Mediagazer: Gawker creates a new writer pipeline with “Recruits” (Justin Ellis/Nieman Journalism Lab)

6:50 PM ET, February 11, 2014

Top News:

Adam Weinstein / Gawker:

Business Insider Changed its Story on Buzzfeed — Yesterday, Business Insider chief correspondent Nicholas Carlson stuck a subtle shiv into his competitors at Buzzfeed, attributing the site's success in exploiting Facebook's ever-evolving newsfeed algorithm to its practice of buying traffic …

Nicholas Carlson / Business Insider:

Buzzfeed CEO: Here's Why Facebook Isn't Crushing Us — In December, Facebook changed its News Feed algorithm to favor more “high quality” news over “memes.” — Looking at a bunch of charts yesterday, we found this change correlated with a sudden and massive drop in traffic to Upworthy and several viral news sites.

Discussion: @timherrera, @newswhip, @mims, @niemanlab, @dskok, WebProNews, @moneyries, Mediawire Daily and Business Insider

Dominic Rushe / Guardian:

Bing censoring Chinese language search results for users in the US — English and Chinese language queries for terms like ‘Dalai Lama’ return radically different results on Microsoft search engine — Microsoft's search engine Bing appears to be censoring information for Chinese language users …

Discussion: Quartz

Michael Sebastian / AdAge:

Bloomberg Media CEO Justin Smith: Expect Splashier Storytelling on Bloomberg TV — Appeal to Broader Business Audience Also Likely — Justin Smith, CEO of Bloomberg Media Group, is slated to wrap up a 100-day review of the company in the coming weeks, when he is expected to offer recommendations …

Discussion: TVNewser, @counternotions, FishbowlNY, @justin_b_smith, Mediawire Daily, Talking Biz News and Capital New York

Michael Melia / Associated Press:

Drones Create New Ethical Minefields For Journalists — HARTFORD, Conn. (AP) — As police responded to a deadly car crash, they noticed an increasingly familiar sight: a remote-controlled aircraft, equipped with a video camera, hovering over the wreckage. — The Federal Aviation Administration …

Matt Waite / Drone Journalism Lab: Drones, journalism, the FAA and the crackdown that isn't a crackdown

Alex Kantrowitz / AdAge:

Mozilla To Sell Ads In Firefox Web Browser — Mozilla Will Serve Ads Within Tiles Of Its New Tab Pages — Mozilla will soon sell ads within its Firefox browser, the company announced Tuesday. — Wait, what? Mozilla made itself the villian of the online ad business early last year …

Discussion: Advancing Content, ZDNet, Consumerist, Mashable, Marketing Pilgrim and mUmBRELLA

Jordan Chariton / TVNewser:

Carl Bernstein Joins CNN as a Contributor — CNN's political additions continue with legendary Watergate reporter Carl Bernstein joining as a contributor, substitute anchor John Berman announced on “AC360″ last night. — Bernstein was an analyst for CNN during the 2008 election season …

Discussion: FishbowlNY, The Huffington Post and FishbowlDC

Michael Rondon / Folio:

Time Warner, Condé Nast Invest in Ad Tech Co. — Programmatic direct firm, iSocket, looking to expand partnerships. — Time Warner, parent (for now) of Time Inc., and Condé Nast have joined in on in a $5 million round of funding for programmatic ad developer, iSocket, the firm announced Monday.

Justin Ellis / Nieman Journalism Lab:

Gawker creates a new writer pipeline with “Recruits” — The path to enter the journalism business is changing. Some media companies are abandoning unpaid internships; others are terming them reporting fellowships. — Enter Gawker, which is adding a new metaphor to the game by creating a new “Recruits” program.

Discussion: joel.kinja.com

Aaron Taube / Business Insider:

Slate Hires NPR Sports Reporter To Boost Its Podcast Business — The online magazine Slate will bolster its roster of popular podcasts with a daily current events commentary show hosted by National Public Radio sports correspondent Mike Pesca, a spokesperson for the site told Business Insider.

Discussion: JIMROMENESKO.COM, @timothynoah1, @kaysteiger and @josh_levin

Peter Kafka / Re/code:

Netflix Says Verizon Isn't Slowing Down Its Streams — A federal court may have given the pipe guys clearance to start slowing down Web services like Netflix. — But so far, that's not happening, Netflix says. — That update comes to us via a note from J.P. Morgan analyst Doug Anmuth …

Discussion: Ars Technica, Techdirt, @ceciliakang, Consumerist, PandoDaily and The Verge

Guardian:

AP launches investigation after finding images of Fidel Castro were digitally manipulated — Ear one minute, gone the next: Fidel Castro's hearing aid Photoshopped out — The Guardian has been a vocal proponent of, and active adherent to, the ideals of the open web.

Discussion: Daily Mail, UK - The Huffington Post, The Voice of Russia, News, iMediaEthics, The Independent, NBC News, Gizmodo and Associated Press

David Sirota / PandoDaily:

Old media outlets collude with politicians to protect monopoly, punish media startups — Here's some good recent news for free-speech advocates: A federal court recently ruled that bloggers, online journalists and the public at large enjoy the same protections as legacy news outlets do when facing defamation lawsuits.

Discussion: Free Press Blog, @davidsirota, @mathewi, @digiphile and @jayrosen_nyu

Lucia Moses / Adweek:

Capital NY Tweaks Prices Ahead of Paywall — Capital New York has tweaked its pricing as it prepares to start charging for e-newsletters and news coverage today (Feb. 11), making it the latest startup to test consumers' willingness pay for news. — The experiment will no doubt be closely watched …

Discussion: @jayrosen_nyu