Mediagazer: Why China is censoring ‘The Big Bang Theory’ but not ‘Game of Thrones’ (Lily Kuo/Quartz)

6:45 PM ET, April 29, 2014

Top News:

Alex Wilhelm / TechCrunch:

Twitter Beats In Q1 With $250M In Revenue And Picks Up 14M New Monthly Active Users — This afternoon Twitter released its first quarter financial performance, reporting revenue of $250 million in the period, and earnings per share of $0.00 on a non-GAAP basis.

Discussion: Forbes, Gigaom, Gawker, The Wrap, Business Insider, Computerworld, @papadimitriou, ZDNet, Pocket-lint, Marketing Land, Mashable, @fmanjoo and The Next Web

Mike Isaac / Re/code:

Twitter faces decelerating growth in active users and timeline views — Twitter Adds More Users, but Wall Street Wants More — Twitter is still growing — but hardly fast enough for Wall Street. — Twitter reported 255 million monthly active users as of the end of March …

Discussion: @thestalwart, Washington Post, @jennydeluxe and @tim

Alastair Reid / Journalism.co.uk:

Vice journalist Tim Pool launches Taggly app on iOS for journalists to watermark images, video — Taggly app launches to watermark images and video — Tim Pool, renowned for his use of mobile technology in reporting, has launched the app for reporters and citizen journalists on iOS

Discussion: The Next Web, @jaredbkeller, @mickcote, @lukewearechange and @sarahmarshall

Brian Stelter / CNNMoney.com:

Media startup PolicyMic raises $10M in funding, Netscape co-founder Jim Clark invests — A $10 million boost for millennial media startup PolicyMic — PolicyMic, one member of a pack of BuzzFeed-like online startups, is taking on $10 million in funding from a number of investors, including Jim Clark, the co-founder of Netscape.

Discussion: @adamostrow, @andysherry, @alexmleo, @brianstelter, @bthewirz and The New York Observer

Sandra Oshiro / Poynter:

TMZ, NBC News got it wrong: NBA bans Sterling, will force sale of Clippers — TMZ.com — NBA banned Los Angeles Clippers owner Donald Sterling for life from any connection with the league and will force a sale of the team after determining it is his voice on recordings making racist remarks to his girlfriend.

Discussion: Forbes, Mediaite, Washington Post, AdAge, The Huffington Post, Politico, @btryn, @pat_garofalo, @andrwlvngstn, ESPN and TMZ.com

Tom Wheeler / Official FCC Blog:

FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler defends net neutrality approach, seeks path to avoid years in court — Finding the Best Path Forward to Protect the Open Internet — I am a strong believer in the importance of an Open Internet. As President Obama has explained, “Preserving an Open Internet …

Discussion: Engadget, The Verge, @rafat, @karlbode, @byersalex and @fcc

Andrew Beaujon / Poynter:

NYU will honor Matthew Power with literary reporting award — The spirit of Matthew Power's writing isn't easy to define, but his friend and editor Roger Hodge took a stab at it anyway: “strong, character-driven narratives with detailed scene writing, beautiful lyrical description,” …

Discussion: @joshuahersh, FishbowlNY and @poynter

Bloomberg:

Vevo Owners Said Close to Hiring Goldman to Explore Sale — Vevo LLC's four owners are close to hiring Goldman Sachs Group Inc. to explore sale options for the music video-hosting service, according to three people familiar with the matter. — The sale of a majority stake is being considered among …

Discussion: hypebot, VentureBeat, Billboard and @pkafka

Tom Cheredar / VentureBeat:

Glam rebrands as ‘Mode Media,’ dives into streaming video business — Glam Media is giving itself a major makeover. — Today the company announced that it is changing its name to Mode Media to better reflect its extended focus on a wider variety of topic-based publications, including Foodie …

Discussion: Folio, Forbes, Capital New York, New York Times, MediaWire Daily, AdAge, Variety and VBProfiles

Robert Andrews / Beet.TV:

AOL Will Use Nielsen TV Ratings To Measure Its Video Audience — AOL says it will become the first digital publisher to use Nielsen's TV metrics to quantify its video shows for advertisers - a move that may expose it to comparatively lowly perception by comparison but which could allow …

Discussion: Capital New York, Broadcasting & Cable and AdAge

Lily Kuo / Quartz:

Why China is censoring ‘The Big Bang Theory’ but not ‘Game of Thrones’ — An alliance with CCTV could be good for the Lannisters. HBO — Chinese regulators recently ordered the country's major video streaming sites to take down four popular American television shows, including The Big Bang Theory …

Greg McNeal / Forbes:

FAA ‘Looking Into’ Arkansas Tornado Drone Journalism, Raising First Amendment Questions — Storm chaser and videographer Brian Emfinger used a drone to document the aftermath of a tornado that ripped through Arkansas. That video prompted speculation as to whether the FAA was going to investigate …

Discussion: @peterwsinger, Mashable, @gregorymcneal, @mattwaite, @gregorymcneal, @weathermankeith, @mattwaite and ArkansasOnline.com

Kif Leswing / Gigaom:

Sprint will offer discount Spotify subscriptions to customers — Sprint plans to offer its customers Spotify trials and will give them the the ability to pay for the streaming music service via their phone bill, Sprint CEO Dan Hesse said at an event in New York on Tuesday.

Discussion: Business Insider, TechCrunch, Re/code, ZDNet, AdAge, Pocket-lint, The Next Web and VentureBeat

Chris Welch / The Verge:

Spotify's major redesign comes to Android — The all-new Spotify experience that launched on iPhone and desktop earlier this month is now arriving on Android. The app now looks essentially identical across both mobile platforms, sharing the same dark theme, new typeface, and subtle translucency effects.

Discussion: Engadget

Tony Biasotti / Columbia Journalism Review:

Federal judge: Delayed access to court records raises First Amendment concerns — Courthouse News editor sees “nationwide plague”—and he'll get a chance to make his case — It's been a routine for generations of legal beat reporters: Every weekday afternoon, at courthouses across the United States …

Laura Parker / New York Times:

Telltale Games adapts movies, books and TV shows to games, working with HBO on Game of Thrones — A Gaming Company Devoted to Narrative Tackles ‘Thrones’ — SAN RAFAEL, Calif. — Behind closed doors and papered-over windows here, a half-dozen storytellers have been scrambling to conjure …

Discussion: @lauraannaparker, Digital Spy and Polygon

Michelle Dean / Gawker:

Allegedly Greedy Marxist Press Demands That Marxists Pay For Marx — A kerfuffle is haunting the Marxist internet—a kerfluffle about copyright. — The Marxist Internet Archive, a website that hosts a number of translations of the works of Marx and Engels online, free for the use of scholars …

Discussion: Salon, Ars Technica, Business Insider, @imjasondiamond and @casey_cac

Ian Burrell / The Independent:

Fears grow that the BBC News Channel could become online only — Fears are growing among BBC journalists that the 24-hour BBC News Channel could follow the youth-orientated BBC3 in becoming an online-only service. — The issue was discussed today at an internal meeting at the Radio Theatre inside …

Discussion: Press Gazette

Peter Kafka / Re/code:

The New York Times Gets Into the Viral Video Business — The New York Times has taken many swings at Web video, and it hasn't connected yet. But it's not going to stop: Yesterday the paper promised advertisers that it would be rolling out more than 30 video series and offered a sneak peek.

Discussion: Beet.TV, AdAge, @moneyries and Business Insider