Mediagazer: Rebekah Brooks 'not aware of hacker's contract while she was NoW editor' (Guardian)

9:25 AM ET, February 21, 2014

Top News:

Rebekah Brooks paid £1,000,000 for David Beckham's autobiography, court told — Rebekah Brooks paid £1,000,000 to buy up David Beckham's autobiography, she told the Old Bailey. — Giving evidence for the second day, Brooks said despite paying large sums for exclusive stories …

BBC:

Venezuela threatens to expel CNN over protest coverage — Venezuela's President Nicolas Maduro has threatened to expel the US news network CNN from the country over its reporting of recent protests there. — Mr Maduro said he would take action if CNN did not “rectify its coverage”.

Discussion: Politico, @fieldproducer, Caracas Chronicles and TIME

Uri Friedman / The Atlantic Online:
Why Venezuela's Revolution Will Be Tweeted

Discussion: @valtmc, @hemlockmartinis and @anupkaphle

Danny O'Brien / Electronic Frontier Foundation: Venezuela's Internet Crackdown Escalates into Regional Blackout

Kara Swisher / Re/code:

Om-Niscient: A Much-Deserved Mash Note to Tech Blogger Om Malik — Of course, I was jammed yesterday with a trip and then the big news of Facebook forking over $19 billion for WhatsApp in the endless hamster-wheel cycle that is sometimes my life, so I missed the news about Om Malik.

Discussion: Talking Biz News

Om Malik / Gigaom:
Om Malik leaves day-to-day operations at Gigaom, becomes full partner at True Ventures, site raises $8M more

Discussion: Om Malik, TechCrunch, @alexia, @kentgoldman, @waltmossberg, @tomkrazit, @om, @nitashatiku, @carr2n, @johnolilly, @pkafka, @hblodget, @thekenyeung, @laurengoode, @satishd, @caseynewton, @pkedrosky, @twittner, @rafat, @msquinn, @mikeisaac, @ashleymayer, @tonysphere, @mims, @jason_pontin, @timoreilly, Pulse 2.0 and PE Hub Blog

Keith J. Kelly / New York Post:

Gannett blog shuts down after almost 7 years — Gannett Blog, a nonprofit site being run by an ex-Gannett editor, has shut down after nearly seven years. — The site was launched by Jim Hopkins, a former reporter and editor at USA Today, and was probably the foremost tracker of the tumult …

Discussion: Gannett Blog and SFist

Peter Kafka / Re/code:

Sources say Amazon readying a Web TV box competing with Apple TV and Roku, for March rollout — Amazon Gets Its TV Box Ready, Again — Amazon is gearing up to take on Apple and Roku, again. — Industry sources say Amazon is getting ready to launch a Web TV box that would compete …

Discussion: CNET, TechCrunch, MacRumors, BGR, 9to5Mac and The Verge

Pew Internet:

Mapping Twitter Topic Networks: From Polarized Crowds to Community Clusters — Summary of Findings — Polarized Crowds: Political conversations on Twitter — Conversations on Twitter create networks with identifiable contours as people reply to and mention one another in their tweets.

Discussion: Quartz, Des Moines Register, The Technology Chronicles, PBS, Al Jazeera America, Washington Post and CNET

Michael Calia / Wall Street Journal:

Dish Profit Up as Subscriber Rolls Grow; EchoStar Profit Falls — Dish Network Corp. said its fourth-quarter profit jumped 38% as it added subscribers to both its pay-TV and broadband services. — Dish, which has faced tough competition from pay-TV rivals as well as the proliferation …

Discussion: Business Wire, Reuters, Bloomberg, WKRB News and NASDAQ.com

Lily Kuo / Quartz:

A Chinese tycoon is close to buying a bygone icon of American capitalism — A Chinese conglomerate on a global buying spree is reportedly in talks to buy Forbes Media—although for much less than the Forbes family has been hoping. Fosun International—which most recently bought JP Morgan's …

