Mediagazer: De Blasio Places Personal Call to CBS to Keep ‘Late Show’ in NYC (Jill Colvin/The New York Observer)

6:50 PM ET, April 8, 2014

Top News:

Online competitor Alaska Dispatch is buying Anchorage Daily News from McClatchy for $34M — Alaska Dispatch to purchase Anchorage Daily News — In what amounts to a stunning media shakeup in the 49th state, the still-young online news organization Alaska Dispatch announced on Tuesday …

Discussion: Anchorage Daily News, Poynter, @alaskadispatch, bizjournals, Associated Press, @wconnors, @alaskarobyne, @anjumsheh, @adn_jomalley, @mlcalderone, @ethanklapper and @ethanklapper

Lucia Moses / Digiday:

Michael Wolff: 'Online journalism can't pay for itself' — When author, Internet entrepreneur and media pundit Michael Wolff surveys the landscape, few are safe from his bleak prognostications. In recent columns for USA Today, the Guardian and GQ, he has skewered Marissa Mayer for wanting …

Discussion: FishbowlNY, Kirk LaPointe's …, @mediaczar, @jason_pontin, @mathewi, @niemanlab, @bobtheprguy, @bmorrissey, @emilybell and @lmoses

Felix Salmon / Politico:

Is There a Wonk Bubble? — Why the boom in data journalism actually makes sense. — Call it the Wonk Bubble. If you're in the market for serious, empirical, quantitative analysis of national policy—or of just about anything else in the news these days—the East Coast Media Elite has you covered like never before.

Discussion: @felixsalmon and @jayrosen_nyu

Todd Spangler / Variety:

Comcast, Time Warner Cable Defend Union as Benefiting ‘Millions’ in FCC Filing — Cable giants cite increased competition in video market, including from Netflix, Apple, Google and Amazon — Comcast's $45 billion takeover of Time Warner Cable will benefit millions of consumers and businesses …

Cecilia Kang / The Switch:
Comcast the little guy? There's competition everywhere, the company argues.

Discussion: Free Press Blog

Wall Street Journal:

DirecTV Reaches Deal With Weather Channel — Pact Ends Monthslong Dispute, Will Restore Channel to Satellite Operator's Lineup — DirecTV reached an agreement to restore the Weather Channel to its program lineup, say people familiar with the matter, after a monthslong dispute between the two companies over program fees.

Discussion: TVNewser, The Wrap, AdAge, CNET, Mashable, Hollywood Reporter, Variety, @jbflint and @jimcantore

Jill Colvin / The New York Observer:

De Blasio Places Personal Call to CBS to Keep ‘Late Show’ in NYC — Mayor Bill de Blasio today revealed that he placed a personal call to CBS head honcho Les Moonves yesterday, urging the network to keep the Late Show With David Letterman in the city after its host's departure next year.

Discussion: Mediaite, Capital New York, The Wrap, New Yorker and New York Magazine

Paul Farhi / Washington Post:

Vox Media's key to growth: working with “media hackers”, says CEO Jim Bankoff — Vox Media ventures into general news and news analysis with Vox.com — Jim Bankoff was already fascinated, even a bit obsessed, by the media when he was in the third grade. As a class project, he developed his own make-

Discussion: 10,000 Words, @ninersnation, @joshuatopolsky, @hollyanderson, @lock, @chadmumm and @voxmediainc

Todd Spangler / Variety:

AwesomenessTV Hires Ex-Disney Stores President Jim Fielding — DreamWorks Animation's AwesomenessTV plans to extend its youth-skewing media brand, which centers on YouTube videos, to merchandise. — AwesomenessTV has hired Jim Fielding, former president of Disney Stores Worldwide …

Discussion: The Wrap, Hollywood Reporter, Chicago Business, Kidscreen, Deadline.com and PandoDaily

Jack Shafer:

NYT's Times Premier is mainly a repackaged New York Times subscription, not worth the upgrade — Dressing up the NYT with fins, chrome and glitter — At the beginning of April, the New York Times launched its “Times Premier” digital offering, accessible to Times home delivery subscribers …

Discussion: @lmoses and @antderosa

Bloomberg:

Time Inc. to Raise $1.4 Billion in Debt for Spinoff — Time Inc., the publisher of People and Time magazines, said it will raise $1.4 billion in debt as part of its planned spinoff from Time Warner Inc. (TWX) this year. — Time Inc. said it will use the proceeds to fund the acquisition …

Discussion: Folio, Reuters, Business Wire, TheStreet.com and @edmundlee

Harrison Weber / VentureBeat:

Twitter launches photo-centric profile redesign, rolling out over next few weeks — Connect with leaders from the companies in this story, in real life: Come to the fourth annual VentureBeat Mobile Summit April 14-15 in Sausalito, Calif. Request an invitation.

Discussion: The Twitter Blog, Forbes, Today, The Next Web, @bydanielvictor, Re/code, WLTX-TV, Huffington Post UK, Pocket-lint, @emilylfoley and @coffeecocktail

Todd Spangler / Variety:

Amazon Streams More Video Than Hulu or Apple, But It's Still Miles Behind Netflix — Amazon is touting a study finding that the number of streams delivered for its Prime Instant Video service nearly tripled year over year — and now surpasses Apple and Hulu in streaming-video usage.

Discussion: The Verge, Wall Street Journal and Fox Business

Mathew Ingram / Gigaom:

Collaborative-writing platform Wattpad gets $46M in financing for global expansion — Wattpad, a collaborative-writing community that helps new authors connect with a community of fans and fellow writers, has closed a new round of financing worth $46 million that co-founder and CEO Allen Lau …

Discussion: Re/code, Business Insider, GalleyCat, VentureBeat and TechCrunch

Michael Sebastian / AdAge:

Esquire Network Quicker to Attract Advertisers Than Audiences — Esquire Editor David Granger pitched a TV show to Adam Stotsky. But the general manager for Esquire Network, the cable channel named after Mr. Granger's magazine, passed. — “He was pretty frank with me that it was a good idea …

Cory Doctorow / Boing Boing:

Attributr bookmarklet updated to scrape Flickr source code to get Creative Commons attributions after breakage caused by redesign — Restoring CC attribution to Flickr, because Yahoo broke it — For years, Flickr has been one of the most important repositories of Creative Commons imagery in the world …