Mediagazer: New milestone: Amazon stock surpass $400 for first time ever (Taylor Soper/GeekWire)

5:35 PM ET, December 20, 2013

Top News:

Jim Kennedy / News Corp:

News Corp Acquires Social News Agency Storyful — Accelerating News Corp's digital transformation and video strategy, the company has acquired Storyful, the world's first social news agency. — Building on Storyful's skill in finding verified news amidst the noise of social media …

Ingrid Lunden / TechCrunch:

News Corp Pays $25M For Storyful, Which Digs Up And Verifies News From Social Sites Like Twitter And Instagram — News Corp is raising its game in digital news again: the company has just announced that it is acquiring Storyful, a Ireland-based “village square” for social media news …

Discussion: Wired, @coreypein, @raju and @erichippeau

Mathew Ingram / Gigaom:

Raju Narisetti talks about why News Corp. bought Storyful and founder Mark Little talks about why he sold — We've written before about how crowdsourced verification of user-generated content is a significant trend in new media, and Storyful has been at the forefront of that wave since before most people had even heard the term.

Discussion: @raju and Online NewsHour

Andrew Beaujon / Poynter: Storyful CEO: ‘We want to be in every newsroom in the world’

Michael Calderone / The Huffington Post:

Washington Post's Ezra Klein Considering Starting New Venture — NEW YORK — Ezra Klein, a top Washington Post policy writer and editor of the paper's Wonkblog, is currently speaking to outside suitors about starting a new media venture, according to a source familiar with the matter.

Discussion: City Desk, @mattgertz, @mathewi and @thestalwart

Gautham Nagesh / Wall Street Journal:

FCC Approves Gannett-Belo, Tribune-Local TV Deals — $1.5 Billion Gannett-Belo Deal Would Affect 20 Stations in 15 Markets … The Federal Communications Commission on Friday approved two major deals involving local television stations that will add to consolidation in the media market.

Discussion: Broadcasting & Cable, NetNewsCheck Latest, Bloomberg and TVSpy

Meg James / Los Angeles Times:

FCC approves Tribune Co. purchase of 16 stations from Local TV — The FCC on Friday approved Tribune Co.'s planned acquisition of 16 TV stations owned by Local TV Holdings. Above, Tribune Tower, the company's headquarters, on Michigan Avenue in Chicago. (Scott Olson / Getty Images / December 20, 2013)

Free Press:

A Sorry Moment in the History of American Media — We just experienced a shameful milestone in the history of U.S. media — and barely anyone noticed. — There are now zero black-owned and operated full-power TV stations in our country. — This sorry state of affairs is the culmination …

Andrew Beaujon / Poynter:

Report: No black-owned full-power TV stations remain in U.S. — The planned sale of Roberts Broadcasting's remaining stations means there are “zero black-owned and operated full-power TV stations in our country,” Free Press' Joseph Torres and S. Derek Turner write.

Discussion: TVSpy and St. Louis Post-Dispatch

Cory Haik / Nieman Journalism Lab:

News that anticipates the reader's needs — The year 2014 is going to be all about you. And me. And him and her. It's going to be all about all of us — and what we are doing on all our devices. The job in news is to be exactly there for people, no matter what they're doing or where they're doing it …

Discussion: @sclary, @mims and The Public Editor's Journal

Elizabeth Green / Nieman Journalism Lab:

The continued rise of single-subject sites — Five years ago, when I first started building the news organization that my colleagues and I now call Chalkbeat (then known as GothamSchools), a friend asked me an innocent question. “So you cover education now. But what will your next beat be?”

Discussion: @davidepstein and @niemanlab

Keith J. Kelly / New York Post:

Maxim magazine sale to Darden Media reportedly collapses — Darden not Alpha enough to nail Maxim mag — Negotiations by Darden Media to buy Maxim and its parent, Alpha Media, have collapsed, sources tell Media Ink. — Cerberus Capital Management, Alpha's majority owner …

Discussion: FishbowlNY

Roy Greenslade / Guardian:

Media coverage of Saatchi and Lawson evidence flirted with contempt — The frenzied dissection of the witnesses' testimony in the Grillo sisters' fraud trial held up all concerned to public mockery — The trial of the Grillo sisters was covered by the media with a greater intensity …

Discussion: Softpedia News, Reuters, Latest News & Headlines and Variety

Lance Ulanoff / Mashable:

Walt Mossberg: The Exit Interview — At an age when some may consider spending more time practicing their golf swing or perfecting their poker face, tech journalist Walt Mossberg is about to embark on what may be his biggest adventure yet. After 22 years as The Wall Street Journal's personal …

Discussion: @pkafka and Talking Biz News

Taylor Soper / GeekWire:

New milestone: Amazon stock surpass $400 for first time ever — This summer, Amazon.com's stock hit $300 for the first time. — Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos with the Kindle Fire HDX 8.9″. — Now, five months later, it has reached a new milestone: $400.

Discussion: VentureBeat

Aditya Kishore / Guardian:

Battleground Britain: who will dominate UK video streaming? — Aditya Kishore analyses the battle for video streaming dominance in extremely competitive UK market place — Clearly, Netflix dominates the US home video market: More than 30 million households subscribe to the service …

Alan Rusbridger / Guardian:

Guardian editor contrasts the U.S. public debate after NSA leaks with Britain's apathy — Obama's NSA review gives the lie to Britain's timid platitudes: a debate is possible — In the US, the official response to Snowden's revelations celebrates journalism and calls for real change.

Discussion: Capital New York, Kirk LaPointe's …, Press Gazette, @ggreenwald, @glynmoody, @antloewenstein, @robobr7, @juliansimpson1, @jeffjarvis, The Daily Caller and Wired

Daniel Reimold / Poynter:

Singaporean government bureaucracy effectively closes news site — I am in Singapore at the moment, by chance witnessing the death and dismemberment of a popular online news outlet. — I have seen scant outside coverage of this rather strange, censorious saga, so I'm writing a tiny bit about it in hopes of helping spread the word.

Discussion: @poynter