Mediagazer: Amazon Looking To The Wisdom Of Crowds To Find New Authors (John Biggs/TechCrunch)

5:20 PM ET, September 23, 2014

Top News:

Layoffs hit Freedom Communications as it ceases publication of L.A. Register — Layoffs hit the Orange County Register on Tuesday after owner Freedom Communications ceased publication of its Los Angeles daily five months after it debuted. — The number of layoffs wasn't immediately clear …

Discussion: New York Times, JIMROMENESKO.COM, Guardian, Associated Press, LA Observed, @dannysullivan, @earleyoc, @hillelaron, @lauraelizdavis, @mattdpearce, @jimbradysp, USA Today, @stevebuttry, @davidfolkenflik, LA Observed, Media Nation and Nieman Lab

Agence France-Presse:

Somali pirates release German-American journalist and writer Michael Scott Moore after more than two years — Somalia pirates release US-German hostage — Mogadishu (AFP) - Somali pirates on Tuesday freed a German-American journalist and writer, Michael Scott Moore …

Discussion: SFWeekly, Medium, New York Times, BBC, Associated Press, VICE News and Committee to Protect …

Leslie Kaufman / New York Times:

Dataminr, which detects breaking news on social media, now commercially available to news orgs — A New Tool Scours Social Media for Hot Tips — Earlier this year, several producers at CNN received an alert from a new digital news gathering tool that they were testing …

Discussion: @tvnewslab and The Next Web

Liam Dillon / Nieman Lab:

Behind the plans to turn San Diego's daily newspaper into a non-profit — What we know (and don't know) about the plan to make San Diego's daily a nonprofit — Editor's note: In San Diego, a philanthropist is talking about buying up the local daily and turning its ownership into a nonprofit model.

Discussion: @jayrosen_nyu, @niemanlab and Voice of San Diego

Ilya Khrennikov / Bloomberg:

News Corp, Pearson, and Axel Springer among firms that may have to sell their pieces of Russian media under draft law — Springer, Pearson Independence in Russia Tested by Media Bill — Russia's planned amendments to media law are threatening independent publications run by companies such as News Corp. …

Discussion: Reuters, New York Times and ITAR-TASS

Justin Ellis / Nieman Lab:

New York Times launches real-time aggregated feed of headlines, tweets, multimedia on homepage — Watching what happens: The New York Times is making a front-page bet on real-time aggregation — The rhythms of the homepage of NYTimes.com are by now familiar, even a little predictable.

Discussion: Capital New York, FishbowlNY, NetNewsCheck Latest, @jeffjohnroberts, @justinnxt, @brianboyer, New York Times Company, Politico, @jayrosen_nyu, New York Times and Cision

Todd Spangler / Variety:

Disney's Maker Studios Pacts with MiTú to Produce Latino YouTube Content — Maker Studios, the YouTube multichannel network owned by Disney, reached an exclusive deal with Latino-focused MCN MiTú to develop original and branded content aimed at the fast-growing U.S. Hispanic market.

Discussion: The Wrap

John Biggs / TechCrunch:

Amazon Looking To The Wisdom Of Crowds To Find New Authors — According to a Kindle Direct Publishing forum user, Amazon is quietly rolling out a way to find diamonds in the proverbial publishing rough. The unnamed project would bring a crowd approach to the acquisition of new titles using …

Discussion: The Digital Reader, Melville House Books and Publishers Weekly

Caroline O'Donovan / Nieman Lab:

A conversation with David Rose, little magazine veteran and publisher of Lapham's Quarterly — When I sat down with John Summers to talk about the publishing strategy of The Baffler, he told me that if I really wanted to understand the business of small magazines, there was one man I simply had to talk to — David Rose.

Economist:

Think-tank journalism: more to promote ideas and policy than to inform or expose wrongdoing — Think tanks and journalism: the divide between having ideas and reporting on them is dissolving — The divide between having ideas and reporting on them is dissolving

Jennifer Steinhauer / New York Times:

A Tailor-Made Publisher Taking Over Jeff Bezos' Washington Post — WASHINGTON — Frederick J. Ryan Jr. juggles black-tie invitations, while Jeff Bezos shuns the social limelight for reading about space travel. — Former colleagues of Mr. Ryan joke that for him casual Friday is a day without …

Discussion: @thefix, @nytimesbusiness, @abeaujon, The New York Observer and @markberman

Mark Sweney / Guardian:

Mashable appoints Blathnaid Healy and Tim Chester as Editor and Deputy Editor of UK site — Mashable appoints editor for new London office as UK audience grows — Social media site's first operation outside of US to be headed by Blathnaid Healy, with Tim Chester taking deputy editor role

Discussion: Mashable, FishbowlNY, Poynter, @adamostrow, @nycjim, @blathnaidhealy, @marklittlenews and @blathnaidhealy

Joan E. Solsman / CNET:

Vevo ramps up original programming, adds over 100 new episodes — Vevo original shows are multiplying — and getting animated — The streaming service is amping up its own original content with its programming slate so far, finding visitors spend more time when they have more than just slick music videos to dive into.