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Yahoo! in Talks to Acquire Tumblr: Deal Could Reach As High As $1 Billion (Adweek)
Is Marissa Mayer about to make a game-changing acquisition? It appears so. Yahoo! is in serious talks with Tumblr to acquire the social blogging site, according to multiple sources familiar with the talks. While its revenue is modest, Tumblr has positioned itself as one of the few players in the digital ad world that is well-suited for brand advertising. And Tumblr is also the domain of the young, cool and creative crowd — not currently a Yahoo! sweet spot. AllThingsD Earlier this week, Yahoo! CFO Ken Goldman spoke at JPMorgan’s Global Technology conference and underscored the need for the aging Silicon Valley Internet giant to attract more users from the coveted 18-to-24-years-old age bracket. Along with more marketing, he explicitly said Yahoo! needed to be “cool again.” The Verge Since taking control of Yahoo!, Mayer has pursued a string of acquisitions, including Summly, Astrid, Jybe and others. In addition to the failed Dailymotion acquisition, the company has also been rumored to be looking at Hulu, although Mayer has previously said that the company is shopping for smaller targets valued in the $100 million range. Read more

The great Tumblr editorial experience is over. The site announced that it was cutting the staffers it hired just over a year ago, explaining that “What we’ve accomplished with Storyboard [the service created by the writers] has run its course for now, and our editorial team will be closing up shop and moving on.”

When Tumblr announced that it was hiring a staff to cover the inner workings of the company and some of the people who used the platform, we thought that was stupid. There was simply no reason for Tumblr to venture into this territory. Why do companies always try to be something they’re not? It’s like the pro athlete who decides to start rapping: Just because you do one thing well, doesn’t mean you can do everything well. Although, to be honest, Kevin Durant can spit. Seriously!

Fortunately those who were axed by Tumblr are talented, so we don’t see them having a tough time finding a better place to work.

It can be fun to look back on how things were many years ago. You can marvel at the lack of technology (“They had to wait hours to find out trivial news! That’s not living!”) or just laugh at some of the fashion choices. This is why we’re happy to hear that The New York Times has launched a Tumblr full of pictures that have been stashed away in its archives for decades.

Titled, “The Lively Morgue,” the site will post photos like the one above several times a week. There are captions to each picture, a way to click the image and view the back and a link to purchase prints.

“We hope you’ll enjoy the serendipity of discovery, that you’ll know something of the thrill we feel when we unlock the door of the morgue and walk into a treasure house made of filing cabinets, index cards, manila folders and more 8-by-10s than anyone can count,” writes David W. Dunlap, on The Lively Morgue’s “about” page.

[Image: Arthur Brower/The New York Times]

Not too long ago, we posted about Tumblr’s hunt for journalists. Now the blogging platform is looking for someone to lead ad sales, reports Business Insider.  The role would likely focus on partnership development with interested companies as a strategy for increasing ad revenue.

Katherine Barna, a spokesperson for Tumblr told Business Insider, ”We currently have people working on revenue products and partnerships and now it’s about leadership to take it to the next level.”

Are you that leader?

Tumblr, the blogging site, has hired two writers to cover the site and its users. The New York Times reports that Chris Mohney, a Senior Vice President for Content at BlackBook Media, has been named Editor-in-Chief and Jessica Bennett, a Senior Writer and Editor at Newsweek/The Daily Beast, is Executive Editor.

Mohney and Bennett’s articles will appear on Tumblr’s homepage, with the hope that it will keep users lingering, thus making the site more attractive to advertisers. The two will be tasked with writing about the dynamics of Tumblr and the people behind the blogs. “I’m trying to figure out how we cover the ideas, themes and people who live in it,” Bennett told the Times.

Oh! Well, that just sounds… Terrible.

Read more

Here’s a look at what FishbowlNY stories made the most buzz this week.

1. Gawker Writer Fired After Using N-Word in Post, January 6
2. CBS This Morning Makes Major Changes to the Formula, But Do They Work?  January 10
3. Hey Journalists: Tumblr is Looking for You, January 6
4. Pics of Beyonce and Jay-Z’s Daughter Expected to Fetch $2 Million, January 11
5. Hearst’s Present to You: Angelina Jolie, January 10
6. Michelle Obama Won’t Read Jodi Kantor’s Book, January 11
7. Nick Denton’s Change of Heart, January 6
8. Veteran WCBS Reporter Jay Dow Joins WPIX, January 9

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Gawker recently posted the headline, “Tumblr Is Launching Its Own Journalism Operation.” Our immediate thoughts: Wow, really? That would be awesome. Or, wait, would it? Maybe not. Could be. Hmm, why would the platform want to do that?

But no need to worry BIG media. Tumblr isn’t launching a journalism department, for now at least.

The implication stems from a recent interview by Business Insider with Tumblr’s young founder and CEO David Karp, that mentioned, “There’s now an editorial team forming that will help promote stories people write and share on Tumblr too.”

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WordPress has been around for 8 years. Tumblr has only been around for four. But as NPR reports, in the past six months, Tumblr has taken off, and its users have nearly tripled, with more than 7 million blogs.

Why is Tumblr so successful? Mark Coatney, who works at Tumblr, describes the Tumblr experience like this: “You’ll dash off an email or do a tweet or something like that because it’s quick and easy, so it’s kind of taking that thinking and applying it to blogging.”

“Quick and easy” seems to be a key part of Tumblr’s strategy. Many classify it as less a blogging platform, and more of a social network. Its growth has in part been powered by the idea of reblogging, similar to retweeting, according to Social Times. Mashable recently reported the introduction of a Tumblr button, similar to a tweet button and a Facebook “like” button, so users can share a link to an article or a website with just a click. If you want to be a blogger (and let’s face it, who doesn’t? We’re so glamorous!) then Tumblr is a way to do it with minimal effort and maximum immediate readership, because of its focus on community. Coatney’s job at Tumblr is even to help media outlets like The New York Times, Newsweek and The Huffington Post start their “tumblogs.”

A video interview with Coatney about social media and Tumblr’s interest in journalism from the Social Times is after the jump.

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For those of you who care about actors who aren’t really actors and writers who aren’t really writers, we have great news for you: Lauren Conrad will be guest editing Lucky’s Tumblr next week.

Conrad – the magazine’s latest cover girl – will be engaging readers on a variety of subjects that all have to do with her:

Be sure to ask her some questions about anything you like—her new blog and online community, LaurenConrad.com, her beauty site, Paper Crown or anything else that comes to mind.

Sounds fab!

If there’s anyone who doesn’t know who Lauren Conrad is, consider yourself, well, lucky.

The New York Times had finally gone live with its first Tumblr blog on Monday for T: The New York Times Style Magazine, The Cutline reports.

Apart from the fact that “T on Tumblr” just sounds cute, why did the Times venture forward on the popular blogging platform with their fashion magazine first?

According to The Cutline, part of this has to do with the fact that Tumblr has “a highly-active fashion community,” which make sense, considering sharing photography is a strength of the platform. When Vogue‘s Tumblr launched earlier this year, Mark Coatney, Tumblr’s resident media liaison, said it racked up more than 1,000 followers in its first day.

If you want to see a very dapper photograph of David Beckham (of course you do) we suggest you check it out.