• If you do only one productive thing today, you must, MUST go by our brother Defamer and see his footage of Tom Cruise's BlackBerry exchange with Katie Holmes during his Primetime interview. Diane Sawyer told him the camera was off, but whoops — she caught those lovebirds using emoticons! Well done, D, and major props to the cameraman who zoomed in on the 'Berry. [Defamer]
• Andrew Hearst is back to playing with Quark; Uterus Weekly is his latest masterpiece, which counts Jennifer Aniston's empty womb as a cover story. [Panopticist]
• Didn't we already tell you that Ron Burkle was having a party for the Clintons? Yeah, we did, which means you've had plenty of time to save up the grand it costs to get in. [Deadline Hollywood]
• Braden Keil over at the Post reports that Katie Couric is looking to buy in the Hamptons for around $6 or $7 million. A quick search for $6 million gems in East Hampton turns up this unfortunate beast. Perfect, she'll take it. [NYP / Corcoran]
• Is the Times trying to kill feminism with bottles of peroxide and books about binge drinking? [Broadsheet]
• A community stake-out on Shake Shack helps burger lovers time their visits. [ShackWatchers]
• To reiterate: ambisexual magalog Cargo is dead. Your subscription bill, however, lives on. [Big and Sharp]

• Matt Lauer adds three years to his Today contract, at $13M per. He'll also receive a footwear allowance, for clickety stilettos. [NYT]
• And Diane Sawyer has lost the game. [NYSun]
• Jack Kliger had to kill ELLEgirl to save it as a website. Or something. [Ad Age]
• First Kurt Andersen calls it, now Variety: We're all tired of celebrities. [Variety]
• Most publications won't accept freebies, Page Six — and David Pogue — excepted, of course. [MB]

• Naomi Watts and Liev Schreiber have hit a "rough patch," reportedly because Watts finds her man a bit too controlling. To be fair, bitch better call him if she's not going to be home in time to make dinner. [R&M]
• Like manna from heaven, Barbra Streisand gives us a second farewell tour (the first was in 2000, and we've been saying goodbye every day since). The butter-voiced political genius will be paid $2 million her show; Gays and Jews everywhere start saving for the best tickets, which will go for $1500 apiece. [Page Six]
• To promote her forthcoming flick Friends With Money, Jennifer Aniston opts to sit down with the Today show instead of Diane Sawyer and Good Morning America. The reason? In a report on Brad Pitt's work in Africa, Diane Sawyer failed to call the actor a skank ho. [Lowdown (2nd to last)]
• Anti-Scientologists fight Tom Cruise, one back-page alt-weekly advertisement at a time. [Scoop]

• Today's speculation on the next World News Tonight anchor: Charlie Gibson. Because Diane wants him to. [NYO]
• That Times Mag Mark-Warner-Looks-Nothing-Like-His-Photo correction? It's all thanks to the Observer. [NYO]
• Howell Raines' latest memoir TK on May 9. In case 20,000 words in The Atlantic wasn't enough for you. [E&P]
• Kent Brownridge is gone from Wenner Media. Again. For real. We think. [NYP]
• And Jann startes hunting for a new Kent. Mary Berner, maybe? [WWD]
• The Times thinks Hillary's running for president, too: She'll now be covered through the Washburo instead of the Metro desk. [NYO]

• Big media companies like buying popular websites. Who knew? [Mediaweek]
• 2005 was a bad year for newspapers. You don't say. [WSJ]
• David Carr can't quite figure out why CBS wants Katie Couric so badly. [NYT]
• Lewis Lapham's welcome present for Roger Hodge: Lots of readers pissed off about an article on researchers who dispute the idea that HIV causes AIDS. [NYT]
• Diane Sawyer will be the next World News Tonight anchor. [Newsday]
• No, wait. Charlie Gibson will. [NYP]

• With injured anchor Bob Woodruff not likely making a full-time return and co-host Elizabeth Vargas' bursting womb, ABC is in need of a talking head for World News Tonight. Thankfully, it looks like Diane Sawyer will be coming to the rescue. She may be the network's fourth choice, but she's first in beating Katie Couric to the punch. [Fox 411]
• Dina Lohan cries to daughter Lindsay about her smoking, preferring that her little cash cow stick to non-carcinogenic substance abuse. [Page Six]
• Chloe Sevigny gets haughty when View co-host Joy Behar asked about her infamous blowjob scene with Vincent Gallo in Brown Bunny. She'll do it on camera, but she won't talk about it on camera — the mark of a true lady. [R&M]
• At a dinner on Saturday night, Ellen Barkin gets the Heimlich from CAA queen Bryan Lourd while Sylvester Stallone watches on. Point: Gays. [Page Six]
• How much is an interview with the French woman who had a face transplant worth? About $500K and a trip to Disneyworld, according to her lawyers. [Lowdown]

• Penguin wins auction for Alan Greenspan memoir with an offer believed to be nearly $9 million. Obligatory question: Irrationally exuberant? [NYP]
• The dude behind the allegedly forthcoming mags Everything for Men and Everything for Women is a con artist and a felon. Unlike most mag people, who are merely con artists. [WWD]
• Arthur S. holds his State of the Times meeting; reporters question why he gets paid so much and they so little. [Media Mob/NYO]
• ABC's Bob Woodruff reportedly now conscious and talking, though heavily medicated. [ABCNews.com]
• Air America could lose its New York affiliate on April 1. We'd be bummed, if we ever listened to it. [NYP]
• The Jew and the gays brought Oscar his second-worst ratings since 1987. [WP]
• Does Diane Sawyer want to anchor World News Tonight? One gossip site says so. [TMZ]
• Candace Bushnell to launch weekly Sirius Satellite Radio show giving advice to women. First piece of advice we'd like her fans to hear: "They're just cupcakes. Stop waiting on a line around the corner for them." [NYDN]
• Will Nick Sylvester be a Stephen Glass, a Mike Barnicle, or a Janet Cooke? [Media Mob/NYO]

• Because there just aren't enough glossy mags about celebrity gossip: Page Six magazine, coming in February to a newsstand near you. [WWD]
• For the first time, Mr. Sulzberger goes to Switzerland. And various other Timesiana. [NYO]
• Also, Mr. Sulzberger has taken valuable lessons from all his fuckups. Really. [MW]
• Hell with Couric. CBS News should give Diane Sawyer the Evening News chair. [NYO]
• Steve Brill gives money to Yale to make more journalists. Because what the media business needs in more Ivy kids. [NYT]
• How a rant becomes a letter to the editor. [CJR]

• Now Diane Sawyer wants the World News Tonight job. [B&C]
• But Geraldo says Elizabeth Vargas should get it. [B&C]
• New Time Inc. chief John Huey isn't as bad as he's rumored to be, says Huey. [NYP]
• Selma Blair went to an old psychiatric hospital and put a live rat in her mouth. For a photo shoot. For the Times, of course. [WWD]
• Announcing the cast for Miss Run Amok: The Movie. [Media Mob/NYO]
• After two days of conferring in Puerto Rico, magazine bigshots have breakout insight: Things must change. Wow. [Mediaweek]
• David Carr's kids believe only suckers pay for content. Content companies sort of believe it, too. [NYT]
• City of Newark, N.J., pays $100K for good news coverage. Which has clearly been very successful. [NJ.com]

We watch the Today show around here. Not because we like it, mind you, but because it's ripe for comedy. But as Alexis Glick is increasingly permitted to smash her pretty face against the camera and we grow more attentive to Matt Lauer's scalp than his interviews, we're beginning to wonder if, God forbid, we might have to jump ship for the sake of common sense.