Mediagazer: Murdoch's hard-paywall success (Ryan Chittum/Columbia Journalism Review)

7:40 PM ET, February 19, 2014

Top News:

FCC plans to issue new net neutrality rules. — The Federal Communications Commission said Wednesday that it will craft new rules to prevent Internet service providers from charging companies like Netflix or Google a toll to reach consumers at the highest speeds.

Discussion: FCC.gov, Variety, Home Media Magazine, New York Times, The Breakdown, @digitalsista, BGR, PandoDaily, Free Press Blog, @pkafka, TIME, Mother Jones and AllAccess.com

Amy Schatz / Re/code:

Net Neutrality Rules Are Out: New Twist on Old Proposal — Federal Communications Commission Chairman Tom Wheeler is launching a new effort to craft net neutrality rules, agency officials said Wednesday, basically proposing a do-over under a different part of the law.

Discussion: TechCrunch, VentureBeat, The Verge, Techdirt, Computerworld, @amy_schatz, @karaswisher and @mikeisaac

Timothy B. Lee / The Switch:
White House says it backs FCC in efforts to protect network neutrality

Discussion: White House.gov Blog, NYT Bits, TheHill, Computerworld, Broadcasting & Cable and CNET

Ted Johnson / Variety:

Utah Federal Judge Halts Aereo in Salt Lake City and Denver — A federal judge in Utah has imposed a preliminary injunction on Aereo's operations, a win for broadcasters as they seek to halt the startup streaming service in Salt Lake City and Denver. — “Based on the plain language …

Discussion: CNET, Adweek, Hollywood Reporter, Los Angeles Times, The Wrap, Bloomberg and @xpangler

Martin Evans / Telegraph:

Tony Blair offered to be unofficial adviser to Brooks and Murdoch over phone hacking scandal, court hears — In an hour-long phone conversation with Mrs Brooks the day after the News of the World was closed in July 2011, the former Prime Minister advised her to “tough up” telling her “it will pass”

Discussion: Guardian, @felixsalmon, Irish Independent, @emilybell, @dansabbagh, The Daily Beast, The Independent, @emilybell, @davidfolkenflik, The Dish, The Huffington Post, @callingengland, @theredrag and @aaronbastani

John Rentoul / The Independent:
Blair responds to Brooks email

Discussion: @johnrentoul and @dangillmor

Lisa O'Carroll / Guardian: Phone hacking jury is told of Rebekah Brooks' plan to stay with News Corp prior to resignation

Tim Peterson / AdAge:

Vice Goes Into Food Business With ‘American Idol’ Producer FremantleMedia — Site to Debut in Early April and Air Videos Online, on TV — In early April Vice will debut a yet-unnamed food vertical with “American Idol” producer FremantleMedia. The brash digital-media company also has a food-related ad network on its menu.

Discussion: The Wrap, Variety, Digital Spy, @adamclarkestes, broadcastnow.co.uk, thedrum.com, Digiday and Variety

Fred Vultee / ACES:
Vice should hire a copy editor and A/B test the value of copy editing for readers

Discussion: @andybechtel, @ebrenner, @lauren_kelley, @kellyhagen, @abrahamhyatt, @jbenton, abrahamhyatt.com, Poynter and JIMROMENESKO.COM

Marisa Guthrie / Hollywood Reporter:

HLN's Surprising New Slate: Game Shows, Viral Videos and a #FOMO App (Exclusive) — From left: Fred Seibert, Rob Barnett and Tom Lynch — The cable news network that is home to Nancy Grace undertakes a major rebrand. — A version of this story first appeared in the Feb. 28 issue of The Hollywood Reporter magazine.

Discussion: TVNewser, Deadline.com, Mediaite, Wired, @gobobbo, The Wrap, The Huffington Post and The Awl

Glenn Greenwald / The Intercept:

On the UK's Equating of Journalism With Terrorism — (updated below) — As my colleague Ryan Devereaux reports, a lower UK court this morning, as long expected, upheld the legality of the nine-hour detention of my partner, David Miranda, at Heathrow Airport last August …

Discussion: The Huffington Post, Firedoglake, @freedomofpress, Hit & Run, Freedom of the Press …, @trevortimm, thedrum.com, @intercept_this, @laughingstoic and @attackerman

Costas Pitas / Reuters:
British court quashes legal challenge by partner of Snowden leaks reporter

Discussion: The Intercept, Guardian, Guardian, BBC, The Daily Beast, @fleetstreetfox, Associated Press, The Verge, The Huffington Post, @article19org, Softpedia News, @colvinius, @paultowen and @davidleigh3

Jonathan Marino / The Deal Pipeline:

Fosun closes in on deal for Forbes; price short of $250M — When money management magazine and website Forbes Media LLC is sold, likely to Fosun International Ltd., the Chinese conglomerate that has taken the front-runner position in the company's auction, sources said …

Discussion: @hofrench, @joshsternberg and @jackshafer, Thanks:@jonmarino

Sara Morrison / Poynter:

Media is ‘failing women’ — sports journalism particularly so — The Women's Media Center released its third annual Status of Women in the U.S. Media report today, and if you've been paying any attention to gender imbalances across print, broadcast and online platforms, it's more of the same.

