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For seven months the New York Times managed to bury news of the kidnapping of one of its reporters by the Taliban. It also worked with Wikipedia to quash any mention of the kidnapping, and in doing so raised some questions about the very nature of the online encyclopedia.

Guest: Wikipedia researcher Joseph M. Reagle, adjunct professor at NYU

More coverage of this story:

Keeping News of Kidnapping Off Wikipedia (New York Times)

Why Wikipedia was right to stop the revelation of David Rohde's kidnapping (TimesOnline)

The Troubles of Crowdsourcing: How Do You Keep a Secret? (Mashable)

Wales quashes kidnapping on Wikipedia (TECH.BLORGE)

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Rupert Murdoch says his News Corp. plans to charge people to read its news sites. News Corp. properties include the New York Post, the Times of London, and the Wall Street Journal, which already requires a subscription fee.

Murdoch says the ad-supported news model is "malfunctioning."

Guest: Robert Andrews, paidContent:UK

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Who will report the local news when newspapers cut staff or close altogether?

On today's show I talk with Mark Glaser of MediaShift, a PBS blog that covers the new media industry, about the new crop of local watchdog sites staffed in part by former newspaper reporters.

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Some newspapers and magazines have abandoned their print operations as a way to cut costs -- most notably the Seattle Post Intelligencer, Christian Science Monitor and Blender magazine. What are the consequences when publications move to online-only? Some clues can be found by looking at Taloussanomat, a financial publication from Finland that stopped printing to focus on digital operations in December 2007.

Other stories mentioned today:

Searching for Silicon Valley (New York Times)

The Internet's Librarian (Economist)

Five Best Screen Capture Tools (Lifehacker)

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In a recent TechCrunch post Eric Clemons, professor at the University of Pennsylvania's Wharton School, argues that advertising on the Internet is failing.

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In some ways blogs are the opposite of newspapers. Produced by people who don't own printing presses, blogs link to other places and lend themselves to community discussion and collaboration. Digital media such as blogs are growing while newspapers and magazines contract.

So why would Josh Karp want to make a newspaper out of blog posts?

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Putting content on the Web has never made business sense for the triCity News of Monmouth County, New Jersey. The small, alternative weekly is doing just fine on paper, according to publisher Dan Jacobson.