Mediagazer: Ex-FCC chief says politics and funding droughts would slow the internet if it were a utility (Jon Brodkin/Ars Technica)

10:40 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, Business Insider, AdAge, Computerworld, Gawker, Forbes, Gigaom, The Wrap, ZDNet, Pocket-lint, Marketing Land, @fmanjoo, The Next Web, Mashable, @papadimitriou and VatorNews

Peter Kafka / Re/code:

Twitter and TV Working Just Fine, Says Twitter — Yesterday, after a top TV executive lobbed a bomb at Twitter's TV pitch, Twitter executives kept quiet. — But Twitter CEO Dick Costolo knew he'd get asked about NBC* research chief Alan Wurtzel's “emperor has no clothes” comments today during his earnings call.

Discussion: Forbes and VentureBeat

Mike Isaac / Re/code:
Twitter faces decelerating growth in active users and timeline views

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

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: Variety, Business Insider, Engadget, The Verge, @byersalex, @karlbode, @rafat, @ddayen and @fcc

Jon Brodkin / Ars Technica:

Ex-FCC chief says politics and funding droughts would slow the internet if it were a utility — Cable lobbyist who once led the FCC is glad he didn't regulate the Internet — Michael Powell made sure Internet access wouldn't be treated as a utility. — There are some people …

Discussion: Hollywood Reporter, Re/code, New York Times and Cable Tech Talk

Cory Doctorow / Guardian:
Internet service providers charging for premium access hold us all to ransom

Discussion: Boing Boing

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, @lukewearechange, @mickcote and @sarahmarshall

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, TechCrunch, New York Times, MediaWire Daily, Capital New York, Variety, AdAge and VBProfiles

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

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: FishbowlNY, @joshuahersh and @poynter

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

Caroline O'Donovan / Nieman Journalism Lab:

NewsLynx wants to build tools to better measure the impact of journalism — A new research project over at Columbia's Tow Center wants to do a better job of determining the real impact news has on the world around us. — Former Knight-Mozilla OpenNews fellows and current Tow fellows Brian Abelson …

Discussion: Tow Center for Digital …

Andrew Wallenstein / Variety:

Most Pirated TV Shows, Networks Dominated by Broadcasters — Piracy tracking firm CEG TEK came out with a rare comprehensive look at just what TV shows and networks are the most active on P2P hub Bittorrent. While it's hard to extrapolate broad trends from numbers drawn just from last week …

Andrew Wallenstein / Variety:

Condé Nast to Launch New Digital Brand Aggregating Video — Variety among the news brands named as inaugural video partners for The Scene — Condé Nast Entertainment sees strength in numbers in the video space-even if that means mixing its high-class brands with those outside the company.

Discussion: Folio

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 …

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, @imjasondiamond, @casey_cac and Business Insider

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: Billboard, VentureBeat, hypebot and @pkafka

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

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 and AdAge