Mediagazer: Comcast CEO says the company plans to debut a wireless service by mid-2017, using leased Verizon airwaves and Comcast's 14M+ Wi-Fi hot spots (Chris Welch/The Verge)

1:20 PM ET, September 21, 2016

Top News:

CNN says reports of Lewandowski suspension are untrue while the Trump campaign says it will continue to pay him through remainder of 2016 — Donald Trump's former campaign manager Corey Lewandowski will be paid by the campaign through the end of 2016, heightening concerns of a conflict of interest for CNN …

Charley Lanyon / New York Magazine:

Fox says it didn't know about Sean Hannity's appearance in recent Trump campaign video, says the network star will not appear in any in future — Fox has confirmed that it did not know about a recent Trump promotional video featuring Sean Hannity, and that Hannity would not be appearing in similar videos in the future.

Discussion: Washington Post, CNNMoney, Politico, @rosiegray, @eleutheria_heis, @ericboehlert, @ybbkaren, @kagrox, @timobrien, @tomkludt and @fmanjoo

Washington Post:

Trump's Federal Election Commission filing shows former campaign manager Corey Lewandowski received $20K for strategy consulting in August while working for CNN — Last month at this time, regular readers will recall, we posed this question: Donald Trump is finally raising money. So why isn't he spending it?

Discussion: @mateagold, @bterris, @mikemadden, @philiprucker and @karol

Kurt Wagner / Recode:

Twitter will live stream Bloomberg's coverage of all three presidential debates, split revenue from ads displayed during pre-debate and post-debate coverage — Hillary versus Trump, live on Twitter. — When Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump square off in their first nationally televised presidential debate …

Discussion: CNNMoney, FishbowlNY, Fast Company, Media Wire Daily, LostRemote, TechCrunch, The Verge, @harrymccracken, @ninatypewriter, @niketa, @brianstelter and @digiphile

Sarah Perez / TechCrunch:
ABC News teams up with Facebook to live stream the 2016 general election debates

Discussion: Nieman Lab, The Hill, Variety, Fortune, The Next Web, The Week, Mashable, Wall Street Journal, Engadget, SocialTimes, The Verge, CNNMoney and Variety

Tony Maglio / The Wrap:

Viacom's interim CEO and President Tom Dooley will depart November 15, as search for permanent CEO continues — Viacom's new interim CEO and president Tom Dooley is set to exit the company — yes, already. — Additionally, the company announced on Wednesday that it has dropped …

Discussion: Ad Age, Broadcasting & Cable, Hollywood Reporter, Variety, Business Wire, @edmundlee, @ej_fournier, @edmundlee, @alexweprin and @alexweprin

Chris Welch / The Verge:

Comcast CEO says the company plans to debut a wireless service by mid-2017, using leased Verizon airwaves and Comcast's 14M+ Wi-Fi hot spots — Comcast just solidified long-rumored plans to launch its own MVNO cellular service. Speaking at an investor conference moments ago …

Discussion: Broadcasting & Cable, Crain's New York Business, Fast Company, Tech Times and Ad Age

Jim Milliot / Publishers Weekly:

AAP: mass market paperback sales down 25.5% YoY in Q1 2016, as decline in e-book sales continues — Sales of adult books fell 10.3% in the first quarter of 2016, compared to the first period of 2015. Sales of children's/YA titles dipped 2.1%, according to figures released by the AAP's StatShot program.

Discussion: GalleyCat

Danielle Bacher / Esquire:

Behind Andrea Tantaros' $49M suit against Fox News; in run-up to suspension from the network, Tantaros accused both Ailes, Bill O'Reilly of sexual harassment — One evening this past April, Andrea Tantaros returned to her Manhattan apartment from a yoga class and picked out a series of outfits for the week ahead.

Thanks:@msebastian

Mike Klein / Sunlight Foundation Blog:

Sunlight Foundation exploring merger or alliances with other organizations, will discontinue tool building and database maintenance, will retire OpenCongress — The board of directors of the Sunlight Foundation has reached some important conclusions about our future.

Benjamin Mullin / Poynter:
Source: Sunlight Foundation will lay off about five staffers out of about 20, a major drop from a staff count of about 40 in early 2014

Discussion: @emptywheel, @digiphile and @eads

Patrick Foster / Telegraph:

Leaked PricewaterhouseCoopers report shows BBC journalists are paid up to 40% more than commercial rivals — BBC journalists are paid up to forty per cent more than their competitors in the commercial sector, according to a leaked review of salaries in the corporation's news division.

Discussion: @janemartinson, Press Gazette, @stuartclarkson and Daily Mail

Todd Spangler / Variety:

Netflix CFO David Wells says company wants original content to make up 50% of its catalog within a few years, is currently “one-third to halfway” toward target — Netflix is driving toward having half the content on its streaming service be original productions over the next few years …

Discussion: TechCrunch, @jembradshaw, Vanity Fair, Consumerist, MacRumors and Engadget

Matthew Weaver / Guardian:

Editor of Norway's Aftenposten Espen Egil Hansen challenges Mark Zuckerberg to discuss Facebook's control of news and content — Head of Aftenposten, which forced backdown over ‘napalm girl’ photo, accuses Facebook founder of hiding from debate — The Norwegian editor who successfully took …

Discussion: Guardian, @eghan, @anupkaphle, @journalismfest, @openrightsgroup and @holpuch

Josh Constine / TechCrunch:
Delay in surfacing police shooting of Terence Crutcher underscores need for Facebook to reexamine Trending Topics

Discussion: Fusion, @joshconstine, @web, @jguynn, @tayhatmaker, @joshconstine and @joshconstine

Roger Cheng / CNET:

AT&T CEO says company will launch online streaming video service, DirecTV Now, in Q4, will feature 100+ premium channels and “aggressive” price points — Not a fan of your cable provider? AT&T is prepping an alternative for you. The Dallas-based telecommunications giant plans …

Jordan Cohen / The New York Times Company:

The New York Times partners with Google Jigsaw for comment moderation, sharing comment archive with Jigsaw and using predictive models to help moderators — The New York Times is working together with Jigsaw, a technology incubator at Alphabet, Google's parent company, to improve and expand its comments section.