Mediagazer: Fox News' Roger Ailes Biographer Gabriel Sherman Rebuts Criticism of Sourcing, Defends Reporting (L.A. Ross/The Wrap)

2:25 PM ET, January 28, 2014

Top News:

Mark Sweney / Guardian:

Sue Douglas leaves Trinity Mirror as People.co.uk closes — Company says Sunday People's first dedicated seven-day digital version did not hit expected traffic targets — Sue Douglas, hired seven months ago to take charge of Trinity Mirror's Sunday People, is leaving the company …

Discussion: @buzzfeedben, @marksweney and @flashboy

Brent Lang / The Wrap:

Comcast Earnings: Profits Up 28 Percent Thanks to Broadcasting, Theme Parks — Comcast's profits spiked 28.6 percent during the cable giant's fourth quarter thanks to its resurgent primetime broadcast line-up and higher attendance at its Universal Studios theme parks.

Discussion: Radio & Television …, Bloomberg, @timkarr, Los Angeles Times and CNBC

Georg Szalai / Hollywood Reporter:
Comcast CEO: NBC Turnaround Is Happening ‘Faster’ Than Anticipated

Discussion: Hollywood Reporter

Nate Silver / FiveThirtyEight:

Nate Silver has hired 15 journalists for FiveThirtyEight and plans relaunch “early this year” — Status Update: Building FiveThirtyEight — We're continuing to build our team of journalists at FiveThirtyEight as we prepare for re-launch with our partners at ESPN and ABC News early this year.

Discussion: Mashable, @jayrosen_nyu, @prof_bearb, @nycjim, @mikepetroff, @brianstelter, @burger, @dansinker and The Next Web

Alexandra Steigrad / WWD:

More Layoffs to Hit Time Inc. — TIME TO GO?: Time Inc. staffers are bracing for layoffs, which could come as early as next week, WWD has learned. — Word of the job cuts came last month, when Time Inc. chief executive officer Joe Ripp told employees during a quarterly corporate meeting …

Discussion: Mediawire Daily and FishbowlNY

Peter Kafka / Re/code:

Inside's News Is Longer Than Twitter, Shorter Than Business Insider and Jason Calacanis Says You'll Love It — It's 2014. Do we need another service that summarizes news other people have written? — Yes, says Jason Calacanis. And because Jason Calacanis is a very persuasive pitchman …

Discussion: The Verge, Capital New York, WebProNews, @antderosa, @digidave, @pkafka, Business Insider and @danielfletcher

Mathew Ingram / Gigaom:
Jason Calacanis launches Inside, a mobile news-curation app powered by humans

Discussion: TechCrunch, CNET, INSIDE, @jason, @mickhagen, @mathewi, @peterc and The Next Web

Mike Isaac / Re/code:

Medium, Evan Williams' Post-Twitter Media Startup, Raises $25 Million Round — Medium is about to become large. — The collaborative publishing startup has just closed a $25 million round of financing, the company confirmed, marking its first major funding raise since it launched a little more than a year ago.

William Launder / Wall Street Journal:

News Websites Proliferate, Stretching Thin Ad Dollars — Many Generate Revenue by Hosting Conferences — Big profits in online news may be as scarce as buried gold but that isn't deterring journalists and investors from rushing into the sector. — In the past few months …

Discussion: @edwardroussel, @jessmarmor, @sarahneedleman, @bryfitz, @garciaruize, @jenniferpreston, @lheron, @aburnspolitico, @evanasmith, @mattyglesias and @jbenton

Jack Shafer:

The limits of Ezra Klein's star power — No greater act of press criticism exists than to launch your own publication. Starting anew allows a journalist to leave the cracked glass, dents and rust of the old behind, to reject the past and all its mistakes and compromises, and to show by example how the work should be done.

