Everybody wants to get a piece of that sweet sweet millennial gold. Even the lead-slug tycoons who bankroll the NRA. Behold "Noir," the gun lobby's can't-miss shot at a hot web series for the hip, urbane American who wants a multicolored gun to match that iPhone case!

William Lynch, the CEO of Barnes & Noble, resigned this week after less than two years on the job, having failed to turn around the earnings of the Last Remaining Book Store by selling color tablets. So, uh... anybody have any other ideas? For making money?

Oh good: due to the general sense of panic afflicting the financial world, European regulators are considering a temporary ban on short selling. This is stupid.

The hard-hearted dream-destroyers of Harvard's admissions office have spoken: Grace Oberhofer, the Washington teen who became a viral star begging to get off Harvard's waitlist, did not get into Harvard. Instead she will go to Tufts, where she will spend the next four years deflecting "safety school" jokes. [FlyByBlog, IvyGate]

Now that Borders is dying, book publishers are collectively asking themselves, "Huh, where do we sell all these stupid books, now?" I mean Barnes & Noble is okay and all, but it's gonna take more shelf space than that to show off all those fancy attractive book covers designed to make people forget they could be buying this copy much cheaper used, on Ebay. The solution? Placing books in every kind of store, anywhere, that sells anything at all.

A Turkish man living in Germany fled to the local police station this week seeking protection from his wife, whose insatiable demands for sex have caused him to sleep on the couch for the past four years. Wacky, wacky stuff.

The Democrats' 1988 presidential candidate, Michael Dukakis, who's familiar with a determined GOP attack machine, recently "popped in" to the White House to go over midterm strategy with the president's aides. About time "The Duke" came to the rescue!

When Conde Nast announced early this year that it would be pursuing "brand extensions" to try to scare up some cash, we took it as a joke. But it's all too real! A cafe...named for GQ...in Istanbul? Sure, why not?

Libraries are moving into shopping malls in an effort to get Americans to read books.

Alain de Botton is a respected European writer who was ready to bite the arms off anyone standing in the way of his contract to spend a week sitting in an airport, writing a boring airport book. Writing careers suck.

Harvey Weinstein is so desperate for Inglourious Basterds to succeed that he's flogging tchochkes on a tiny invitation-only web site for millionaires. Keep an eye out—you might just spot him on the street wearing a sandwich board.

The New York Times Co., which you may know from glancing at your local news stand, is now also selling wine. Good wine! Not that cheap shit. Hey buddy, need some wine?

Look at this nasty ad for shingles medication. It is featured prominently on the New York Times home page today. Is there no gross ad the Hobo NYT will not display, in exchange for precious money? (Click for full grossness!)

It's not unheard of for questionnaires to be accompanied by a dollar bill, to encourage recipients at least to open the envelope, and guilt some of them into replying. But the New York Observer is more desperate than that: the weekly newspaper, supposedly for Manhattan's elite, encloses a $5 note in its latest reader survey. (Thanks, Matt, for the pic.) The generous interpretation: the Observer's ad rates depend on proving to advertisers that the curiously pink newspaper's readers are indeed worth $1.7m apiece; and such wealthy readers need commensurately rich inducement to open an envelope. Alternatively, boy-publisher Jared Kushner, who is trying to sustain the Observer's paltry paid circulation of some 50,000, is simply applying the family's experience with bribery. Hey, it works. Kushner won his place at Harvard University after his father pledged $2.5m to the school. ENLARGE»

We keep trying to come up with a new word or phrase for "slim pickings." Previously our term of choice has been "skinniest girl at fat camp" but that's not very femiladyist and also, we've said it about twelve too many times. "Shallow bench?" Anyway, this is the last semifinal round of "Hot" Straight Men Of Book Publishing. The winner of this round will face off against Overlook Associate Editor Aaron Schlechter and Chris Parris-Lamb @ The Gernert Company in the finals on Thursday.