More changes at Condé Nast: The company reports it's splitting the CEO job into two.

• It's a new day at Condé Nast. The mag giant's chief exec, Chuck Townsend, has gone from firing staffers to giving them motivational speeches. [NYO]
• In Touch's editor quit yesterday, reportedly because he wasn't happy that his bosses wouldn't agree to increase his $750,000-a-year salary. [NYP]
• Is MSNBC's Ed Schultz thinking about running for Senate? [HP, The Hill]
• A draft of the script for the third Twilight film has been leaked online. [WSJ]
• Fox's latest reality show, Our Little Genius, is stirring up controversy. [NYT]
• It looks like Sam Mendes will be directing the next James Bond movie. [MTV]
• Advertising: Hanes is pulling its TV ads featuring Charlie Sheen. [People]
• Taylor Swift's "Fearless" was the No. 1 selling album of 2008. In other Taylor-related news, Taylor Lautner is now the highest paid teenager in Hollywood.
• "Newspaper reporter" is officially one of the worst jobs in America. [HP]

Conde Nast CEO Chuck Townsend is meeting personally this month with shell-shocked staffers at the company's various magazines for what is described as "a rah-rah speech" with "lots of charts and graphs." Everybody, "Conde rules" on one! [NYO]

Mort Zuckerman's latest attempt to expand his media empire has failed, it seems. Reuters is reporting the real estate developer and owner of the Daily News and US News has decided to drop out of the race to acquire BusinessWeek, possibly because he sensed execs at the mag's parent company, McGraw-Hill, are more interesting in doing a deal with Bloomberg LP instead.

Conde Nast CEO Chuck Townsend says that Conde's Very Bad, No Good, Four-Magazine-Folding Day today marks the end of magazine closures for the company. Although not the end of the hard times.

• More on Condé Nast's decision to shut down four magazines, including Gourmet, Cookie, Modern Bride and Elegant Bride: An estimated 180 people will likely lose their jobs as part of the move, although CEO Chuck Townsend says the company has no plans to shutter any other titles. [NYO, AdAge]
• If Comcast goes ahead with a deal to take a controlling stake in NBC, Jeff Zucker, NBC Universal's CEO, may need to find a new job. [NYP]
• Don Imus' radio show debuted on Fox Business today. [WP]
• Rich Ross, the president of Disney Channels Worldwide, is taking over Walt Disney Studios; he's succeeding Dick Cook, who was ousted on Sept. 16. [NYT]
• Universal Pictures has fired chairmen Marc Shmuger and David Linde. [LAT]
• CBS has been busy ridding YouTube of David Letterman's mea culpa. [NYT]
• Zombieland was No. 1 at the box office this weekend with a $25 million take. Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs dropped to second place. [Variety]
• It wasn't all bad news at Condé Nast today: The New Yorker landed its biggest ad buy since 2005 with a $1 million deal with HSBC. [Folio]

Condé Nast CEO Chuck Townsend announced this morning that the company will be shutting down four magazines: Gourmet, Cookie, Modern Bride and Elegant Bride. [WWD]

That was quick. Here is the grim memo that Condé Nast CEO Chuck Townsend just sent out announcing that it is bringing in McKinsey & Company to "develop new perspectives on optimizing our approach to business." This will be brutal.

• NBC is chopping 6 shows, including, yes, the Chopping Block. [THR]
• It's rumored Budget Travel has, yes, cut its budget. [Gawker]
• Another stain on Jim Cramer, not that he needs it: In '07, he called Andrew Cuomo a "communist" for proposing mortgage industry regulation. [NYT]
• The Times's Bill Keller sheds some light on yesterday's cuts and layoffs. [E&P]
• Condé Nast's Chuck Townsend sheds light on his staff changes. [AdAge]
• Lionsgate slashed 8 percent of its staff today. [THR]
• Newspaper ad revenue dropped 17.7% in 2008. [E&P]
• Americans spend 8.5 hours a day consuming video content. [NYT]
• Facebook needs a (generous) friend: It's trying to raise $100 million. [PC]
• Cable company Charter Communications is officially bankrupt. [NYT]

Tommy Hilfiger turns 58 today. Star Jones is 47. Condé Nast CEO Chuck Townsend is 65. Lara Flynn Boyle is turning 39. Lake Bell is 30. Actress Alyson Hannigan is 35. Filmmaker Curtis Hanson is turning 64. Fashion designer Bob Mackie is 69. Comedian Louie Anderson is turning 56. And Peyton Manning, the Super Bowl MVP and older brother of Eli, turns 33 today.