Discussion: Columbia Journalism Review, FishbowlNY, @atotalmonet, @martinrickman, @politicohen_ and The Huffington Post

Joshua Benton / Nieman Journalism Lab:

What to do when your video is winning social media, but it's a copy that's getting the clicks? — What should a news organization do when an unauthorized copy of video they produced is going viral on YouTube? — That's the question Dallas ABC affiliate WFAA faced when a commentary …

Discussion: @standupkid, The Texas Tribune Fellowships and Upworthy

Sarah Perez / TechCrunch:

LinkedIn Opens Its Publishing Platform To All Members — To date, LinkedIn has allowed a small, editorially selected group of “Influencers” like Richard Branson, Bill Gates and Barack Obama to publish their thoughts and advice to its network as long-form blog posts.

Discussion: blog.linkedin.com, NYT Bits, Gigaom, Gigaom, @danroth, @sap_jarret, Mashable, The Next Web and mUmBRELLA

Alan D. Mutter / Editor and Publisher:

Newsosaur: Big Data Zeros in on Ad Inefficiency — John Wanamaker, the innovative Philadelphia merchant who pioneered the modern department store in the Gilded Age, was such a fan of newspapers that he is credited with buying the first full-page ad. — But even Wanamaker knew …

Andrew Beaujon / Poynter:

1 journalist dead, many injured in Ukraine violence — Vyacheslav Veremyi was “dragged out of his taxi by unknown assailants” in Kiev early Wednesday morning, Reporters Without Borders reports. The reporter for Ukrainian newspaper Vesti “was violently beaten up, and according to witness accounts …

Discussion: Reporters Without Borders, Kirk LaPointe's …, GlobalPost, @freedomofpress, The Huffington Post and The Newspaper Guild

Dominic Ponsford / Press Gazette:

Journalists seeking accreditation for Brit Awards asked to agree coverage of sponsor Mastercard — The organisers of tonight's Brit Awards for pop music appear to be asking journalists to guarantee coverage of sponsor MasterCard as the price of attending. — Before providing journalists …

Discussion: Guardian, The Drum, @kevinmitchell50, @arunsudhaman, The Independent, @pressgazette and @davidefraser

Josh Feldman / Mediaite:

CNN Reporter: Venezuelan Cops Confiscated Our Equipment at Gunpoint — Kiev isn't the only part of the world protesting this week, protestors in Venezuela have been standing up against the government of President Nicolas Maduro. Since protests began in Venezuela, there have been five fatalities …

Discussion: TVNewser, CNN, The Huffington Post and Hot Air

Ben Sisario / New York Times:

Warner in Deal to Sign Acts Found on Shazam — In the good old days of digital music — say, five or six years ago — high-tech talent scouting by record labels meant trawling MySpace for hot new bands. Labels still hunt for acts online, but the pools of data they consult have become much more vast …

Discussion: Music Week, AllAccess.com, Mobile Entertainment Feed, BroadwayWorld.com, hypebot, The Next Web, @sisario and @wiesenthal

Janko Roettgers / Gigaom:

Ustream launches nonprofit program to support citizen journalism in Ukraine and beyond — As demonstrations in Kiev descended into chaos Tuesday, some of the most striking pictures came from citizen journalists. Part of that is dedication — live streamers like Ukrstream.tv and Spilno.tv …

Discussion: BroadwayWorld.com, Streaming Media, Engadget and GlobalPost

Ryan Chittum / Columbia Journalism Review:

Murdoch's hard-paywall success — I've criticized Rupert Murdoch for his hard-paywall strategy at The Times of London, arguing that a metered model a la the Financial Times or New York Times would be the much better option. — I still think The Times should move to a meter …

Matthew J.X. Malady / The Awl:

How To Bust Out Of Blogging Into The Magical World Of Television — People drop things on the Internet and run all the time. So we have to ask. In this edition, writer Cord Jefferson tells us more about his new job. … Cord! So what happened here? — In mid-January I got a call saying …

Discussion: @matthewjxmalady, @cordjefferson, @annfriedman, @heavenrants and @michelledean

Christoph Koettl / Mediashift:

‘The YouTube War’: Citizen Videos Revolutionize Human Rights Monitoring in Syria — When I started working on human rights crises seven years ago, a promising and groundbreaking way to monitor violations were satellite images. The idea seemed simple enough: a single sensor in space taking pictures …

Jesse Hicks / The Verge:

How Wikipedia's robots and cyborgs snuff out vandalism — How Wikipedia's robots and cyborgs snuff out vandalism — At midnight on February 13th, 2014, a Wikipedia user named Lightningawesome added to the list of My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic characters a lengthy biography of Lightning Dash …