Mediagazer: The Times advances the NSA's amnesty-for-Snowden trial balloon (Jack Shafer)

12:40 PM ET, January 3, 2014

Top News:

Ravi Somaiya / New York Times:

Ezra Klein Is Said to Plan to Leave Washington Post — Ezra Klein, an analyst, columnist and television commentator who runs The Washington Post's Wonkblog, is making plans to leave the newspaper after failing to win support for a new website he wanted to create within the company …

Jack Shafer:

The Times advances the NSA's amnesty-for-Snowden trial balloon — Of course the New York Times editorial page wants clemency or, at the very least, a generous plea bargain for National Security Agency contractor turned super-leaker Edward Snowden! The news pages of the New York Times …

Discussion: Guy Fawkes' blog, The Dish, BuzzFeed, @saletan, WebProNews, VentureBeat, The Daily Caller and The Switch

Kevin Gosztola / The Dissenter:
Dear New York Times Editors: If Snowden Is a Whistleblower, What Is Chelsea Manning?

Discussion: CNN, TheBlaze.com and The Daily Caller

Kalev Leetaru / Foreign Policy: King Snowden and the Fall of Wikileaks

Margaret Sullivan / The Public Editor's Journal:
Weeks in the Making, an Editorial on Snowden May Go ‘Beyond What Is Realistic’

Alexis C. Madrigal / The Atlantic Online:

How Netflix uses the 76,897 micro-genres it assigns to videos — How Netflix Reverse Engineered Hollywood — If you use Netflix, you've probably wondered about the specific genres that it suggests to you. Some of them just seem so specific that it's absurd. Emotional Fight-the-System Documentaries?

Discussion: Daily Dot, @manovich, @npetit, @sriramk, @davidbauer, @errorjustin, @andywhitlock, @kesabeth, @alexismadrigal, @alexismadrigal, @alexismadrigal, Subtraction.com, @mollyesque, @harrisj, /Film, Deadline.com, WebProNews, The Verge and Gizmodo

Felix Salmon / Reuters:

Netflix's dumbed-down algorithms — Alexis Madrigal has a rollicking investigation into Netflix's movie genres — all 76,897 of them, from category #1 (African-American Crime Documentaries) to category #91,307 (Visually Striking Latin American Comedies). His story is titled …

Discussion: @reuters and @obsoletedogma

Brooks Barnes / New York Times:

DreamWorks is set to launch a tablet for children with original and exclusive programming — A Tablet for Children That Comes With Its Own Penguins — GLENDALE, Calif. — DreamWorks Animation first captivated children in movie theaters. Then it branched into TV, piping cartoons based on hits like …

Discussion: The Verge, VatorNews, TechnoBuffalo, Softpedia News, AndroidHeadlines.com, Gizmodo, SlashGear, @peterlattman, Cult of Mac, Geeky Gadgets, Engadget and Electronista

Press Gazette:

Pakistani TV reporter becomes first journalist killed in 2014 — Pakistan journalist Shan Odhor has become the first media worker to die in 2014 because of his work, the International federation of Journalists (IFJ) said today. — The announcement came just days after the organisation reported …

Discussion: IFJ.org, The Eastern Tribune, The Drum, kuna.net.kw and The Express Tribune

Peter Wilby / New Statesman:

Paul Dacre of the Daily Mail: The man who hates liberal Britain — He's the most successful and most feared newspaperman of his generation. But after a bad year in which he was forced to defend his methods, how much longer can Dacre survive as editor-in-chief of the Daily Mail?

Discussion: Boing Boing, @ruskin147, @mrianleslie and @thebrowser

Joe Pompeo / Capital New York:

Daily News closes Desi News, a South Asian-centric vertical led by NewsCred — Daily News shutters South Asian site — The Daily News has pulled the plug on Desi News, a South Asian-centric vertical fueled by the New York-based content-licensing platform NewsCred.

Tamer El-Ghobashy / Middle East Real Time:

Cautious Campaign for Egypt Journalist's Release — The family and lawyer of an Al Jazeera English journalist detained on terrorism charges in Egypt have mounted a delicate media campaign for his release, underscoring the deep unpopularity of the news channel that is seen as sympathetic to the outlawed Muslim Brotherhood.

Discussion: @tamerelg

Wall Street Journal:

Cox to Buy Back Stake in AutoTrader — Deal With Providence Equity Implies $7 Billion Value for Online Car Marketplace … Cox Enterprises Inc., the closely held media conglomerate, has bought back a stake in AutoTrader Group Inc. in a deal that implies a value of about $7 billion for the online auto marketplace.

Discussion: Atlanta Journal-Constitution, NetNewsCheck Latest and PR Newswire

David Oliver / American Journalism Review:

BuzzFeed's Secret Weapon: Ky Harlin — Ky Harlin, BuzzFeed's director of data science, runs simple tests on news stories, with extraordinary results. — For “The 35 Best Places to Visit Over the Summer,” one reader might see a picture of Paris. Another sees a picture of Tokyo.

Discussion: @amjourreview

Marc Graser / Variety:

Verance Finds First Electronics Partner for Anti-Piracy Technology — Verance's Cinavia Level 3 software detects pirated pics and sends viewers to e-tailers to buy legal copies — Funai Electric Co., the maker of Blu-ray players through the Funai, Magnavox and Emerson brands …

Discussion: Myce.com

Angela Watercutter / Wired:

The Most Pirated Movies of 2013 — And Why Piracy Isn't Hurting the Box Office — The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey finished 2013 — a year where it earned over $300 million domestically at the box office — by being named the no. 1 most torrented movie of the last 12 months.

Discussion: Forbes, Softpedia News and The Week