Mediagazer: Amazon's crowdsourced publishing platform will launch soon for mystery, romance and sci-fi authors (Laura Hazard Owen/Gigaom)

1:05 PM ET, October 2, 2014

Top News:

A mixed bag on apps: What The New York Times learned with NYT Opinion and NYT Now — The New York Times' announcement today that it was cutting 100 positions in its newsroom was coupled with changes to two of its most closely watched experiments, each just a few months old: NYT Now and NYT Opinion.

Emily Steel / New York Times:

With Four New Adam Sandler Films, Netflix Takes Aim at Theaters — Netflix plans to announce on Thursday that it has struck a deal with the comedian Adam Sandler to produce and star in four new feature films that will appear exclusively on the streaming service.

Discussion: Netflix, Variety, Forbes, The Wrap, Hollywood Reporter, @noahshachtman, @andygreenwald, @ditzkoff, UPROXX, Gigaom and Engadget

Eriq Gardner / Hollywood Reporter:

Google threatened with $100M lawsuit for failure to remove nude images of hacked celebrities — Celebrities Threaten “Despicable” Google for “Facilitating” Hacked Nude Photos — In a letter that rips Google for acting “like the NFL” and turning a blind eye, a lawyer representing celebrities warns of consequences

Krishnadev Calamur / NPR:

One System, Two Media: How China, Hong Kong Are Covering The Protests — Hong Kong media are providing wall-to-wall coverage of the protests calling for the resignation of Chief Executive Leung Chun-ying, but in mainland China there has been little to no mention of the unrest.

Discussion: New Yorker and Agence France-Presse

Ingrid Lunden / TechCrunch:

Twitter UK TV Ratings Go Live This Month, The First Of 6 New Markets With Kantar — Twitter is today putting in place the latest piece of its global “social TV” strategy, which involves measuring how its users share and discuss TV programs and related content on Twitter's network.

Discussion: Telecompaper, Broadband TV News and Rapid TV News

Peter Kafka / Re/code:

The NFL's Flirtation With the Web Is Over (For Now) — One day, a tech giant like Google or Apple might stream pro football games to American homes. But not anytime soon: DirecTV has renewed its deal to carry the NFL's “Sunday Ticket” subscription package.

Discussion: @pkafka

David D. Kirkpatrick / New York Times:

Egypt Seizes Newspapers to Censor an Article — CAIRO — The Egyptian authorities on Wednesday confiscated all the copies of one of the country's largest private newspapers in order to censor an article, just days after President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi vowed in an American television interview that there was …

Discussion: @nervana_1, The Newspaper Guild, @rajivwashpost and Daily News Egypt

Laura Hazard Owen / Gigaom:

Amazon's crowdsourced publishing platform will launch soon for mystery, romance and sci-fi authors — Amazon's crowdsourced publishing initiative is for romance, mystery/thriller and sci-fi/fantasy authors, and will open to the public in a couple of weeks. Separately, Amazon is launching a community called WriteOn.

Discussion: Publishers Weekly and The Digital Reader

Denise Lavoie / Associated Press:

New York Post settles lawsuit over “bag men” cover — BOSTON (AP) — The New York Post has settled a defamation lawsuit over a cover three days after the Boston Marathon bombing that featured a photo of two Massachusetts residents with the headline “Bag Men.” — Neither side would disclose terms of the settlement.

Discussion: Washington Post, FishbowlNY, Washington Post and Mediaite

Tim Peterson / AdAge:

Ready for a Vice Talk Show? Vice News to Develop Scheduled Live Shows With Skype — Weighing Two Talk Show Formats to Involve Its Audience — Vice News has gained attention with long live feeds from Ferguson, Mo., but is now moving to also schedule live programming online. — Hispanic Fact Pack 2014

Discussion: Media Week

Variety:

SoftBank Investing $250 Million in Legendary, Forms Joint Venture — Japanese banking and technology giant SoftBank Corp. has closed a deal to invest $250 million in Legendary Entertainment. As part of the pact, the companies will form a joint venture designed to promote and create business opportunities …

Discussion: The Wrap, Deadline, Wall Street Journal, Bloomberg, New York Times, Reuters, StreamDaily and Engadget

National Union of Journalists:

NUJ calls for urgent investigation of RIPA's use to spy on journalists — The NUJ has condemned a further case in which police have misused the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act (RIPA) in order to secretly access material from journalists and their sources.

Discussion: Guardian, Gravesend Reporter and Guardian

Dominic Ponsford / Press Gazette:

£600k salary for outgoing Newsquest chief Paul Davidson as company makes £53m profit in 2013 — The UK's third largest newspaper group Newsquest made an operating profit last year of £52.8m on turnover of £289m. — Both profit and turnover were down from the 2012 totals …

Discussion: Guardian

Jim Milliot / Publishers Weekly:

HarperCollins increases royalty rate by 10% on direct sale print, digital, and audio — HC Offering Authors Direct Sales Option, Higher Royalty — HarperCollins is ramping up its direct sales efforts by giving its authors the chance to earn a higher royalty rate by selling their titles directly to consumers.

Discussion: Gigaom, Publishers Lunch and Digital Book World

Lisa O'Carroll / Guardian:

Sun journalist faces retrial over alleged payment to police officer — Jury fails to reach a verdict on first journalist to be charged under Met police's Operation Elveden — The first Sun journalist to be charged for payments to police leaking stories will face a retrial after a jury failed to reach a verdict at the Old Bailey.

Andrew Chung / Reuters:

Sirius XM will appeal copyright ruling in $100 million lawsuit — Satellite radio provider Sirius XM Holdings Inc will appeal a California federal judge's decision finding it liable of copyright infringement for airing pre-1972 songs by the band, The Turtles, and failing to pay royalties.

Discussion: Radio Ink Magazine, AllAccess.com and Wall Street Journal

Press Association:

Music consumption helps drive UK technology sales by £11bn — Each 1% increase in demand for music translates to 1.4% boost in sales of smartphones and 2.2% for tablets, study finds — Music consumption in the UK has had the knock-on effect of driving technology sales to the tune …

Discussion: allmediascotland, Music Ally, Music-News.com and Herald Scotland

Nic Christensen / mUmBRELLA:

BBC ramps up Australian online news operation — The BBC is following its British counterparts The Guardian and The Daily Mail in ramping up its Australian news operation, but will look to add a more international perspective to local news. — As part of the push the British public broadcaster …

Reuters:

France's Orange to market Netflix in November - CEO — France's biggest telecom operator Orange has reached an agreement with Netflix to offer the video streaming service on its set-top boxes from November, its chief executive Stephane Richard told Le Monde newspaper on Wednesday.

Discussion: The Next Web and Bloomberg