These are difficult times for Condé Nast. AdAge reported yesterday the publishing giant is planning to slash the ad sales group managed by Richard Beckman; today, Keith Kelly of the Post reports some of the company's flagship titles have seen a 30 to 40 percent decline in revenues, and the company has "taken a dagger to its corporate pension plan" in order to reduce costs. Meanwhile, the Observer's John Koblin reports chairman Si Newhouse and CEO Chuck Townsend have asked editors to trim their discretionary budgets (which includes items like messengers, first-class airfare, and car services), and says a broader round of job cuts is inevitable. Of course, it's hard for any editor to trim his or her own staff—and it can be difficult for top execs to take a step back and see the absurd spending when they're so close to it.

In his memo yesterday, Conde Nast CEO Chuck Townsend told the company's employees that "difficult decisions" are coming. How bad could Conde's 2009 really be? Catastrophic, potentially.

Condé Nast advertising is down a terrifying 30 percent this year, leading to speculation a bunch more people will be fired. Condé's CEO reassured everyone that, yes, they could be fired.

• Tom Cruise says he loves flying, hockey, football, skydiving, horse riding, mountain climbing and scuba diving. Oh, and he also says he'd like to have seven more kids with Katie Holmes. [The Sun]
• Jennifer Lopez and Marc Anthony plan to end their marriage "right after Marc's show at Madison Square Garden on Feb. 14," which sounds like excellent timing, if you ask us. [NYDN]
• Is Mariah Carey pregnant? Yes? No? Do you care? [P6, Fox News]
• No one is quite sure if Tom Brady proposed to Gisele last week. [NYDN]
• Whitney Port, you'll be shocked to hear, rarely turns up to her "day job." [P6]
• Heather Mills' former nanny is suing her for having to "blow-dry Mills' hair, work unreasonable hours, and spray-tan a naked Mills." [MSNBC]
• Condé Nast CEO Chuck Townsend may be slashing staff, but he's still charging the company for private jet flights. [P6]
• Assuming you have access to a very good house cleaning service, the Kardashian residence in LA is now on the market for $3.395 mil. [TMZ]

Incredible resources were deployed to figure out if Tom Brady is marrying Gisele Bundchen and to get Condé Nast's Chuck Townsend wherever the hell he wants to go, in style.

If you're the sort of magazine industry obsessive who looks forward to the first week of December when Condé Nast releases its holiday luncheon seating chart—wherein Condé overlord Si Newhouse either exalts or punishes his editors according to where he seats them at the Four Seasons, and with whom—you're going to have to wait until next year. The company's CEO, Chuck Townsend, informed staffers yesterday that the lunch has been canceled. Of course, you probably don't need a chart to surmise that if the lunch had taken place, Portfolio editor Joanne Lipman could have expected to nibble on her Cobb salad in the coat room. [WWD]

♦ Harvey Weinstein may be a million bucks poorer today. Or maybe not! After yesterday's email debacle, Harvey says he'll donate $1 million to the Robin Hood Foundation once he can verify that Scott Rudin's email is "authentic," which means he'll probably conduct an "investigation" into the matter until it blows over. [P6]
♦ Janet Jackson has been released from the hospital. But fiancé Jermaine Dupri doesn't seem too concerned. He hasn't missed any of his scheduled party appearances the past few days. [People, R&M]
♦ Britney Spears' lawyers have been working overtime to quash the sex tape she made with Adnan Ghalib. [The Sun]
♦ Salma Hayek was spotted in Paris with her ex Francois-Henri Pinault, which means it's time to start speculating about whether they're getting back together. [Daily Star]

The president and CEO of Condé Nast, Chuck Townsend is Si Newhouse's right-hand man at the media conglomerate.