The surprise sale of the Washington Post to Amazon founder Jeff Bezos stirred plenty of commentary and speculation, not necessarily in that order. Henry Blodget, the former equity executive who has been one of the most prominent tech bloggers, counts Bezos as an investor in his Business Insider operation, and he has positive things to say and relevant ideas on why Bezos used his own $250 million to enter that element of the media business. He notes the parallels: that news is another form of content, that it already is into delivery services, that news intersects with shopping as you browse other content, and that Amazon is already in the subscription and gadget-related business. David Remnick, a Post alumnus and the editor of The New Yorker, talks to publisher Katherine Weymouth and former executive editor Leonard Downie. And David Carr, the media critic of The New York Times, talks to the vendor, Donald Graham.
Steve Hewlett, writing for The Guardian, pursues the idea that the British government's review of media plurality has the BBC in its crosshairs. He says the government's culture secretary is pretty much acknowledging that the BBC's clout in news is going to be affected by a review that will aim to broaden the range of sources and rein in the larger players.
Last week The New York Times introduced an online feature to permit comments alongside stories, and not just at their conclusion. Now Quartz, the recent entrant into financial journalism, has introduced a feature to permit comments about certain paragraphs. AdWeek reports the feature, called Annotations, is designed to stimulate much more interactivity with the journalism.
The Mail and Guardian looks at the challenges in Zimbabwe to fair and accurate reporting, particularly in the current election campaign. Media are either "red or green" in their support of or opposition to the government. It questions whether the bias extends so far as to insult the public. Even with oversight, fairness is hard to achieve.