CBS bought CNET, the tech-focused online conglomerate, for $1.8 billion earlier this year. Which prompted the general reaction "Really, that much?" And also, "Isn't this two fundamentally boring brands combining to form a larger, still boring brand?" Well one brave man says no, it's much more promising than that: CBS CEO Les Moonves, who engineered the deal! But is he right? It's hard to see why he would be: Moonves is counting on CNET to raise CBS' revenue by two points within three years, which would mean that its online growth would have to offset the "flattening out" of CBS' own TV and radio ad revenue. But CNET is basically a tech news brand, and a pretty unexciting one. CBS is a general interest brand, and an unexciting one. So why try to make CNET another unexciting, general-interest brand?

Preeminent among the magazine world's kingmaking power lists is Vanity Fair's New Establishment, which appears in the October issue — on newsstands in L.A. and New York today, but not in the Bay Area for another six days. Silicon Valley gets similar short shrift: The names who make it there are predictable bigs like Steve Jobs and Larry Ellison, or Hollywood-crossover types like Jeff Skoll, eBay's first employee turned movie producer. Walt Mossberg, now employed by New Establishment perennial Rupert Murdoch, also squeaked in. The consolation prize Vanity Fair offers: Its "Next Establishment" list, reserved for the likes of Twitter's Ev Williams. It's a marvelous piece of New York media trickery — flatter the geeks by making them feel included, but corral them into a side room so the real power brokers aren't offended by comparison. True, the "Next Establishment" suggests that these are people who might matter in the future. But in saying that, Vanity Fair's editors are also sending the message that right here, right now, its "Next" nominees are nobodies. On this year's list:

CNET overhauled its site right before agreeing to be acquired by CBS in May. Now, CBS has another redesign ready to launch this week. You can probably guess: More video, more product placements. Here's the deets:

Set aside the money NBC minted broadcasting the Olympics to American TV sets. The network is hinting it wants to give internet video a bigger role in its coverage — and advertising sales — around the 2012 games in London, where the time differential makes it awkward to broadcast live events in the U.S. So how did NBC do Webcasting the 2008 games? The network bragged to the Times about doubling its 2004-2006 Olympic traffic. But somehow Yahoo, with none of NBC's exclusive footage or capital outlay, managed to draw even more people to its Olympics section than NBC, according to Nielsen. And NBC made a pathetic $6 million in video ad revenue from the Olympics — a quarter of what CBS Sports made streaming a college basketball tournament earlier this year. The problem? NBC saved all the good stuff for television. Writes the Journal:

We love nothing more than a fairy tale ending, and we got one on last night's Big Brother, when—amidst the tragedy of contestant April's ejection from their 24-hour surveillance Eden— surviving housemate and oral-sex-partner Ollie proposed..um...popping his relationship cherry? Prodded by host Julie Chen, who had already been given a fat dossier on the pair's budding romance which included a number of X-ray stills from their quilt-covered shenanigans, Ollie extolled the many virtues of the Arizona auto-financing manager, then announced, "I got a question for you: Will you be my first girlfriend? I want an answer from you the second I get out of this house." CBS would be fools not to capitalize on the event, mounting a lavish Ollie and April's Going Steady Ceremony primetime special upon which no expense would be spared.

• Hachette is shuttering Home magazine. [Mediaweek]

• Bob Costas and Meredith Vieira are among the many NBC anchors who haven't been pronouncing "Beijing" correctly. (It's Bay-jing, not Bay-zhing.) Bonus points to Brian Williams for getting it right. [AP]
  

• Yet another miserable day for people whose livelihoods depend on ink and paper: Gannett is cutting 1,000 jobs, McClatchy is freezing wages, Cox has put 29 of its papers up for sale, and Tribune is a mess as usual. [Gawker]

There are a lot of places to start with this clip from last night's episode of Greatest American Dog: for example, though the on-screen chyron gives the dog's name as "Galaxy," we're pretty sure that owner JD variously calls for "Gutsy," "Curtsy," and "Koyaanisqatsi." More entertaining, though, than JD's strange names or his hip-hop/breakdancing routine with a nonplussed Galaxy are the reaction shots from the judges, which run the gamut from open-mouthed incredulity to a suspenseful, physical performance of, "Should I applaud? Yes? Both hands? No, just the one. How will I clap, then? Why, I'll just hit the table in a few sharp strokes like I'm a bad nanny." [CBS]

· Laurence Fishburne is in negotiations to take over for the departing William Petersen in CSI: Crime Scene Investigation, in which he'll play a scientist who "has the same genetic profile as a serial killer," much like the sociopathic cowboy he played on Saturday morning TV in the late '80s. [THR]
·Load up on guns, bring your friends: "Smells Like Teen Spirit" video director Sam Bayer will direct the Michael Bay-produced noir action thriller Fiasco Heights for Universal. [THR]
·Suspiciously obtained reality show concept Wipeout, a surprise summer hit for ABC, has been renewed for another season of waterlogged, spine-snapping fun. [Variety]
·Taking Woodstock, Ang Lee's totally weird movie starring Demetri Martin as the gay decorator inadvertently at the center of the legendary music festival, will begin shooting this month, with go-to Period Gay Emile Hirsch added to the cast.
· Tony-winning Best Play August: Osage County is being prepped for a movie version, probably to star Meryl Streep, with a snappier plot based on a series of loosely-strung-together Roxette songs. [Variety]

Moderators: Lehrer and Gwen Ifill of PBS, Tom Brokaw of NBC, Bob Schieffer of CBS. [WSJ]

For vivid proof of the weakening dollar, look no further that the annual salary survey in the forthcoming issue of TV Guide: After two years of slumming alongside the likes of Zach Braff and seeing everyone from William Petersen ($600,000 per episode) to the Simpsons cast (each $400,000 per episode) pass him by, Charlie Sheen has reclaimed his spot at the top of the prime-time cash heap, earning $800,000 per 30-minute episode of Two and a Half Men. Granted, it's not seven-figure Friends money (which Sheen originally asked for in negotiations back in 2006), but we still think it bears repeating: Charlie Sheen makes $800,000 per episode of Two and a Half Men. Join us in getting our heads around it (and a few other hot-ticket raises) after the jump.

