An apartment-hopper writes in to say that s/he is being tortured by the Hearst building. (Hey, how do you think Helen Gurley Brown feels?) "I'm temporarily staying at an apartment in midtown whose bedroom window faces the ginormous monstrosity that is their new headquarters and those bitches never turn off their lights! Rows upon rows, floor after floor, it's like a greenhouse of squandered fluorescent energy. Unfortunately the window shades are sheer, and it's not my apartment! They have a video about how the tower is 'NYC's first green building' but how can that be possible when they're using energy all night, every night, for nothing?? Please make them shut off the lights! Even if it's only for five minutes.. I need to get some sleep!" Please enjoy your stay in midtown, friend, and then quickly return to whatever crazy blacked-out rural borough in which you reside.

The Wall Street Journal reports today that Hearst's partnership with gaming company Arkadium will soon result in a game at Seventeen.com called "Editor's Assistant," wherein you're the assistant to new 'Toos replacement Ann Shoket and you have to complete "certain tasks" to win. But that's not even as cool as the game that's planned for Cosmpolitan.com: to win "Boy Toy," players will control a virtual man's attempts to "keep his girlfriend satisfied." How lezzie! And how downmarket!

The 'Toos may be gone, but Hearst has no plans to abandon her girls. Ad Age's Nat Ives reports:

This one's a lot less irresponsible a rumor than we usually monger, because Hearst has actually been served with papers, but a tipster writes:

We've made our feelings about Marie Claire known, but have nothing to do with this little poison-pen plot that's going on now. Really, we don't—it sounds like way too much trouble.

With the holiday season in full swing, we're starting to get reports from various company parties. The common denominator seems to be that a) nobody serves food, and b) the parties suck. After the jump, we share reviews of two recent shindigs: Hearst and VNU.

• Hearst has no fucking clue who should edit Seventeen. That's because the 'Toos is irreplaceable. [Radar]
  

Another dispatch from that hideous Hearst tower, but this one kind of takes the cake. The boob-shaped cake topped with body-paint icing, that is.

An update to this morning's 'Toosage: A tipster writes,

Oookay, so, when Hearst employees whined to us that they wouldn't be getting their normal ration of shrimp at this year's holiday party, we took pity—though we also wondered what it's like to work for a real company, with a real holiday party. With real shrimp!

There's an article behind the pay wall in today's Wall Street Journal about "destination elevators," buttonless cars programmed to arrive at specific floors. They're initially difficult to adjust to, causing confusion among the elderly (Rupert Murdoch) and the young alike. But,

Wow, it must be a really great time to be working at Hearst, what with the fancy new building on 57th Street and everything! Oh ... wait. It's not, reports a tipster:

If you haven't been able to wrangle an invitation to the new Hearst cafeteria from your friend at Popular Mechanics yet, have no fear. New York magazine restaurant critic Adam Platt paid a visit to the shiny new Hearst cafeteria recently, and seemed unimpressed with the "chewy skirt steak" from the Hearst ranch in California, though he allowed that the fried chicken was "not entirely horrible." Still, we're more inclined to hit up one of the editors at Vanity Fair online for our corporate dining needs. Conde may not have sushi every day, but at least it doesn't have what a Hearstie told Platt was a "slight fishy taste."

• This may very well be the worst charity ad ever. [London Evening Standard]
• Oprah Winfrey gives Hearst Tower a handjob, calls it "out of the box." Yeah, it's that kind of morning. [NYO]
• Not even Times Square is safe from Bill O'Reilly. [THR]
• If you work at Time Inc. you should probably start boxing up your personal belongings now, just in case. [WWD]
• David Brooks is a terrible human being who will select whatever "facts" conveniently support his glib, tendentious arguments without regard for consistency. Also, he's a bad Mets fan. [NYO]

Last night was the official opening of the new Hearst tower, the green and glassy behemoth on Eighth Avenue. Pretty much every media power player was in attendance: Oprah, Martha Stewart, Dan Rather, Katie Couric (awkward!), Governor Pataki, and...Christopher Meloni? Sure, the actor might not carry much weight in the media world, but Cathie Black just LURVES Law & Order: SVU. Seriously, she can't get enough!

A tipster notes the following about Hearst's Quick and Simple:

Per little Jossie: Maxim senior editor and Black Table founding co-editor (you decide which is more important) Eric Gillin has handed in his resignation. Also leaving is ME Laura Silverman, who's not returning to New York after going abroad to launch Maxim India and finding inner peace while downward dogging in a Rishikesh ashram. The resignations follow the August "bloodbath," wherein editor Jimmy Jellinek bravely sacrificed several editoral lambs so that the magazine could do something "huge and historic."

What will you be doing this weekend? If you work for Hearst, probably not shopping, etc.!

• Hearst mags to eliminate subscription cards for a month; will anyone dumb enough to subscribe to House Beautiful figure out alternative methods of contact? [WSJ]
• For $300 million you could pick up Ziff Davis. What you'd do with it is another story: the whole segment is dying. [NYDN]
• Couple of broads at Fox News got $225,000 in a sexual harassment settlement. Don't spend it all in one place, gals. [FOXNews]

An e-mail sent to all Hearst employees this morning: