Mediagazer: Australia's national security proposals will criminalise journalists, says union (Katharine Murphy/Guardian)

12:10 AM ET, August 12, 2014

Top News:

Caroline O'Donovan / Nieman Journalism Lab:

With $50 million, BuzzFeed growth calls for sharper lines between news and the other stuff — The New York Times' Mike Isaac was the first to report late Sunday night that BuzzFeed had raised $50 million in new venture funding from Andreessen Horowitz. … The story was followed by a chorus of blog posts and press releases.

Discussion: The Awl, Nieman Journalism Lab, Mashable, USA Today, PandoDaily, @natematias, @mikeisaac, @mathewi, @cdirusso, @ceodonovan, @jbenton, Guardian, Business Insider, SocialTimes, Hollywood Reporter and @buzzfeedben

Felix Salmon / Medium:

Don't compare BuzzFeed to newspapers; compare it to agencies, reaching young, mobile audiences — Normally, when some big deal is announced in the business world, a rah-rah press release goes out and then smart journalists start explaining what's really going on.

Discussion: BuzzFeed, @pkafka, @jhweissmann, @nxthompson, @mathewi, @dkthomp, @cdixon, @espiers, @felixsalmon, @gaberivera, @lpolgreen, @mattzeitlin, @riceid, @riceid, Tubefilter, The New York Observer, The Hill and Wall Street Journal

Peter Kafka / Re/code:

A16Z's Chris Dixon: BuzzFeed, which could reach 10X-100X the audience of past media empires, is a bargain at $850M valuation — How Jonah Peretti and BuzzFeed Got to $850 Million — We passed the billion dollar mark awhile ago. Today a hot tech company is worth multiple billions of dollars, easily.

Discussion: Valleywag, BuzzMachine, Guardian, Gigaom, @edmundlee, @riceid, Om Malik, BBC, @weegee, @nbj914, @timkiladze, The FJP, Gawker and New York Magazine

Todd Spangler / Variety:
Why BuzzFeed Is Launching Its Own Hollywood Studio

Discussion: chris dixon's blog, Hollywood Reporter, Latest News & Headlines, Daily Dot, AdAge, The Wrap, Crain's New York, Lost Remote, FishbowlNY and @jesseredniss

Tim Molloy / The Wrap:
Producer Michael Shamberg and comedian Jordan Peele join BuzzFeed's new movie unit as advisers

Discussion: @alexweprin and New York Times

Laura Kosann / The New Potato:
BuzzFeed's Founding Editor Peggy Wang on the future of digital media and how she consumes it

Discussion: @twelveoclocke, @thenewpotato, @peretti, @millie, @mccollumashley, @s_m_i, @iam486, @niemanlab, @s_m_i, @jessmisener, @nomizeichner, @emilydreyfuss and @danoshinsky

Jezebel:

Jezebel staff accuse Gawker of not dealing with trolls posting violent porn images in comments — We Have a Rape Gif Problem and Gawker Media Won't Do Anything About It — Working at Gawker Media is a dream job for many of the women on staff here at Jezebel.

Kristen Hare / Poynter:
Jezebel staffers wanted to 'light a fire under management's collective ass'

Discussion: The New York Observer, Gigaom, Mediaite and @mathewi

Mat Honan / Wired:

If you like everything on Facebook, brands and content mills like Upworthy dominate News Feed — I Liked Everything I Saw on Facebook for Two Days. Here's What It Did to Me — There's this great Andy Warhol quote you've probably seen before: “I think everybody should like everybody.”

Discussion: Anil Dash, PandoDaily, The FJP, @matthewteller, AdAge, @mnik, @bobmcmillan, @jeffchu, @numeson, @stevesilberman, @brad_frost and Mother Jones

Sarah Buhr / TechCrunch:

BeachMint Gets Lucky In Joint Venture With Conde Nast — E-commerce platform BeachMint announced it will take over all operations for Lucky Magazine today. The takeover is part of a newly formed joint venture between BeachMint and magazine publishing giant Conde Nast.

Discussion: Adweek, Fashionista, MediaWire Daily, AdAge, PandoDaily, FishbowlNY, Jezebel, @lapresmidi, @benparr, WWD Media Headlines, VentureBeat, The Huffington Post and New York Magazine

Greg Gilman / The Wrap:

Los Angeles Times Names Austin Beutner New CEO and Publisher — Beutner succeeds Eddy W. Hartenstein, who was the Times publisher for six years — Austin Beutner, the civic leader and former Wall Street investment banker, has been named the new publisher and chief executive officer …

Discussion: LA Observed, Los Angeles Times, @latimesrainey, The Daily Caller, Variety, Poynter and FishbowlNY

Nick Summers / The Next Web:

Ghost gives its blogging platform a huge upgrade before moving to a 2-4 week release cycle — Ghost has updated its open-source blogging platform with a bevy of technical improvements that should help it to compete with established competitors such as WordPress, Tumblr and Medium.

James Poniewozik / TIME:

Hashtag activism after a fatal police shooting serves as grassroots media criticism — IfTheyGunnedMeDown and What Hashtag Activism Does Right — Social media protests have their limits, but one thing they're very, very good at is grassroots media criticism. — The injury, a deadly one, came first.

Discussion: The Root, @tropicloner, The Verge, New York Times, @mtdukes, @jrphillips5, @wendi_c_thomas, @kellyosullivan, Race, On The Media and Daily Dot

Jeff Bercovici / Forbes:

A Year After Its Disastrous Launch, Bustle Is Doing Better Than OK — It would be hard to make a less auspicious entrance than the one Bustle, the women's general interest site started by Bleacher Report co-founder Bryan Goldberg, managed for itself one year ago.

Discussion: @mallelis, @jeffbercovici, @mallelis, @mallelis and @samstahl

Katharine Murphy / Guardian:

Australia's national security proposals will criminalise journalists, says union — Media Entertainment and Arts Alliance joins media companies to warn of ‘chilling effect’ on Australia's public-interest journalism — Australia's media union has warned the Abbott government's looming …

Discussion: @ms_em_ and @castancentre

Lucia Moses / Digiday:

Yahoo Finance reboots with unpaid contributor network on Tumblr — Yahoo Finance tries to reboot with a platform publishing model — Can Yahoo Finance get its groove back? The once-dominant online finance publisher is leaning on fellow Yahoo property Tumblr to power a revamped contributor network …