Discussion: The New Yorker Blog, Mediaite, FishbowlNY, The Daily Caller, @gabrielsnyder, @binarybits, @dankennedy_nu, @brianstelter, @johnjcook, @jpheasly, @jaredbkeller, @ravisomaiya, @michaelroston, @jayrosen_nyu, @carr2n, Politico, Columbia Journalism Review and Twitchy

Tim Peterson / AdAge:
Vox Media CEO Jim Bankoff on Ezra Klein's Plan to Re-Imagine the News

Discussion: Gigaom, Felix Salmon, FishbowlNY, @darrenheitner, VentureBeat and The Corsair

Kristen Hare / Poynter:

YouTube, news sites will livestream the State of the Union — YouTube will livestream President Obama's State of the Union address at 9 p.m. eastern, according to a press release from YouTube, “followed by the Republican response by Representative Cathy McMorris Rodgers on Speaker Boehner's channel.

Discussion: Yahoo News, Capital New York, New Yorker, The Verge, Featured stories and Washington Post

Liana B. Baker / Reuters:

Comcast in talks to license technology to Cox -sources — (Reuters) - Comcast Corp, the No. 1 U.S. cable operator, is in advanced discussions about licensing its “X1” video operating system to Cox Communications, the third-largest cable operator, according to people familiar with the matter.

Discussion: CNET

Roger Yu / USA Today:

Battle of the brands: A newspaper war in New Orleans — Local Times-Picayune fights to fend off an invasion by Baton Rouge's Advocate in New Orleans. — NEW ORLEANS - The pirate flag hanging in the New Orleans Advocate's office in downtown is something of an inside joke …

Lucas Shaw / The Wrap:

Gawker Fires Back at Quentin Tarantino: We Didn't Leak Your Script — Gawker rejected Quentin Tarantino's claims that it leaked a copy of his latest script, “The Hateful Eight,” in a post by editor-in-chief John Cook. Cook wrote the piece after Tarantino's lawyer Marty Singer filed suit …

Discussion: Gawker, Mediaite, Pocket-lint and Hollywood Reporter

Janko Roettgers / Gigaom:

GetGlue becomes tvtag, focuses on curated TV moments — Remember GetGlue? The social TV pioneer got bought by Utah-based social TV startup i.TV late last year, and now, GetGlue's user base is being transitioned to a new app dubbed tvtag that takes some elements of the original and combines …

Discussion: VentureBeat, TechRadar.com, @trevordoerksen, Digital Trends, Digital TV Europe, Lost Remote, The Next Web and App Advice

Michael Calderone / The Huffington Post:

How Russia Is Censoring Reporting On Sochi Olympics Controversies — NEW YORK - Corruption. Environmental damage. Forced evictions. Exploitation of migrant workers. — Journalists would be expected to dive headfirst into such headline-grabbing allegations, especially when tied …

Discussion: Poynter, Committee to Protect …, The Daily Beast and Forbes

Johana Bhuiyan / Capital New York:

Mashable expands into climate reporting — Andrew Freedman, most recently a senior science writer for Climate Central, will be Mashable's first climate, weather and environment reporter, the site said Tuesday. — Mashable chief content officer and executive editor Jim Roberts told Capital …

Discussion: @mashable

Roy Greenslade / Guardian:

Daily Telegraph publishes advert attacking ‘pro-gay’ Times columnist Libby Purves — Update 12.30pm: The Daily Telegraph is carrying a bizarre advert today criticising The Times's columnist Libby Purves. It is in the form of an open letter signed by Demetri Marchessini, a Greek-born businessman and author.

Discussion: @garylineker and @lecanardnoir

Lucia Moses / Adweek:

Business Insider investing in paid content, expanding BI Intelligence unit — Business Insider Has Ambitious Paid Content Plans — Business Insider is known for its clicky mix of business and gossip content, delivered in the form of rapid-fire posts, slideshows and videos.

Discussion: @lmoses

Michael Depp / NetNewsCheck Latest:

NPR Eyes More Personalized Digital Platform — Public radio network NPR is developing a new app aimed at fostering a more seamless listening experience between devices that employs geotargeting and algorithms to better integrate local content and play to users' taste, as well as features DVR-like time-shifting.