Mediagazer: John Carney leaving CNBC for Wall Street Journal's “Heard on the Street” (Chris Roush/Talking Biz News)

2:36 PM ET, February 1, 2014

Top News:

Craig Silverman / Poynter:

In Pennsylvania and Alaska, a publisher takes infringement to another level — Near the end of last year, a small publishing company made a big bet: it purchased a a group of 19 regional papers servicing remote areas of Alaska. The purchase included a printing plant, but the plan …

Discussion: @poynter, @craigsilverman and Toronto Star

Erik Wemple:

Omidyar news venture: Where's the leadership? — In November, First Look Media, the startup general-interest news project bankrolled by eBay founder Pierre Omidyar, announced it had hired former Rolling Stone Executive Editor Eric Bates. The announcement carried some trademark features of a job memo …

Discussion: @nbj914, @jayrosen_nyu, @janinegibson and @carloslozadawp

Chris Roush / Talking Biz News:

John Carney leaving CNBC for Wall Street Journal's “Heard on the Street” — Carney leaving CNBC for WSJ's “Heard on the Street” — Liam Denning, co-deputy editor of The Wall Street Journal “Heard on the Street” feature, sent out the following staff hire on Friday:

Discussion: @carney, @miriamgottfried and Business Insider, Thanks:@talkingbiznews

Margaret Sullivan / The Public Editor's Journal:

Giving Credit: A Work in Progress at The Times — Curtis Tate, a reporter for McClatchy News's Washington bureau, spent a recent weekend generating spreadsheets from a data base on hazardous materials for his story on the increasing amount of crude oil spilled in rail accidents.

Discussion: @kateaurthur, @normative, @bartongellman, @jimasher, @mlcalderone, @buzzfeedben, @mathewi and @fmanjoo

Jonathan Bill / Plugged India LLC:

Pricing Piracy Out Of India Film and Music — The grey market for content in India has never been healthier - burgeoning middle class income and lower priced tv's and mobile / mp3 are driving it upwards. On the supply side, mass digital storage means proliferation of pirated content and sellers is unencumbered.

Owen Bowcott / Guardian:

Secret hearings could allow police to seize journalists' notes if bill passes — Requests for notebooks and files must currently be made in open court - but clause in deregulation bill could change that — The seizure of journalists' notebooks, photographs and digital files could be conducted …

Discussion: @glynmoody and @dangillmor

Joe Pompeo / Capital New York:

The Daily Mail will join Buzzfeed, the Guardian and Business Insider in expansion to Australia — Why is everybody opening up shop in Australia now? — A growing number of American and British news outlets are setting up shop in Australia, where the newspapers and broadcast outlets …

Discussion: Nieman Journalism Lab

Reuters:

Canada strips former publisher Conrad Black of honors — Canada has canceled two prestigious honors for Conrad Black, who once ran a newspaper empire stretching from the Chicago Sun-Times to Britain's Daily Telegraph and the Jerusalem Post but who ended up in U.S. prison for fraud.

Jon Brodkin / Ars Technica:

Who wants competition? Big cable tries outlawing municipal broadband in Kansas — Lobbyist for Comcast, Cox, TWC wrote bill to stifle rivals like Google Fiber. — Legislation introduced in the Kansas state legislature by a lobby for cable companies would make it almost impossible …

Discussion: @lexalexander, WebProNews, DSLreports and Boing Boing

Jack Shafer:

Dear Obama, spare us the press-freedom lecturing — Wearing his best straight face, White House Press Secretary Jay Carney lectured China on press freedom yesterday. In a redundant official statement, he accused Beijing of restricting “the ability of journalists to do their work” and “imped[ing] their ability to do their jobs.”

Discussion: CNNMoney.com and Guardian

Rebecca J. Rosen / The Atlantic Online:

Forgotify: The Tool for Discovering Spotify's 4 Million Unheard Tracks — The idea first came to Lane Jordan when he heard an odd little fact: Around 20 percent of tracks on Spotify—some four million songs—had been played exactly zero times. — Four million songs! That got Jordan thinking.

Discussion: BetaNews, Adverblog and Wired.co.uk

Chris Welch / The Verge:

President Obama pledges he ‘will continue to support’ net neutrality — During his latest Google+ Hangouts session today, President Obama provided his most direct response yet to the recent court ruling that dealt a major blow to net neutrality. On the topic of net neutrality itself …

Discussion: Associated Press and Ars Technica