Recently by Leah McBride Mensching

A report based on research carried out by Pew Internet shows a dramatic increase in the use of mobile phones to access the Internet, with a 13% growth since last year. "While overall mobile phone ownership has not grown over the last year, cell owners now take advantage of a much wider range of their phones' capabilities," the report states.

Even though adults between ages 18 and 29 are leading the trend, with 65% of them accessing the Internet from their mobiles, other age groups are catching up. In fact, more than half of mobile phone users go online daily using their phones, with 43% of users going online several times a day compared to 37% in 2009. Recent studies in the UK by comScore had similar findings, with more than a third of smartphone users regularly accessing the internet through their phones.

For more on this story, visit our sister publication, editorsweblog.org.

For more information like this, look for SFN's World Digital Media Trends 2010, due out later this month.

Google has bought online social payment start-up Jambool, a next step past search and into the realm of "using personal relationships as the basis to find and share online content," the San Jose Mercury News reported today.

TechCrunch first reported the buy last week, noting that Jambool's Social Gold payment product gives developers the tools they need to "build payments directly into their games and other applications." The price of the buy wasn't released by either company, but sources told TechCrunch it was around US$70 million, which includes about $20 million in earnouts. The buyout was announced Friday.

The New York Times Co. is testing out its paywall strategy, but not on its flagship newspaper's website. Rather, the company has set up a metered paywall on the website of its Worcester, Massachusetts newspaper, the Telegram & Gazette, The Times announced yesterday.

Beginning today, the daily will allow readers to view 10 local news articles each month for free. After that threshold has been reached, they will be offered several different online subscription options, from a US$14.95 monthly pass, to a $1 day pass.

Publishers can go onto Twitter and customise the tweet button onto their own websites. Once the newspaper has added the button, readers can share their favorite news stories via Twitter without leaving the original Web page. Instead they click on the "tweet button," which opens a small Twitter box with the shortened link.

For more on this story, visit our sister publication, editorsweblog.org.

News Corp. CEO Rupert Murdoch has announced a new plan to launch a national U.S. digital newspaper, which will be made available exclusively on mobile phones and tablet computers, such as the iPad, the Los Angeles Times reported today.

No launch date has been set, but people familiar with the situation said it is likely to be unveiled before the end of the year. The new digital newspaper would directly compete with USA Today and The New York Times, offering general news and information through short stories that can be consumed quickly.

In a publication made available online yesterday, the Knight Foundation has detailed possible non-profit local and regional news ventures.

Saving traditional news organisations cannot be helped by the non-profit model; instead, creating and strengthening "informed communities and local information ecosystems, of which journalism is a necessary component" is the type of venture that non-profits can possibly be of help with, the U.S.-based organisation states, the foundation notes. The publication is based on an April 26 meeting sponsored by the Knight Foundation and co-hosted by the Texas Tribune, Voice of San Diego and Knight Chair in Journalism at The University of Texas at Austin.

The South African government is debating the role of the press and government control over keeping federal information secret after the country's ruling political party, the African National Congress, has backed proposals to tighten controls on the media, Reuters Africa reported yesterday.

The proposed tribunal would control print media in order to "enhance accountability and improve reporting," a senior ruling party official said, the article explained. The Media Appeals Tribunal would investigate complaints against print media, and decide on punishments when it deems irresponsible reporting has taken place, according to the Wall Street Journal.

Image: ANC spokesman Jackson Mthembu. Photo via Times Live

The Boston Globe is hoping that adding a new position, vice president of digital content development, will help to expand the newspaper's audience beyond print and its website, the daily announced today in a press release.

Jeff Moriarty, former senior vice president of product management at About.com, has been named to the position.

In an attempt to ramp up its advertising model, Twitter has hired two employees to sell ads, Jennifer Valentino-DeVries reported today for Wall Street Journal Blogs.

The microblogging site has hired Amanda Levy, the first ad saleswoman for review site Yelp, and Dan Coughlin, former director of media sales at Facebook. Levy will be Twitter's sales director in the Western region, while Coughlin will be sales director for the East. In an e-mailed statement, Twitter's chief operating officer, Dick Costolo stated that the company is "putting together a top-flight sales team as we begin to open our Promoted Suite of products to more companies," according to the WSJ.

UK communications regulator Ofcom has recommended relaxing cross-media ownership rules so that the only restriction left would be that one body cannot own local newspapers with more than a 50 percent market share, the ITV licence for the area and a local radio station. Now, however, Culture, Olympics, Media and Sport Secretary Jeremy Hunt is asking the regulator to consider further liberalising that rule as well, The Press Association reported today.

Because local media is facing "significant economic pressure," Ofcom has said it will review the rules.

As social media increasingly becomes part of everyday life, New York-based MTV has hired 23-year-old Gabi Gregg to be its first-ever "Twitter Jockey," The Associated Press reported today.

After a nationwide viewer vote, Gregg won the position, called a TJ. The job is a social media version of the music television station's video deejay job, or VJ. Gregg is also the founder of the fashion blog, Young Fat & Fabulous.

Researchers at Hewlett-Packard have analysed 2.5 million tweets and used its "Influence-Passivity Algorithm," and found that technology website Mashable is the most influential Twitter account, based on links posted and links retweeted, MediaGuardian reported today.

"Influence" is different from "popularity," the research notes, as influence has to do with engagement, and popularity is based on the number of followers a Twitter account has.

The U.S. Federal Communications Commission today called off closed-door talks it was having with lobbyists on network neutrality, the Wall Street Journal reported.

The announcement came a day after news reports broke that an unannounced deal between mobile phone giant Verizon Communications Inc. and Google Inc. on their own network management practices had been made. Under the agreement, Verizon would have been able to prioritize some broadband traffic.

Image: A protester shows support for network neutrality in Canada in 2008.

News Corp. yesterday announced it turned a profit in the fourth quarter, compared to a loss the same time last year, The Associated Press reported.

The media conglomerate's finances were helped by the sale of its Bulgarian television station and a drop in restructuring charges. However, its profits were down about US$16 million, to $932 million, due to lower profits at its Sky Italia satellite TV unit and movie studio. MySpace, owned by News Corp., also saw revenue continue to fall. Revenue in the three months ending June 30, meanwhile, were up 6 percent, to $8.11 billion.

Despite the social networking site's privacy missteps, Facebook's biggest advertisers have increased their spending 10-fold or more over the past year, the company's chief operating officer told Bloomberg Businessweek. Some have even boosted spending by 20-fold.

"Two years ago the big brands were experimenting with us," Sheryl Sandberg, said in the interview, published today. "They started buying with us a year ago. Now, they're going big." She would not specify which advertisers are spending more, and Facebook does not disclose revenue figures. However, the article cited two unnamed sources who said Facebook's sales could reach at least US$1.4 billion by the end of 2010, and between $700 million and $800 million last year.