix now has more paying subscribers than HBO in the United States — Netflix just reported that its streaming video service had 29.93 million paying subscribers in the United States at the end of September. That surpasses, for the first time, HBO's paid subscriber base of 28.96 million in the US.

Leslie Kaufman / New York Times:

BuzzFeed Hires Pulitzer Winner to Head Investigative Unit — BuzzFeed, the media Web site focused on viral content, announced on Monday that it was again expanding its reporting staff, this time to introduce an investigative unit. A new team of about half a dozen reporters will be led by Mark Schoofs …

Discussion: Capital New York, FishbowlNY, @kkjschmidt, @nickriccardi, @mattdpearce, @wblau, @add, @jessicaplautz and @stefanjbecket

Michael Calderone / The Huffington Post:

Associated Press Fires Journalists Over Erroneous Terry McAuliffe Report — NEW YORK — The Associated Press has fired a reporter and editor over an erroneous Oct. 9 report that Virginia gubernatorial candidate Terry McAuliffe lied to an investigator in a federal fraud case, according to sources familiar with the matter.

Discussion: Terry McAuliffe for Governor, Talking Points Memo, @jmartnyt and @thefix

Brian Womack / Bloomberg:

Facebook Woos Media Companies With Tool to Post Stories — Facebook Inc. is testing a feature to simplify how media companies find content to post on its service, stepping up efforts against Twitter Inc. for driving traffic to news providers. — The new tool suggests stories from media sites …

Discussion: Poynter

Todd Wasserman / Mashable:
Facebook Average Referral Traffic to Media Sites Up 170% This Year

Discussion: TechCrunch, Facebook, GigaOM, AllThingsD, @rubinafillion, @kantrowitz and @lavrusik

Andrew Beaujon / Poynter:

Publishing, broadcasting revenues down at Gannett — Revenues were down in most of Gannett's segments in the third quarter of 2013, according to the company's new earnings report. Advertising revenue at Gannett's publishing properties fell 5.9 percent compared with the same period the year before.

Discussion: Broadcasting & Cable, Radio & Television …, NetNewsCheck Latest, USA Today and @poynter

David Carr / New York Times:

Tech Wealth and Ideas Are Heading Into News — Producing serious news is an expensive enterprise with a beleaguered business model, one that remains tied to the tracks as a locomotive of splintered audiences and declining advertising hurtles toward it. — But just when it looked as if all were lost …

David Carr / New York Times:
An Interview With Pierre Omidyar

Discussion: Reflections of a Newsosaur, Guardian, PandoDaily, @jenniferpreston, @michaelluo, @mlcalderone, @nasimzehra, @dicktofel, TheBlaze.com, @tweetsintheme, @gregorydjohnsen, @paullewis, @brianstelter, @justinjm1, @jcstearns, @carr2n and @dangillmor

Lucia Moses / Adweek:

Who Killed the Magazine App? 97% of newsstand apps are now free — The Association of Magazine Media (MPA), the magazine publishers trade group, this month reported some seemingly encouraging results for an industry that's become all too used to bad news.

Discussion: @sannijokinen, @rafat and @michaelwolffnyc

Janko Roettgers / GigaOM:

The slow but inevitable decline of Netflix's DVD business — When will Netflix send out its last red envelope? The company is clearly focused on streaming, but executives have long maintained that DVDs, while declining, are going to be a part of its business for years to come.

Discussion: Pocket-lint, Businessweek, MarketWatch, @jank0, GDP Insider and DailyFinance

Darren Boyle / Press Gazette:

Embassy man to meet with British journalist held on Russian piracy charges — UK consular officials will visit a British journalist detained by Russian authorities on piracy charges later this week. — Kieron Bryan was arrested by armed Russian security officials aboard …

Discussion: Guardian and Maritime News