Mediagazer: President Trump says he will not attend White House Correspondents' Association Dinner this year; WHCA president says the dinner will still go ahead on April 29 (Martin Pengelly/The Guardian)

3:50 PM ET, February 26, 2017

Top News:

Martin Pengelly / The Guardian:

President Trump says he will not attend White House Correspondents' Association Dinner this year; WHCA president says the dinner will still go ahead on April 29 — Donald Trump on Saturday capped a week of tumultuous relations with the press by saying he will not attend …

Annie Karni / Politico:

Sources: Sean Spicer warns staff against leaking to media in a meeting that included a check of phones, saying apps like Confide and Signal violate Records Act — The push includes random phone checks overseen by White House lawyers. — Press Secretary Sean Spicer is cracking …

Discussion: Mediaite, @maggienyt, Newser, New York Magazine, @tripgabriel, The Hill, The Slot, Politicus USA, @erinscafe, @erinscafe, @realdanlyons, @katieglueck, @lrozen, @arimelber, @lpdonovan, @jeffbercovici, @davidenrich, @wakeup2politics, @mikiebarb, @braddjaffy and Axios

Carole Cadwalladr / The Guardian:

How Robert Mercer steers politics through Facebook data and media, using Cambridge Analytica, Breitbart, the Media Research Center, aid to Leave.EU, and more — With links to Donald Trump, Steve Bannon and Nigel Farage, the rightwing US computer scientist is at the heart of a multimillion-dollar propaganda network

Oliver Darcy / Business Insider:

Sources: Gretchen Carlson is in talks to join MSNBC; the former Fox News anchor settled a sexual harassment lawsuit against Roger Ailes for $20M last year — Gretchen Carlson, who settled a multi-million lawsuit late last year against former Fox News chief Roger Ailes …

Discussion: The Hill, New York Daily News, Daily Mail, Mediaite, @imillhiser and @brucebartlett

Greg Miller / Washington Post:

Sources: Trump administration got senior members of intelligence community and Congress to call news outlets to challenge stories about Trump's ties to Russia — The Trump administration has enlisted senior members of the intelligence community and Congress in efforts to counter news stories …

Discussion: Wall Street Journal, The Guardian, Fortune, @gideonresnick, New York Times, @braddjaffy and Vanity Fair

New York Times:

A frustrated Trump, used to controlling media with strategic tabloid leaks, ramps up attacks on an entrenched White House press corps and broader media — WASHINGTON — The White House press secretary, Sean Spicer, has taken to slapping journalists who write unflattering stories with an epithet …

Discussion: CNNMoney, Mediaite, @radhikajones, @mathieuvonrohr, @maggienyt, @jmseabrook, @radhikajones, @ariannahuff, @jonathanwpeters, @markberman, @nils_gilman, @danawollman, @markharrisnyc, @jerometaylor, @adamnagourney, @jayrosen_nyu and @maggienyt

CNN:

Kurdish reporter Shifa Gardi killed in Iraq — (CNN)A reporter and anchor for an Iraqi Kurdish TV station was killed Saturday while working on the front lines as Iraqi forces battle ISIS for the city of Mosul. — Shifa Gardi, 30, a beloved journalist in a male-dominated profession …

Discussion: Rudaw, ITV, @bayanrahman, @sommervillebbc, BBC, The Sun, Daily Mail, Mirror.co.uk, @zainabsalbi, @qubadjt, Yahoo! News, RT, Committee to Protect …, Al Jazeera English and Al Jazeera English

Spiegel Online:

Documents show Germany's foreign intelligence agency, the BND, spied on the phones, faxes, and emails of foreign journalists over several years — Germany's foreign intelligence agency, the BND, apparently spied on large numbers of foreign journalists overseas over the course of several years …

Discussion: DER SPIEGEL, DW.COM, @mathieuvonrohr, @eff, @sunnysingh_n6, RT, Daily Mail, New York Times, The Independent and Washington Post

Benjamin Mullin / Poynter:

Interview with Mashable CCO on how beats, quality over quantity, and focus have increased unique views by 78% YoY and video views by 452% YoY to 320M/month — Last year, Mashable laid off about two-dozen employees, cutting its politics and international reporters in a push for more video.

Max Cea / Salon:

How an emphasis on web traffic and the recent departure of two music critics have affected The New York Times' dwindling jazz coverage — What changes in music coverage at The New York Times mean for jazz — Given the typical adversarial rendering of critics by artists — pedantic …

Boris Kachka / Vulture:

Exploring why New York Times theater critic Charles Isherwood was fired after a management search of his work email — Charles Isherwood woke up on the morning of February 3 with one of the best jobs in the country: second-string theater critic for the New York Times.

Discussion: @maxfalkowitz, @kevinpokeeffe, @vulture, @stacylemelle, @bringsjohn, @felixsalmon and @tedgioia

Ken Yeung / VentureBeat:

Twitter opens up Periscope Producer to all users; the service lets broadcasters incorporate live video from sources other than their mobile device — After four months of being slowly released, Twitter announced that its Periscope Producer service is now available to everyone …

Discussion: @periscopehelp and Digital Trends

Lyz Lenz / Columbia Journalism Review:

Profile of Texas Monthly's Pamela Colloff, whose true crime stories, oral histories, political profiles have earned her a reputation as a virtuoso of longform — Unemployed college graduate Pamela Colloff and her friend Margaret Brown in 1994 set off from New York on a road trip in a rusty Volvo with no real destination in mind.

Discussion: @prempanicker