Mediagazer: Pandora launches Pandora Plus, its $5/month ad-free service that also gives users offline playback, more song skips and replays (Sarah Perez/TechCrunch)

2:50 PM ET, October 12, 2016

Top News:

Sarah Perez / TechCrunch:

Amazon launches Music Unlimited, a subscription streaming service that costs $4/month for Echo owners, $8/month for Prime members, and $10/month for all others — Rumors have been swirling around Amazon's plans to launch its own, standalone music streaming service, and now those reports …

Sarah Perez / TechCrunch:

Pandora launches Pandora Plus, its $5/month ad-free service that also gives users offline playback, more song skips and replays — Pandora is not taking today's debut of Amazon's new, on-demand music streaming service lying down. The company has conveniently timed the launch of its own new paid tier …

Discussion: Pandora Blog, RAIN News, VentureBeat and Variety

Brian Stelter / CNNMoney:

Sources: Billy Bush to be dropped from NBC's Today show; one source says announcement will happen “in the coming days” — On Saturday night NBC was going to throw a surprise party for Billy Bush in Greenwich Village. Now it has been cancelled. — “Surprise,” indeed.

David Bixenspan / LawNewz:

Gawker Media files new motion as part of bankruptcy proceedings, asking court to authorize investigation into Peter Thiel's financing of lawsuits against it — On Tuesday, Gawker Media, the largely defunct media company that recently sold most of its assets to Univision at auction …

Discussion: Wall Street Journal and Hollywood Reporter

Benjamin Mullin / Poynter:

Wall Street Journal Editor-in-Chief Gerard Baker tells reporters writing must be sharper, shorter, and more creative as newsroom turns focus to digital — The Wall Street Journal is in the middle of a newsroom overhaul. And, according to its top editor, that transformation will include a sharper focus on cutting out editorial flab.

Discussion: @charliebeckett, @itsren, @jonathanhaynes, @brizzyc, @jdye, @bristei and @lydiadepillis

Benjamin Mullin / Poynter:

Newsroom memo: Huffington Post's Executive Editor Liz Heron is departing the site — Liz Heron, managing editor of The Huffington Post, is leaving that organization about a year after being appointed the newsroom's second-in-command. — Heron was hired on in September 2015 after serving …

Discussion: Liz Heron, FishbowlNY, The Wrap, Editor & Publisher, @mlcalderone and Politico

Ricardo Bilton / Nieman Lab:

California news site Berkeleyside launches a direct public offering, giving readers a chance to invest, with up to $800K in preferred stock available — Based solely on the numbers, the Green Bay Packers shouldn't exist. Its stadium, Lambeau Field, has a max capacity of 81,435 people …

Benjamin Mullin / Poynter:

BuzzFeed aims to grow commerce revenue with Shop BuzzFeed, its online shop which sells merchandise created by the site's illustrators and designers — If you like your socks with milkshakes and French fries, good news: BuzzFeed has a store for you. — This summer, the online news …

Discussion: Business Insider

Philip Bump / Washington Post:

How Newsweek journalist Kurt Eichenwald implied connections among Trump, WikiLeaks, and Russia that don't hold up under scrutiny — This tweet, retweeted thousands of times, is at best misleading. … Kurt Eichenwald is a reporter and writer who has been dogged in looking at Donald Trump over the course of the campaign.

Caitlin Dewey / Washington Post:

The Washington Post tracked Facebook's Trending Topics section over three weeks, uncovering five fake stories and three profoundly inaccurate ones — The Intersect ran a little experiment a few weeks ago: During the work day, we'd check in with Facebook each hour, on the hour …

Discussion: Gizmodo, @mlcalderone, @vijayshekhar, @laurahelmuth, @caitlindewey, @brendannyhan, @mantzarlis and Mother Jones

Ken Yeung / VentureBeat:

Google acquires FameBit to better connect YouTube creators with brands — Google announced on Tuesday that it has acquired FameBit, with plans to leverage its technology platform to help YouTube creators better connect with brands. Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed.

Discussion: YouTube Blog, Variety, ClickZ, Wall Street Journal, @pakman, Michael Jones, The Blog for the #1 …, ZDNet, Recode, The Wrap, Business Insider, 9to5Google, @famebit, @nealmohan, @seajayinla, @dipson, @peterpham, Engadget, Hollywood Reporter, The Verge and TechCrunch

Todd Spangler / Variety:

Playboy launches nudity-free magazine on Apple iTunes, Google Play stores, available for $5.99 per issue or $17.99 per year — Playboy's 63-year-old magazine — recently stripped of nude pictorials — is now an app. — Playboy Enterprises is selling digital copies of the Hugh Hefner's …

Discussion: FishbowlNY

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Eriq Gardner / Hollywood Reporter:
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Sam Machkovech / Ars Technica:
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Discussion: Radio & Television …, CBS Philly, BGR and Variety

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Discussion: @wireduk

From Techmeme:

Mark Gurman / Bloomberg:
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