While it's hardly a secret that embattled NBC chief Ben Silverman likes to party, never have his carousing ways received the sort of harsh buzz dealt out this weekend by Nikki Finke, who spent the better part of a blockbuster post detailing how Silverman's antics are about to cost him his job. No, seriously this time! According to a variety of anonymous NBC sources, Silverman is the network's very own Man Who Wasn't There, missing meetings on a regular basis and spending the entire, crucial month of August in Beijing while his colleagues expected him to decamp for a week at most (in all fairness, those Ryan Seacrest remotes weren't going to tape themselves!). However, it seems that the NBC chief's biggest problem is EVP Teri Weinberg, a Silverman protege whose romantic involvement with an NBC showrunner caused upward-failing NBC Universal head Jeff Zucker to step in and terminate that writer's deal:

Going for the Bronze: Though NBC's Olympic coverage provided the network with television's most watched event anywhere, ever, in the history of the universe, that massive audience hasn't translated into major spikes of interest for NBC's fall shows like Kath & Kim and My Own Worst Enemy. The network spent 65% of its promo time on returning shows (like Lipstick Jungle Lipstick Jungle Lipstick Jungle) but failed to perk awareness for anything but the 80's retread Knight Rider. Still, before NBC shoehorns Michael Phelps into Selma Blair's thong, they've got this bit of recent history to add perspective: the Athens Olympics were used to tout quickly flushed shows like Joey and LAX. Perhaps Kath & Kim will stand on its own merits — that is, as long as they didn't advertise it during the rebellion-inducing beach volleyball marathon. [Variety]

That slight crisp in the air this morning signals to us that autumn is fast approaching, with its hayrides and pumpkin picking and legion of miserable children tromping off to their imagined doom. But also it means television, sweet and glorious non-off-season TV like Gossip Girl and, um... other... shows. Many other shows! So many, in fact, that you can't-even with the aid of DVR techmologies-be expected to watch them all. But in this increasingly (for the past few hundred years) pop-driven culture, it's important that you are least able to talk about the zeitgeistiest shows out there, so after the jump we'll give you a few key talking points for some of the most buzzed about series soon to be (or, in a few cases, that already are) flickering on your idiot box. SUNDAY

Maybe the reason the upcoming fall shows seem so unpromising is because we really don't know anything about them. Variety reports today that television critics and marketing executives alike are grumbling about the networks' extremely slow pace in sending out screeners and cobbling together promo clips. That's why we've been seeing the same damn Kath & Kim clip over and over again ("come in if you're sexy!") The strike, of course, is to blame. Because of the 100-day work stoppage, no one had enough time to film full pilots to screen for critics at summer press tours, when eyes are usually first laid on the new shows. "Half of the press tour was a waste because we hadn't seen the shows," a critic for the Newark Star-Ledger said. "I can't imagine writing a single thing based on any of the panels for NBC's new shows." Some hastily picked-up shows are also doing 11th-hour reshoots, like ABC's Life On Mars, which is being promoted with a few clips from the old pilot. That was shot and took place in Los Angeles. The new pilot is filming in New York. "It's a big challenge for us," said Alphabet marketing exec VP Mike Benson. "I've never had a situation like this fall where I don't have a show's pilot yet." It's big ol' mess, none of which bodes well for freshmen shows which rely on thorough marketing blitzes to attract any type of viewership. And now that's all been impeded. By writers! They're the most powerful people in the world! And they also sort of shot themselves in the feet!