Mediagazer: Why so serious? Maybe because data shows news stories can get shared just as often as lighter fare (Nieman Journalism Lab)

1:20 AM ET, November 14, 2013

Top News:

Stand-Alone Food Section Faces Demise in Bay Area — In the food-obsessed Bay Area, The San Francisco Chronicle's food section has been as much of a city institution as the cable car, and to many San Franciscans, more useful. Over the years it has won many awards and developed a dedicated following.

Discussion: Grub Street New York, @dhmeyer, SFist, @kimseverson, @pete_wells and @qualityrye

Audrey Cooper / San Francisco Chronicle:

San Francisco Chronicle's managing editor: We're increasing investment in food coverage — Managing Editor's response to New York Times — It's impossible to separate food, restaurants and the culture of farm-to-table living from the San Francisco experience.

Discussion: @audreycoopersf, @sfchronicle and @john_birdsall

Matt Crawford / SF Station:
New York Times, Chronicle Feud Over Report About SF Food Coverage

Discussion: KQED News Fix

Mathew Ingram / Gigaom:

No, Nick Denton is not buying Business Insider — but he admits that he has thought about it — The idea of of Nick Denton's Gawker network merging or acquiring Henry Blodget's Business Insider site came up recently after the two were seen having breakfast at Balthazar's restaurant in New York …

Discussion: @johnjcook

Kara Bloomgarden-Smoke / The New York Observer:
Nick Denton Denies Rumor of Gawker And Business Insider Merger

Discussion: The Wrap, @jeffjohnroberts, @johnjcook, @moorehn and @stevekovach

Dylan Love / Business Insider: Gawker Chief Nick Denton Says He Has A Cure For Internet Trolls

Jack Shafer:

Your ‘exclusive’ interview isn't — The journalistic lexicon abounds with terms designed to keep reporters' and editors' egos as plump, firm and purple as a ripe eggplant. If a dowdy news account needs dressing up, they rush to wardrobe to wrap it in the “special report” designation.

Discussion: @joepompeo, @ckrewson, @johnjharwood, @blucaller, @jeffreygoldberg, @matylda and @yesevamoore

Erik Wemple:

Another CBS News story comes under attack — There may never be a more classic line in the pantheon of empty boasts by competitive news organizations. On Monday night, CBS News reporter Sharyl Attkisson came up with what looked like a significant story: “Memo warned of “limitless” …

Discussion: @tvmojoe, Talking Points Memo, @joshdorner, @steveweinstein, @dariverzkind, @jayrosen_nyu, Mediaite, Post Politics, @simonmaloy, @dangillmor and The Daily Caller

Nancy A. Youssef / McClatchy Washington Bureau:

Questions about ‘60 Minutes’ Benghazi story go beyond Dylan Davies interview; CBS conducting ‘journalistic review’ — McClatchy Foreign StaffNovember 13, 2013 Updated 60 minutes ago — Facebook Twitter Google Plus Reddit E-mail Print — CAIRO — When “60 Minutes,” …

Discussion: New York Times, Variety, @mlcalderone, @jayrosen_nyu, emptywheel, NPR, @nancyayoussef, @huffpostmedia, @peterfhart and Pressing Issues

Erik Wemple:

Hey, what about Politico's ‘brain drain’? — Politico last night warned of a “brain drain” at the New York Times: “In the past nine months, at least a dozen top reporters and editors have made for the exits.” — The perils of doing media coverage for Politico!

Discussion: Gawker, Politico and @dylanbyers

Joe Pompeo / Capital New York:

‘Times’ ad exec announces ‘full native advertising platform,’ coming soon — The New York Times will launch a “full native advertising platform” in the next two to three months. — Meredith Kopit Levien, the Times' exec vice president of advertising, made the announcement during …

Discussion: AdAge, FishbowlNY and @jeffjarvis

Chris Roush / Talking Biz News:

Pulitzer winner Bennett leaving Bloomberg — Amanda Bennett, former executive editor for projects and investigations at Bloomberg News, is leaving the news organization. — She had been editor at large for several months after Bob Blau took over the projects and investigations team this summer.

