Mediagazer: Gracenote unveils new Internet radio technology (Dawn C. Chmielewski/Los Angeles Times)

4:25 PM ET, January 3, 2014

Top News:

Neetzan Zimmerman to leave Gawker — Gawker viral content mastermind Neetzan Zimmerman is leaving the company, according to editor John Cook who tweeted the news on Friday afternoon. — Reached by email, Zimmerman confirmed that he was leaving but declined to give further details.

Discussion: Business Insider, @fmanjoo, @thestalwart, @tmcgev, @mbradylynch and @sfiegerman

John Cook / @johnjcook:

sad to say @neetzan is hanging up his viral guns for a start-up. if ur obsessed with winning the internet, plz inquire w/in. john at gawker.

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: @caseynewton, @reuters, Mother Jones, @obsoletedogma, @bendwilliams and The FJP

Alexis C. Madrigal / The Atlantic Online:
How Netflix uses the 76,897 micro-genres it assigns to videos

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

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, Taking Note, WebProNews, The Huffington Post and Techdirt

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

Discussion: CNN, CNET, TheBlaze.com and The Public Editor's Journal

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

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

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, AndroidHeadlines.com, TechnoBuffalo, SlashGear, @peterlattman, Softpedia News, Cult of Mac, Geeky Gadgets, Engadget, Gizmodo and Electronista

Dawn C. Chmielewski / Los Angeles Times:

Gracenote unveils new Internet radio technology — Gracenote unveiled a new Internet radio technology that will allow brands to create custom stations for customers. (Gracenote) — Gracenote, a Silicon Valley company whose name-that-tune technology is the backbone of some of the most …

Discussion: Gigaom, Music Ally, PR Newswire, Speakeasy, The Next Web, hypebot, Re/code and VentureBeat

Edmund Lee / Bloomberg:

Discovery CEO Stands to Make $110 Million in 2014 Compensation — Discovery Communications Inc. (DISCA) Chief Executive Officer David Zaslav stands to make more than $110 million in compensation in 2014, the first year of a new contract that keeps him at the cable-network giant through 2019.

Discussion: Adweek, Los Angeles Times, PR Newswire, bizjournals, Wall Street Journal, Broadcasting & Cable, Deadline.com, Variety and @bloombergtech

Katie Roof / Fox Business:

Business Insider Turned Down $100M-Plus Buyout Offer: Source — BusinessInsider.com, an edgy financial and technology news website, may not technically be shopping itself, but that hasn't stopped potential suitors from calling, including one that recently offered more than $100 million …

Discussion: @stefanjbecket, @pablor0bles and @ckrewson

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

Christina Bonnington / Wired:

Vine Sprouts Its 6-Second Mayhem on the Web — Vine, Twitter's looping 6-second video app, is making the leap from mobile to the webtoday. — Unlike some mobile services like Instagram, Vine's web existence isn't just a pretty way to view your Vines in a browser.

Discussion: TechCrunch, The Verge and AppNewser

Eriq Gardner / Hollywood Reporter:

Record Companies' Lawsuit Against Vimeo Heads Towards Appellate Showdown — If the 2nd Circuit agrees to hear this copyright dispute, it could impact how employees of UGC sites interact with videos and whether popular websites carry pre-1972 music. — Barry Diller

Discussion: Gigaom, Plagiarism Today and The Wrap

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.