Mediagazer: Kaltura buys Tvinci to become the Swiss army knife of video platforms (Tom Cheredar/VentureBeat)

5:00 PM ET, May 2, 2014

Top News:

Mike Giglio / BuzzFeed:

Buzzfeed's Mike Giglio describes his kidnapping and release in eastern Ukraine — “I Should Kill You Right Here” — Pro-Russian rebels kidnap more U.S. journalists amid fresh unrest in east Ukraine. “Do you know the things America has been doing here?” — Pro-Russian armed men south of Slovyansk, eastern Ukraine

Discussion: Capital New York, @joe_hill, @mwodzicki24, @martenkokk, @miriamelder and @anneapplebaum

Jack Mirkinson / The Huffington Post:

CBS, BuzzFeed, Sky News Journalists Detained In Ukraine — A group of Western journalists from a number of news outlets was detained by pro-Russian militants in Eastern Ukraine on Friday. — CBS reporter Clarissa Ward and her news crew, along with BuzzFeed's Mike Giglio and reporters from Sky News …

Discussion: Poynter, TVNewser, Associated Press, Gawker, CBS News, Committee to Protect …, New York Magazine and NBC News

Cassie Walker Burke / Politico:

The White House Beat, Uncovered — What the hacks of 1600 Penn really think. — The White House Correspondents' Association began as a response to Woodrow Wilson's threat to end presidential press conferences. A century later, White House reporters no longer have to line up outside …

Discussion: dallasmorningviewsblog …, @causeofactiondc, NewsBusters blogs, Mediaite, The Huffington Post, The Week and Yahoo! News

Tina Daunt / Hollywood Reporter:

Few Movie Stars Set to Attend White House Correspondents' Dinner — One Hollywood insider says the A-listers are avoiding the event because they get “pawed at” as “people act like a bunch of kids at the Kids' Choice Award.” — They may govern the free world's leading nation and regulate …

Discussion: Capital New York, Re/code, Slate, @mateagold, @ravisomaiya, The Daily Beast, @sarahkliff, @mikeriggs, @nickconfessore, @lfung and @marieeoliver

John McDermott / Digiday:

Newspapers are lagging behind in the mobile traffic boom — The Internet is becoming an increasingly mobile medium, but it appears that newspaper publishers are not only struggling to make the transition, they're falling behind. — This year, for the first time ever …

Discussion: @pottsmark and @elanazak

Reuters:

Comcast nears deal to stream Electronic Arts games to TVs via its X1 platform — Exclusive - Comcast nears deal to stream EA games to TVs: sources — (Reuters) - Comcast Corp may soon allow customers using its cloud-connected X1 cable box system to buy games from Electronic Arts Inc through …

Discussion: The Verge

Ken Doctor / Nieman Journalism Lab:

Quartz has a large global audience and strong mobile advertiser base, 19 months after launch — The newsonomics of Quartz, 19 months in … Quartz, at the tender age of 19 months, can hardly be considered a father to Vox, FiveThirtyEight, and The Upshot. Clearly, though, it's a major influence.

Discussion: @elanazak, @niemanlab, @justin_b_smith and Talking Biz News

Tim Molloy / The Wrap:

Sorry Wikipedia: YouTube Says It's the New Encyclopedia — Sorry, Wikipedia: YouTube says it is the world's new encyclopedia. — YouTube CEO Susan Wojcicki went before advertisers Wednesday to offer them the chance to buy ads during the site's most desirable videos. It's an initiative called Google Preferred.

Discussion: iMediaConnection Blog and @cschweitz

Tom Cheredar / VentureBeat:

Kaltura buys Tvinci to become the Swiss army knife of video platforms — Open-source video platform Kaltura has purchased pay TV service startup Tvinci, the companies announced today. Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed. — Tvinci's white-label platform offers paid-TV providers …

Discussion: Media & Entertainment, broadcastnow.co.uk, Digital TV Europe, Advanced Television, informitv, Rapid TV News, Broadband TV News, Kaltura Video Platform and VBProfiles

Nicole Levy / Capital New York:

W.S.J. unveils digital video portal, called Signal — The Wall Street Journal unveiled plans for a “digital video magazine,” called Signal, at its presentation for the Digital Content Newfronts on Friday morning in Midtown. — “Signal will curate an eclectic mix of short video dispatches …

Discussion: AdAge and Wall Street Journal

Los Angeles Times:

Pay-TV field could shrink again with AT&T bid for DirecTV — A DirecTV employee installs a satellite on a home in Bixby, Okla. (Paul Taggart / Bloomberg / June 27, 2011) — A rush among the nation's largest pay-TV and Internet providers to get even bigger could have profound effects on consumers and competition.

Discussion: New York Times, USA Today and @joetrippi

Natan Edelsburg / Lost Remote:

Chatterbox: an inside look at social TV in Thailand — In the U.S. many of the second screen apps that had hoped to thrive as compliments to the viewing experience are now gone. In Thailand however (which has a population of about 66 million), the second screen has actually matured …

Discussion: @stkonrath and @jandwmedia

John Wihbey / Nieman Journalism Lab:

What's New in Digital and Social Media Research: How Facebook rumors spread, and the rise of the collaborative news clip — Editor's note: There's a lot of interesting academic research going on in digital media — but who has time to sift through all those journals and papers?

Discussion: @niemanlab