Discussion: JIMROMENESKO.COM

Margaret Sullivan / The Public Editor's Journal:

Roundup: Staff Departures, an ‘Incorrect Promise’ and More — Here's a roundup of items from all over that may be interesting to Times readers and to the readers of this blog: — 1. The Great Exodus? Several news sites, including The Huffington Post and The Daily Beast …

Discussion: Politico, @tadfriend, @derekwillis, Mediaite, Firedoglake, The Daily Caller, @xor, @jamesrbuk and @jeffjarvis

Caroline O'Donovan / Nieman Journalism Lab:

Who's giving (and getting) that nonprofit money? Some data on grantmaking to media orgs — A new report on grantmaking in media, executed by the Foundation Center with the support of the Knight Foundation and the Wyncote Foundation, aims to answer a basic question: Who in media philanthropy is giving money to whom?

Discussion: @txtianmiller

Ryan Lawler / TechCrunch:

Lonely Planet Acquires Mobile Travel App TouristEye — Earlier this year, we wrote about TouristEye, a mobile app for planning trips and discovering new things to do while traveling. Today the startup is announcing that it has been acquired by travel heavyweight Lonely Planet …

Lindsey Hilsum / Channel 4 News:

War and journalists: why do we go? — The following is the text of a speech I gave on 12 November 2013 at St Bride's, the journalists' church on Fleet Street, during a service to commemorate the media in troubled times: — On August 21st I, like everyone else here, woke up to news of an attack in the suburbs of Damascus.

Discussion: @fieldproducer

Michael Rondon / FOLIO:

The Hollywood Reporter Breaks Out New Style Vertical — Pret-a-Reporter to feature contextualized ecommerce integration. — The Hollywood Reporter has been aggressively expanding its product portfolio over the last eight months. The group launched tech and indie channels in the spring …

Discussion: Hollywood Reporter, Racked National and Capital New York

Paul Mozur / Wall Street Journal:

China's Baidu Faces Suits Over Video Piracy — Online-Video and Film Companies Seek $50 Million From Internet-Search Firm — BEIJING—A group of Chinese media companies accused Baidu Inc. of piracy, filing litigation that signals the maturation of an online-video industry where illegal copying once was rampant.

Discussion: Bloomberg, ValueWalk, UPI, InsideCounsel, PR Newswire, Xinhua News Agency, Hollywood Reporter, Deadline.com, The Verge and Reuters

Bronwen Clune / Guardian:

So Twitter is ruining journalism? Really? — The Australian newspaper published an editorial referring to journalists using Twitter as a ‘path to ruin’. It couldn't be more wrong — There is no quicker way for old institutions to look irrelevant than to insist on their relevance.

Discussion: The Drum, @jimbarrett and TheAustralian

Matt Waite / Nieman Journalism Lab:

What new FAA plans will mean to the future of drone journalism — Editor's note: If you've been at a journalism conference over the past year — or stood near the right Midwestern riverbed at the right time— you've probably heard about drone journalism. That's the idea that small unmanned …

Nick Turner / Bloomberg:

Scripps Howard News Service Will Cease Operation After 96 Years — E.W. Scripps Co. (SSP:US)'s Scripps Howard News Service, which fed syndicated stories to papers across the U.S. since World War I, plans to shut down, becoming the latest symbol of readers' shift away from print media.

Discussion: @sfnick, Big News Network.com, E.W Scripps Company and JIMROMENESKO.COM

Johana Bhuiyan / Capital New York:

Guardian writer and number-cruncher Harry Enten goes to work for Nate Silver — Guardian writer and self-described number-cruncher Harry Enten is the latest to join Nate Silver's growing 538 franchise at ESPN. — He joins Carl Bialik, who is still writing a sports column for The Wall Street Journal …

Discussion: @forecasterenten

Nieman Journalism Lab:

Why so serious? Maybe because data shows news stories can get shared just as often as lighter fare — Editor's note: Our friends at NPR Digital Services, Eric Athas and Teresa Gorman, crunched the numbers on how public radio stories were shared on Facebook and found some encouraging results.

Discussion: @toddmundt

Michael Sebastian / AdAge:

More Time Inc. Sites to Run Sponsored Posts Through Native-Ad Server — Sharethrough to Serve Ads on Real Simple and Health Magazines' Sites — Time Inc. is expanding its use of native-ad server Sharethrough to run some sponsored articles on its desktop and mobile websites, Sharethrough said Wednesday.

Discussion: AdExchanger

Jim Edwards / Business Insider:

Google Is Now Bigger Than Both The Magazine And Newspaper Industries — Google has become so big that sometimes it's difficult to understand just how big it is. It's on course to do $60 billion in revenue this year, almost all of that from advertising. But how big is that in terms of the media it competes against for ad dollars?

Discussion: Digiday, Forbes, Big News Network.com, Kirk LaPointe's …, The New York Observer and BGR