Mediagazer: MetaFilter, launched in 1999, recovers from traffic drop, updates UI, but still struggles with revenue (Ricardo Bilton/Digiday)

4:25 AM ET, September 30, 2014

Top News:

Netflix, Weinstein Co. to simultaneously release “Crouching Tiger” sequel on Netflix and IMAX — With ‘Crouching Tiger’ Sequel, Netflix Takes Aim at Hollywood — In a first deal of its kind, Netflix and the Weinstein Company said Monday that they planned to release next year's sequel …

Discussion: Variety, Deadline, The Huffington Post, Inside Movies, TVbytheNumbers, The Verge, Re/code, BBC, Hollywood Reporter, Bloomberg, @netflix, Engadget and The Wrap

Ben Sisario / New York Times:

Judge Rules Against Grooveshark in Copyright Infringement Case — In the music industry's second big legal victory in a week, a federal judge in New York ruled on Monday that Grooveshark, an online music service long vilified by the major record companies, infringed on thousands of their copyrights.

Discussion: Reuters, Engadget, VentureBeat, TorrentFreak, @pkafka, @xor, @managingip and Billboard

Wall Street Journal:

SoftBank, DreamWorks Animation Talks Cool — Two Sides Still Could Renew Talks or Agree on a Content Partnership — SoftBank Corp.'s discussions to acquire DreamWorks Animation SKG Inc. have cooled, according to people familiar with the matter, less than two days after word first emerged of the talks.

Discussion: The Wrap, New York Times, Deadline, smartcompany.com.au and Business Insider

Ben Sisario / New York Times:

eMusic will no longer offer songs from big labels, focusing only on indies starting Oct. 1 — EMusic Returns to Indie Roots Amid Shift in Online Market — EMusic, a pioneering digital music store that has struggled to find its place in the rapidly shifting online market, has changed directions again.

Discussion: Engadget and Gigaom

Ricardo Bilton / Digiday:

MetaFilter, launched in 1999, recovers from traffic drop, updates UI, but still struggles with revenue — Web 1.0 dinosaur Metafilter modernizes, slowly — MetaFilter calls to mind a bygone Internet age. Launched in 1999, the quaintly self-styled “community weblog” …

Discussion: @digiday

Deron Lee / Columbia Journalism Review:

How Iowa reporters are teaming up to cover a tight Senate race — Eight papers use a new transparency tool to get a handle on the political ad wars — PRAIRIE VILLAGE, KS — Politics has long been a key beat for Iowa media. But today, political campaigns in the Hawkeye State …

Joshua Benton / Nieman Lab:

The Guardian has a new format for liveblogs to make them more readable — The Guardian has a new setup for its liveblogs that aims to fix some of their eternal problems — chief among them that they're great for in-the-moment following along, but cryptic and unnavigable after the fact:

Discussion: Capital New York and next.theguardian.com

Michael Rondon / Folio:

Survey: city and regional mags rely on print revenue heavily; 40% plan new print products — The 2014 City & Regional Magazine Survey — How long can print carry the market? — Print may be dying, but it's still lively enough to carry the city and regional magazine industry.

Discussion: @mediatronic

Brendan Nyhan / New York Times:

Emergent is a tool that tracks data to collect and debunk false news reports in social media — Why Rumors Outrace the Truth Online — It's no surprise that interesting and unusual claims are often the most widely circulated articles on social media. Who wants to share boring stuff?

Discussion: @emergentdotinfo and New York Magazine

Andrew Nusca / Fortune:

In the fight against clickbait, Chartbeat pursues attention metric — Chartbeat, a web analytics company that serves online publishers, believes it has a better way to measure readers' attention. There aren't many things that can capture a busy journalist's attention. A juicy scoop, for one.

Discussion: The Next Web, @macdiva, Chartbeat Blog, Gigaom, @mccarthyryanj, @megan and @mathewi

David Streitfeld / New York Times:

Literary Lions Unite in Protest Over Amazon's E-Book Tactics — The authors are uniting. — Last spring, when Amazon began discouraging customers from buying books published by Hachette, the writers grumbled that they were pawns in the retailer's contract negotiations over e-book prices.

Discussion: Melville House Books, @dannysullivan, @marykarrlit, @electriclit, Gawker, @hawthornebooks, Consumerist, @siejames, Engadget, ThinkProgress, @upstreamism, The Awl, @aburnspolitico and @michaelpaulson

Todd Spangler / Variety:

Thom Yorke Solo Album 'Tomorrow's Modern Boxes' Downloaded 400,000 Times Over Weekend via BitTorrent — Downloads of Radiohead frontman Thom Yorke's first solo album in eight years, “Tomorrow's Modern Boxes,” topped 400,000 in the first three days of he surprised fans with its release on the BitTorrent file-sharing network.

Discussion: USA Today and NME

Variety:

Instagram, Chinese Media Restricted as Hong Kong Riots — Media in mainland China has limited its coverage of the severe social unrest taking place on the streets of Hong Kong. — In contrast, Hong Kong and international media have been carrying non-stop reports from the barricades …