Mediagazer: Marc Andreessen's news-business fairy tale (Ryan Chittum/Columbia Journalism Review)

2:00 AM ET, March 6, 2014

Top News:

JP Mangalindan / Fortune:

CNN sells Zite to Flipboard in all-stock transaction worth more than the $20M CNN paid in 2011 — Flipboard buys Zite news app from CNN — The standalone iPad news app will eventually be shut down and integrated into Flipboard. Also: Zite's CEO tells Fortune why he left.

Discussion: ReadWrite, Tech Deals, TIME, ReadWrite, @craigmod, ZDNet, @megan, @edmundlee and @felixsalmon

Laurie Segall / CNNMoney:

CNN sells Zite to Flipboard, teams up to launch custom magazines for CNN shows — CNN sells Zite to Flipboard — CNN has sold its news reader app, Zite, to Flipboard, a social magazine application. As part of the deal, Flipboard has also teamed up with CNN to launch custom magazines …

Ingrid Lunden / TechCrunch:

Flipboard CEO and CNN digital head talk about future of Zite, advertising and Facebook's Paper — More On Flipboard's Acquisition Of Zite: “The Deal Whisperer”, Zite's Fate, The Price Tag, And Paper — Getty Images Jumps Into The Age Of Social Media With A Free Embed Tool For Its Photo Library

Rosie Gray / BuzzFeed:

Russia Today Anchor Resigns Live On Air — WASHINTON — Russia Today America anchor Liz Wahl resigned live on air on Wednesday, saying that she could no longer work at the Kremlin-funded network after Russia's invasion of Ukraine. Wahl said that she feels “many ethical and moral challenges” …

Patrick Kingsley / Guardian:

Al-Jazeera trial: prosecution presents contents of journalists' hotel rooms — Trial in Egypt descends into farce on day two as everything from journalists' hotel rooms is presented as evidence by prosecution — The second day of the trial of three al-Jazeera journalists in Egypt descended …

Discussion: Poynter, @flip_stewart, @ingridmattson, @jeromestarkey and The Newspaper Guild

Haitham Tabei / Agence France-Presse:
Torture claim in Egypt trial of Jazeera journalists

Discussion: @sasapetricic, World Bulletin, UK - The Huffington Post, english.ahram.org.eg, Business Insider India, The Huffington Post, Al Jazeera America, BBC and The Age

Patrick Kingsley / Guardian:
Peter Greste and other al-Jazeera journalists return to court in Egypt

Discussion: @ajamphoto, Al Jazeera English, Voice of America, Sky News Australia, @jessiehatcher, @kenroth, Committee to Protect …, @bbcos and @bbcandrewh

Jeanine Poggi / AdAge:

Al Jazeera America at Six Months: Some New Advertisers, Few Viewers — Serious Cable News Network Is on the Right Path, Buyers Say — Al Jazeera America is averaging less than half its predecessor's audience — Krux — Al Jazeera America is starting to earn the trust of some advertisers …

Discussion: @tvnewslab, Los Angeles Times, Politico, New York Magazine, FTVLive, @brianstelter, @tomgara and @jayrosen_nyu

Ryan Chittum / Columbia Journalism Review:

The Guardian's digital boom — Revenue rises sharply online for a second-straight year — The Guardian had another big year of digital business last year, further brightening the paper's long-term outlook. — The paper says its digital revenue will hit $117 million in its current fiscal year, which ends on March 31.

Discussion: Poynter and Guardian

Rachel Bartlett / Journalism.co.uk:
Guardian CEO: The paywall ‘horse has bolted’ for us

Discussion: @mattmcalister

Paul McNally / Press Gazette:
News UK chief Mike Darcey says Guardian ‘very brave’ to ‘bet’ the business on a free website

Discussion: Guardian

Adi Robertson / The Verge:

Government backs off case against journalist who faced decades in prison for posting hyperlink — The US government has filed a motion to dismiss several charges against journalist Barrett Brown, who was indicted in 2012 for posting a link to leaked documents among other alleged offenses.

Discussion: Dallas Morning News, Techdirt, @edpilkington, Daily Dot, @freebarrett_, Ars Technica, @green_footballs, Salon, @ggreenwald, @freedomofpress, @digiphile, Guardian, @freebarrett_, dissenter.firedoglake.com, Guardian, @jayrosen_nyu, @sparty_legal and Free Barrett Brown

Electronic Frontier Foundation:
EFF Statement on Dismissal of 11 Charges Against Barrett Brown

Discussion: RT and Freedom of the Press …

Anthony Ha / TechCrunch:

Time.com Gets A Big Redesign, Along With New Ad Units — The new Time.com is here. — Well, it should be here for some of you, anyway. A spokesperson said that the first few users should see the new layout now, and it will continue rolling out tonight and tomorrow.

Discussion: Re/code, Poynter, Capital New York, AdAge and @racheltipograph

Justin Ellis / Nieman Journalism Lab:

Embrace the unbundling: The Boston Globe is betting it'll be stronger split up than unified — The model for the 20th-century American newspaper was to be all things to all people, in one amalgamated package. One daily bundle of newsprint could give you baseball box scores …

Discussion: JIMROMENESKO.COM, @justinnxt, Guardian and bizjournals

Alison Flood / Guardian:

Anne Rice signs petition to protest bullying of authors on Amazon — Almost 1,000 signatories - to include Rice and a number of other authors - are taking a stand against comments that are ‘gratuitously destructive towards the creative community’ — Anne Rice has tackled vampires …

Discussion: Melville House Books, @craigmod, GalleyCat, Toronto Sun, goodereader.com, filmindustrynetwork.biz, Betabeat and EW.com

Reuters:

Exclusive: DirecTV in talks with Disney on deal for Internet rights — (Reuters) - DirecTV is in talks with Walt Disney Co to license the rights to offer Disney's broadcast and cable channels as part of an Internet-based product, DirecTV said on Wednesday. — The deal would mirror …

Discussion: CNET and The Verge

Lexy Savvides / CNET:

Getty making select photos free to embed for non-commercial use, removes watermarks — Getty makes 35 million images free for sharing — Have you ever wanted to share a newsworthy image on a blog or on Facebook, but are not sure how to credit it? — Licensing issues might not be at the front …

Discussion: bjp-online.com, Nieman Journalism Lab, The Verge, TechCrunch, Fast Company, Gizmodo, @maungle, @mathewi, PandoDaily, @pkafka, @jbenton, Techdirt and Engadget

Ryan Chittum / Columbia Journalism Review:

Marc Andreessen's news-business fairy tale — The news industry is not in for exponential growth — Marc Andreessen has some outlandish predictions about the future of the journalism business: … Sorry, but those numbers are crazy town, as Poynter's Rick Edmonds notes.

Discussion: @jayrosen_nyu, @mathewi, @pmarca, @pmarca and ZDNet

Katrin Bennhold / New York Times:

Testimony at Hacking Trial Gives Peek Into British Tabloids — LONDON — When Rebekah Brooks first entered the witness box in Britain's phone hacking trial, her lawyer reminded the jury that she was not on trial for running Rupert Murdoch's tabloid newspapers.

Brian Ries / Mashable:

A War of Open Letters Between Ukrainian and Russian Media — What's This? — The heads of the four major Ukrainian media groups wrote an open letter to their counterparts in Russia earlier this week, asking their Russian colleagues to be responsible with the words they use to describe the crisis in Ukraine.