Arianna settles claim she stole idea for Huffington Post
A fight over the founding of the liberal new site HuffPo has ended in an “amicable” settlement. The case ends the possibility of a jury trial.
The end of tabloid papers and the new quest for media respectability
Tabloid newspapers have long used their powerful cover to influence and intimidate. Their looming disappearance raises interesting questions about what counts as highbrow and lowbrow media these days.
US writers on the take: how demand for more media content leads to more corruption
The government of Malaysia paid 10 media columnists to smear its political opponents on American media sites. It was able to pull this off, in part, because of online publications’ insatiable appetite for content.
Time Warner no longer believes in “invisible network”
Time Warner used to be the biggest media company in the world. But the invisible media networks like Google and Facebook changed the rules that Time Warner never learned.
Fixing online comments — how do you automate trust?
Jeff Atwood, co-founder of Stack Overflow, has launched a new platform that he hopes will improve the nature of online comments by adding trust metrics — but there are no shortcuts to healthy online communtiies.
NYT editor: Journalism pre-dates newspapers and will outlast newspapers
In a recent “Ask Me Anything” interview with Reddit users, the Washington bureau chief for the New York Times had some refreshingly reasonable things to say about how the web has helped improve journalism, and how the practice of journalism will survive even if newspapers don’t.
Martha Stewart’s modern media model
MSLO is struggling: The model is right but the persona has passed its prime.
Social, mobile media increase news role for mainstream
News consumption continues to move towards digital media, with social and mobile media starting to show notable adoption. But Twitter isn’t a mainstream news medium.
Today in Social
When AOL reported its quarterly earnings, it showed that overall online advertising was up 6 percent, but that was driven primarily by Europe and AOL’s ad networks. Its own display ad business was flat, and it blamed a continuing sales force reorganization. It claimed its hyperlocal Patch business will hit $40-50 million this year. Earlier, Yahoo said its display ad business was up 1 percent. Microsoft said its online advertising business was up 8 percent due to search, while display was down slightly. Together, the big portals’ display ad revenues are either flat or down. Google is probably up, but it doesn’t break out display from search, and we’re all waiting for Facebook to report tomorrow. If it turns out that Google and Facebook are the only big guys up double digits, that presents a pretty gloomy picture of online brand advertising. Both companies mostly sell direct-marketing ads that qualify as remnant inventory for brand-name publishers. Would putting together some of these weak sisters help accelerate the business?
Handicapping Microsoft’s media business
Microsoft’s struggles to make a successful business out of advertising led to the company posting its first-ever quarterly loss. Some have been saying for years Microsoft should never have gotten into media. Is it about to get out?