Discussion: @christinelu and Fortune

Anthony Harrup / Wall Street Journal:

Mexican Broadcasters Voice More Objections to Slim TV — Broadcasters say Telmex has ‘de facto partnership’ with Dish Mexico — MEXICO CITY—Mexico's main television broadcasters turned up the volume Thursday in their dispute with billionaire Carlos Slim, charging that agreements …

Vladimir Kozlov / Hollywood Reporter:

Russian Rights Holders File First-Ever Collective Lawsuit Against Online Video Service — The move is expected to create a new precedent in fighting piracy. — MOSCOW — Several leading Russian movie and TV companies have filed the first ever collective lawsuit against an online video service …

Andrew Wallenstein / Variety:

‘House of Cards’ Binge-Watching: 2% of U.S. Subs Finished Entire Series Over First Weekend — Binge-watching on the rise compared to drama series' first season — There are some dedicated “House of Cards” fans out there. — Approximately 2% of Netflix subscribers on U.S. broadband networks took …

Discussion: TIME, @awallenstein, Fox Business, @theaafca, @awallenstein and The Verge

Maryclaire Dale / Associated Press:

Rivals debate auction rules for Philly newspapers … PHILADELPHIA (AP) — The top investor in Philadelphia's largest newspapers wants the company sold in a quick, closed auction among current partners while a rival wants a slower sale open to all. — The Philadelphia Inquirer …

Discussion: Philadelphia Magazine

Eric Lipton / New York Times:

Comcast's Web of Lobbying and Philanthropy — WASHINGTON — Only a few hours had passed after the $45 billion merger between Comcast and Time Warner Cable was announced last week when an early voice emerged endorsing the giant deal. — “Win-win situation for American businesses,” …

Janko Roettgers / Gigaom:

BitTorrent shuts down its live streaming website to refocus on mobile — BitTorrent Inc. is shutting down its P2P-powered live streaming website by the end of the month, according to an email BitTorrent co-founder Bram Cohen sent out to users late Wednesday.

Mark Sweney / Guardian:

In UK, Amazon takes on Netflix by combining LoveFilm video-on-demand with Prime for £79 a year — Amazon takes on Netflix with rebrand of LoveFilm video-on-demand service — Online retailer will fold film and TV rental arm into its Prime subscription service for combined price of £79 a year

Discussion: TechRadar.com, Telegraph, Telegraph, TechRadar.com, The Independent, Daily Mail, Wired.co.uk, The Next Web, Pocket-lint and Engadget

Henry Taylor / TheMediaBriefing:

Contributoria catch up Q&A: how the first month went — Described as “if Kickstarter and Medium had a baby”, crowd-funded journalism community Contributoria is now one month old. — The Guardian Media Group-backed startup has signed up more 650 members - 65 percent of which are writers - and 24 projects have been backed.

Discussion: @mattmcalister

Joseph Lichterman / Nieman Journalism Lab:

News video curator Watchup will update app in March to incorporate ads, add PostTV as partner — Right back after these messages: Watchup adds ads and partners with The Washington Post — The news video aggregator Watchup aims, in a sense, to recreate something like the traditional …

Discussion: Idea Lab, Venture Capital Dispatch, @niemanlab and @crovitz

Susan Currie Sivek / Mediashift:

How First Look Pushes Verticals Ahead of Overarching ‘Magazine’ Brand — First Look Media has gotten plenty of coverage for its strategy of creating “digital magazines” based on the work of specific journalists with unique voices who will dive deeply into focused topics.

Discussion: @pbsmediashift and New York Times

Joe Flint / Los Angeles Times:

FCC wants to improve quality of closed captioning — FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler wants to improve closed captioning. — “Five wins and a very light power reese know” sounds more like gibberish than a weather forecast. — But that was the closed captioning on a WeatherNation report last month.

Discussion: TVWeek.com