Marco Arment sees a bright future for read-it-later services, and says that Instapaper’s acquisition by Betaworks will allow it to get some new features that he hasn’t had time to add. Read more »
New media incubator Betaworks has acquired Marco Arment’s popular read-it-later platform Instapaper. Betaworks acquired Digg last year, and the firm is focusing on both short-form and long-form content companies. Read more »
Blip used to be just another video hosting site trying to compete with YouTube. These days, it’s looking very different – and it’s getting ready to take on cable TV. Read more »
Amazon delivered its Q1 2013 earnings report Thursday afternoon, beating analyst expectations. In its release, which comes a day after renewed reports of an Amazon set-top box, the company highlighted its original television programming initiatives. Read more at GigaOM »
The New York Times is planning new lower-priced digital subscriptions for certain types of digital content. Executives provided some — but not many details on the company’s earnings call. Read more »
Google has published new numbers that show how governments around the world are asking to remove more content from services like YouTube than ever before. Read more at GigaOM »
Citia, a New York-based startup formerly known for its ebook apps, is expanding into new content areas. The company is behind Snoop’s new “Reincarnated: Track Notes” app, out today, and is also expanding from iPad to iPhone and the web. Read more »
Dallas-based book startup BookShout has raised $6 million in its second funding round. When the company launched, it allowed users to import their Nook and Kindle books onto the platform, but that function has been turned off. Read more »
Drippler arrives on iOS after racking up 5 million downloads on Android. The goal is to automatically curate content relevant to an iPhone user based on their device model, carrier, software version and app preferences. Read more »
The New York Times’s latest quarterly earnings estimates slightly missed analysts’ expectations. The company also announced a new plan to offer a variety of new, lower-priced digital products. Read more »
The European Commission has formally revealed the concessions Google is offering to make in order to settle an antitrust investigation over its search practices. Interested parties have a month to comment. Read more »
TV is fundamentally changing from a linear delivery model to a world in which apps compete with each other, and Netflix is spending billions to be part of that future. Read more »
A plan to make out-of-state internet merchants collect taxes could soon become law. Is the law simple fairness or does it mean more tax and regulation? Read more at GigaOM »
One thing that emerged from our media conference was that there is no single solution when it comes to the future of content, or the monetization of media — and that is probably a good thing. Read more »
Tumblr wants users to discover content by themselves, rather than pushing it out to them. The updates to its iOS app Wednesday are aimed at helping users share and save Tumblr posts. Read more »
The Twitter account of the Associated Press has been restored nearly 20 hours after it was suspended following a hacking incident. But, as of Wednesday morning, 95 percent of its followers are missing. Read more at GigaOM »
The Berlin-based Txtr is now selling its barebones e-reader, the Beagle, for €59 in Europe. The plan was to offer it for under €10 through subsidies from mobile carriers, but those deals haven’t surfaced yet — though the company says it’s close. Read more »
While much of the attention during and after the Boston bombings focused on how one Reddit thread got things wrong, there were other important parts of the community that were doing good — and even doing something approaching journalism. Read more »
Financial markets briefly plunged after hackers took over the AP’s account and reported a disaster in Washington. Read more at GigaOM »
Looking for a job in digital media? Each week we highlight some of the most interesting positions posted to paidContent’s jobs board. Check out the latest gigs at media companies across the country. Read more »
Google’s published a blog post last week about “bad apples” in the ad industry. The meaning of the post is now clear: it was intended to rein in shady software, but also to send a message to other advertisers to clean up their act. Read more »
Aereo, a service that lets you watch live TV on your phone, is going live in Boston on May 15. Read more »
Churnalism, a new browser extension and website from the Sunlight Foundation, aims to help detect plagiarism online by checking content against Wikipedia and a database of press releases. But it won’t pick up on plagiarism from other sources. Read more »
The New York Times is no longer restricting non-subscribers’ access to its video content. The move, which comes as the Times tightens other parts of its paywall, is part of the paper’s plans to expand its brand in the video space. Read more »
What can you learn from today’s blogging elite? Check out this audio re-cast from our recent paidContent LIVE show to learn from some of the medium’s masters. Read more »
Netflix CEO Reed Hastings doesn’t really think that many people are sharing their accounts with extended family members. His remarks came in response to an estimate that 10 million people watch Netflix without paying for it. Read more »
Twitter’s love affair with television seems to know no bounds — two recent deals with BBC America and Comedy Central will bring video clips inside users’ streams, and more such deals appear to be in the works. Read more »
Netflix made more than $1 billion in revenue for the first time in its corporate history last quarter. The company also used its Q1 results to announce a new $12 family plan. Read more »
Want to know what happened last week at paidContent Live 2013? Here are links to transcripts of the sessions from New York. Read more »
Rhapsody has some advice for its competitors Spotify and Rdio: Don’t invest in splashy ads. Focus on featuring your service instead. Read more »
A new deal with a large ad-buying firm will be worth hundreds of millions of dollars over a multi-year period, the Financial Times reports. Read more at GigaOM »
Tumblr is inching toward profitability with a new mobile ad offering, announced Monday. Ads will appear directly in the content streams on users’ Android and iOS apps. Read more »
Jelly, the still stealthy new company from Twitter co-founder Biz Stone, has nabbed a top Twitter engineer as its new CTO. Read more at GigaOM »
Canada is the latest country to approve the proposed merger between Big Six publishers Random House and Penguin. Read more »
For The Win wants to take a BuzzFeed-style viral media approach to sports media. The new site, which will compete with rivals like Deadspin, will focus on finding “shareable” content that will be appealing even to people who don’t follow sports. Read more »
It’s now common practice for canceled shows to find their way to fans via digital means, but there’s a big difference between uploading unaired episodes and truly coming back to life. Read more »
Although many other U.S. newspapers have shrunk, the Philadelphia Inquirer has suffered more than most. Will Steacy, whose father was laid off from the paper in 2011, has put together a photo essay showing its decline. Read more »
Feedly has faced two outages since adding millions of users in the wake of the announcement that Google will retire its Google Reader service. Now Feedly is accelerating its monetization plans. Read more »
The long-awaited Digital Public Library of America launched this week — but its collection does not include the digital repositories of many major university libraries. Meanwhile, a much bigger library collection scanned by Google is tied up in court. Read more »
While both Twitter and Reddit have come under fire for distributing incorrect information about the Boston bombings, mainstream outlets have done so as well. In a real-time news environment, having more sources is ultimately better. Read more »