In a conference call to discuss CBS's quarterly results, CEO Les Moonves pointed to the recently announced selloff of radio stations and acquisition of CNET as an effort to jumpstart growth. Profits for the quarter were up a measly 1 percent, and the stock price was down slightly on the news. Moonves is looking for the CBS Interactive division to grow its annual revenue to $1 billion in three years.That's presuming online ad industry growth matches expectations despite a larger economic downturn, which Moonves assures us all it certainly will. In fact, the 50 percent target is modest; it translates to 14.5 percent a year. Which means Moonves is assuming that CBS Interactive will underperform the online-advertising market, which is expected to grow 20 percent a year or more. (Photo by Getty/Vince Bucci)

• Bristol-Myers Squibb is offering $4.5 billion for ImClone Systems, the drug maker controlled by Carl Icahn. [Dealbook]

· And now for some non-earthquake-related Big Brother rumbles: In one corner, we have 75-year-old contestant (and the oldest person on CBS since Murder, She Wrote), Jerry. In the other, we have professional "mixologist" Memphis, precisely one-third Jerry's age. We won't tell you how it plays out, except to say so long as you're glimpsing three-quarters-of-a-century-old armpit, Jerry's winning. [Big Brother] · A fourth Austin Powers is reportedly being written by Mike Myers. It's a "very personal [take] with a father and son theme loosely based on his own life," meaning it's sure to feature a scene in which the old Mini Me is tossed around in the backyard. [Deadline Hollywood] · In honor of Discovery Channel's Shark Week, a chat with a Great White. [edithzimmerman.com] · Hitting every stop on the Interactive Ben Kingsley Accent Map would wear out even the sturdiest Amazing Race contestants. [bestweekever.tv] · Hey—bear running around a track in high heels! [Jezebel]

Following a 5.4 earthquake that dealt most of its damage to people's Facebook status updates ("Jim is: EARTHQUAKE!"), it was only natural to wonder how the tremor might have affected the city's old, its infirm, and its Big Brother 10 residents. Fortunately, the Hollywood Reporter can help us out on at least one of those fronts: its video update reveals that the Big Brother houseguests bypassed the "Is that a truck? Oh, wait..." stage experienced by most Los Angelenos, instead rushing out into the backyard to doff their clothes and trade "Omigawds." Video after the jump.Click to view

· Mad Men's second season opened to a strong start for AMC, pulling in 1.9 million aspiring womanizers and the pregnant secretaries who love them. [Variety] · The Venice Film Festival announced its slate, which will include world premieres of Darren Aronofsky’s The Wrestler, Jonathan Demme’s Rachel Getting Married, Kathryn Bigelow’s Hurt Locker, and the Coens's Burn After Reading. [Variety] · Deposed New Line potentates Bob Shaye and Michael Lynne's first post-studio-snuffing project will be an adaptation of Isaac Asimov's sci-fi epic Foundations for Warner Bros. The duo have an eye on adapting the book's sequels into a Lord of the Rings-style franchise, with Andy Serkis playing Andromeda, a kindly robot, and the speed of light. [THR] · CBS is developing a pilot for updated version of The Streets of San Francisco. We humbly request they retain those cool diagonal stripe-wipes from the title sequence. Those rock! [THR] · Mutinous SAG splinter-group Unite for Strength agrees with the current leadership that the AMPTP's offer is unacceptable, but differs strongly in other areas, such as where they'd like to order in lunch. (Koo Koo Roo, vs. the Alan Rosenberg-championed Chin Chin.) [Variety]

"If [CBS head] Les Moonves wants to get rid of her, he's got to shell out around $40 million. He's tried to get her to move on, and she was like, 'Fine. I'll leave - where's my money?'" [Post]

Amid a summer of great American dogs and semi-scandalous ripoffs of ripoffs, the news that NBC is considering Rosie O'Donnell for a weekly variety show gig should provoke a little more than this dull ache in our frontal lobes. After all, this is a chance for more than just showcasing bad celebrity interviews and performances from the newest, cheapest talent from around the nation; this is an hour-per-week of Hasselbeck payback — in primetime, no less, according to EW. But there's a catch: NBC's first choice, Jay Leno, has to say no. And that's no sure thing (as elaborated after the jump):

When Katie Couric read a page from her "notebook" back in June, highlighting sexist media coverage of Hillary Clinton's presidential campaign, we wondered if maybe she wasn't also talking about herself. Couric was, after all, facing record-low ratings, and her bosses said sexism was partly responsible for viewer apathy. Well, Couric put to rest any doubts she identifies with Clinton in an interview with Haaretz newspaper in Israel, where she is traveling on vacation. In it, she argues that sexism is more common than racism in America, and that she has felt its effects — just like Hillary: