The Hollywood Reporter
Anderson Cooper's nationally syndicated daytime talk show, "Anderson Live," will be canceled after two seasons due to "continued soft ratings, despite a rebrand at its recent sophomore launch," writes Michael O'Connell. "The series will continue to air through summer 2013."
A.V. Club
Humor newspaper The Onion will kill its print edition for the New York area, "a difficult decision made slightly easier by the fact that New York is the single biggest market for the online editions of both publications," writes Josh Modell. Print editions will still be distributed in eight cities, including Providence, R.I., Denver, Chicago and Austin, Texas.
Mediabistro
"After over a year of negotiations," the Times and the Newspaper Guild of New York have agreed to a new five-year contract that, “according to the Guild, 'preserves a defined benefit pension plan, protects the jointly trusteed medical plan, and includes increases in compensation,'” writes Chris O'Shea. Still, the arrangment is not final, "as the deal is subject to changes by Guild members."
New York Times
Ad industry members have been enjoying -- and sometimes, learning from -- Mad magazine, which has been reliably "lampooning — and frequently harpooning — the huckstering of the advertising industry," for six decades, writes Stuart Elliott. Reporting on the publication of an anthology with "generous samples of the wicked ad spoofs, parodies and sendups" in Mad's pages, Elliott quotes such industry notables as David Lubars, chairman and chief creative officer at BBDO North America: "The knowing attitude of Mad’s mockery helped the readers who grew up to join the business realize they must sell 'a skeptical audience,' Mr. Lubars said."
Poynter
Charge your cell phone now, and even if you lose power, you can still track Hurricane Sandy on your phone via The Weather Channel, which is live-streaming its coverage so people "can keep up with the news on their mobile devices,"
writes David Bauder. And the
New York Times has suspended its paywall for all apps and its website for the duration, so you can read up on the storm and/or any other topic for distraction.
The Wall Street Journal, Newsday and
The Baltimore Sun are also freeing up website content, while the Boston Globe's storm coverage …
TV Guide
The top network these days is not on broadcast or cable. Instead, if the DVR were a network, it would be no. 1 -- but a network that's programmed by viewers, according to Michael Schneider. Writing for TV viewers instead of the industry, Schneider explains how "DVR usage has jumped so much — up 30 percent compared to just a year ago — that it's now making a real impact on TV ratings. That's good news for many of your favorite TV shows, which are much more likely to survive if they have a bigger audience than first thought. It's …
Huffington Post
Broadcast networks and the AP will be cutting down on the number of in-person exit polls they do on election night, while increasing the "amount of telephone polling," writes David Bauder. "This is to take into account more people voting before Nov. 6 and households that have abandoned land lines in favor of cell phones," he writes.
Advertising Age
Iconic fragrance brand Chanel No. 5 "landed near the top of the Viral Video Chart this week," with its commercial featuring Brad Pitt -- proving that "sometimes even something deemed by most as pretty bad can easily drive awareness, as long as it stars a man twice named 'Sexiest Man Alive,'" writes Mallory Russell. The commercial -- which has "Mr. Pitt talking about ... well, that's still not clear" -- quickly inspired many spoofs, so "a third of the views for Chanel No. 5 this week actually come from derivatives of the original ad," writes Russell.
Search Engine Watch
Newspapers are not fully taking advantage of Pinterest as a "social bookmarking destination," according to a Searchmetrics study reported by Miranda Miller. One in four newspapers studied (U.S. and U.K.) have no Pinterest presence, while the New York Times, "which saw the most Pinterest action, with an average of 45,739 pins per week," doesn't have a Pin button on its website, writes Miller.
The Australian
The Week stopped publishing in Australia with its Oct.12-18 issue. No word on the U.S. or U.K. editions, which could remain among the few newsweeklies left after the recent demise of Newsweek's print version announced for the end of this year. However, the death of the Aussie The Week, a going concern for four years, does signal "the end of the local weekly news magazine in Australia," writes Sally Jackson.