Mediagazer: New narrative journalism startups, like Latterly Magazine, launch as quickly as others fail in a crowded marketplace (Chris Ip/Columbia Journalism Review)

11:25 AM ET, December 3, 2014

Top News:

Sarah Ellison / Vanity Fair:

Behind First Look Media's inception, star hires, staff turmoil, and uncertain future — Can First Look Media Make Headlines That Aren't About Itself? — When a crusading but conflict-averse billionaire bankrolls several of journalism's most prominent mavericks to create …

Discussion: Poynter, @jayrosen_nyu, @miriamelder, @johnjcook, @davidfolkenflik, @ericuman, @sarahw, @seanmdav, @ericuman and @romenesko

Marlow Stern / The Daily Beast:

Q&A with Laura Poitras on privacy, Snowden documents, and startup hurdles at First Look Media — Laura Poitras on Snowden's Unrevealed Secrets — Filmmaker and journalist Laura Poitras, who first made contact with Snowden and captured his journey in the Oscar-worthy documentary Citizenfour, opens up about Obama and the NSA.

Discussion: @glinner and @glynmoody

Mike Fleming / Deadline:

In memo to staff, Sony execs Michael Lynton and Amy Pascal confirm confidential data was stolen — Sony's Michael Lynton & Amy Pascal On Hacking: “Malicious Criminal Acts” — EXCLUSIVE: Sony Pictures has been largely quiet as it has dealt with a massive pre-Thanksgiving cyberattack …

Discussion: Business Insider, Variety, Hollywood Reporter, Vulture, The Wrap and Los Angeles Times

Kevin Roose / Fusion:
More from the Sony Pictures hack: budgets, layoffs, HR scripts, and 3,800 social security numbers

Discussion: Business Insider, BBC, PandoDaily, Techdirt, Forbes, Talking Biz News, TorrentFreak, @kevinroose, BuzzFeed, Neowin, Variety, Businessweek, Mediaite, The Wrap, The Wrap, Mashable, @robhale77, Engadget, @pencilsareneat, TIME, @kashhill, @fredbenenson, Business Insider, @kevinroose and CNNMoney.com

Peter Sterne / Capital New York:

Gawker restructures editorial leadership, removing editorial director Joel Johnson, who remains at the company — Joel Johnson out as editor in Gawker management shake-up — Gawker is shaking up its editorial management structure, removing editorial director Joel Johnson and creating two new positions …

Discussion: bookforum.com, @nytfridge, @carlzimmer, @petersterne, @erikmal, @dylanbyers, @ceodonovan and @justinnxt

Jim Romenesko:
Gawker adds an executive editor and group managing editor, prepares for an ‘intense’ 2015

Discussion: The New York Observer, @gaberivera, @carigervin, @mathewi and @dansaltzstein

Megan Geuss / Ars Technica:

NYC public libraries will offer 10,000 portable WiFi hotspots for checkout to eligible patrons — New York Public Library will rent Wi-Fi hotspots to people who need it most — Sprint Wi-Fi hotspots will be funded partly by a $1 million donation from Google.

Discussion: Wall Street Journal, WNYC News, Fast Company, bizjournals, Neowin, 9to5Google, @corvida, 7online.com, DNAinfo New York and LJ INFOdocket

Chris Ip / Columbia Journalism Review:

New narrative journalism startups, like Latterly Magazine, launch as quickly as others fail in a crowded marketplace — New narrative journalism startups, like Latterly Magazine, launch as quickly as others fail in a crowded marketplace — Jill Abramson and Steven Brill's upcoming longform outfit …

Discussion: Medium and @sulliview

Sarah Perez / TechCrunch:

Vimeo Revamps Its Mobile Website, Adds Features For Logged Out Users — Video service Vimeo is out this morning with a faster, revamped mobile website that reduces clutter, improves performance and lets users interact with the service while logged out. On the updated site …

Discussion: The Next Web, SlashGear, Tubefilter and VentureBeat

Abigail Edge / Journalism.co.uk:

Ophan: Key metrics informing editorial at the Guardian — The outlet's in-house analytics platform, designed to promote the ‘democratisation of data’, recently launched new features including a bigger focus on attention time — Credit: Michael Bruntonspall on Flickr. Some rights reserved

Discussion: metamedia

Karl Bode / DSLreports:

Verizon's Tech News Website Sugarstring Quietly Dies — Verizon's experiment in technology blogging appears to be over. At the tail end of October news broke that Verizon would be entering the blogging business via a new website dubbed SugarString. The effort appeared to be Verizon's attempt …

Discussion: The Verge, New York Times, Gizmodo, PandoDaily, @taylorlorenz, @karlbode, @mmasnick, @paulwallbank, @caseynewton and Engadget

Jean Lee / The Daily Californian:

Regents approve $7,500 supplementary fee for UC Berkeley journalism school — At their Nov. 20 meeting, the UC Board of Regents approved the implementation of an annual supplemental fee of $7,500 on top of the current UC Berkeley Graduate School of Journalism basic tuition.

Wendy Davis / MediaPost:

Federal judge finds ESPN's transmission of Roku serial number to Adobe doesn't violate the Video Privacy Protection Act — ESPN Defeats Video Privacy Case — A federal judge in Seattle has dismissed a potential class-action lawsuit accusing ESPN of violating a federal video privacy law …

Jason Abbruzzese / Mashable:

Live from everywhere: ABC News journalists will stream video to your screen — ABC News is giving its journalists the ability to live stream video to viewers, embracing a popular tool among citizen journalists. — The project, called GoStream, will allow any of ABC's field journalists …