media-bubble

Media Bubble: 'Time' Again

Jesse · 05/03/06 03:03PM

• Michael Kinsley does not want to be the next editor of Time. Who does? Also: Front-page ads coming to the Journal? [NYO]
• Former Wall $treet Week host Louis Rukeyser dies, four years after PBS killed him off. [NYT]
The Source will finally get a new owner tomorrow. [NYP]
Times obits to go video. [Media Mob/NYO]
• Bill Keller is no fan of the WSJ editorial page. We're shocked. [WSJ]

Media Bubble: 'RS' Matters, Dammit

Jesse · 05/02/06 02:40PM

• Jann Wenner says Rolling Stone is still culturally relevant. He says this in USA Today, of course a key arbiter of cultural relevance. [USAT]
• Walter Isaacson will not run for governor of Louisiana. [WWD]
• Down with the Pulitzers. [Miami Herald]

Media Bubble: Who Will Replace Jim Kelly (If, You Know, He's Going Anytime Soon)?

Jesse · 05/01/06 03:20PM

• Might John Huey poach Slate's Jacob Weisberg to run Time? Sure, maybe. Who knows? [Media Mob/NYO]
• Might John Huey poach Newsweek's Jon Meacham to run Time? Sure, maybe. Who knows? [MW]
• Stephen Colbert does not amuse Bush at White House Correspondents' Dinner. [E&P]
• Anderson Cooper's 60 Minutes segments will be shown on CNN, too. See, boys, there's Coop enough for all of us. [Philadelphia Inquirer]
• Rosie's View contract says she can't cut her hair. As will Keri Russell's next contract anywhere, if she ever works again. [Fox411]

Media Bubble: Air America Going Off the Air, Again

Jesse · 04/28/06 01:30PM

• Today in articles we feel like we keep reading: Air America set to lose NYC affiliate. [Mediaweek]
• While storm clouds perpetually hang over the rest of Time Inc., Real Simple lives it up in Laguna Beach. Where, apparently, the weather was lovely. [WWD]
Shape EIC to take over Fitness. But first — damned noncompetes! — she'll be special-projects editor at More for three months. [NYP]
• Conde to launch site for teen girls featuring user-generated content. Users will then get town cars home. [BizWeek]
Dartmouth Review turns 25, and conservatives run the country. Coincidence? Hardly. [NYSun]

Media Bubble: Spinning Pinch

Jesse · 04/27/06 01:14PM

• NYT Co. searches for outside PR help in recent stock spat. Our tip: Go with Rubenstein; then the Post will be nice. [NYP]
NYDN looks to buy Philly newspapers. You know, because Mort manages such a smoothly running ship here. [Philadelphia Inquirer]
• The latest Seventeen brand extension: A mag for rich girls. [WWD]
• Post-Stern, CBS looking to sell radio stations? [NYP]
• Why does media care about Duke rape story? Because reporters are worried college will be too expensive for their kids. Obviously. [NYPress]

Media Bubble: The 'Times' Don't Need No Stinking Investors

Jesse · 04/26/06 02:25PM

• Hey, Pinch, there's an upside to keeping your stock in the toilet: It's your chance to take the Times Co. private again. Who to fund the deal? Your buddy Steve Rattner, of course! [NYO]
• Did Jann Wenner try to finagle a discounted rate from the Strokes for the RS 1,000th issue party?? Or did the Strokes try to extort more money from Jann? Eh, who cares. [WWD]
• Bill Keller thinks Bushies are out to intimidate the press. You think? [NJ]
• More changes expected at Marie Clarie — which, somehow, the Post makes at least partially Bonnie Fuller's fault. [NYP]
• Because there's nothing this woman can't do, here's dating advice from Bonnie Fuller. [AMNY]
• Oh, sure, Primedia is a disaster of a company. But why does that mean it shouldn't spend $250k to help cover the cost of its CEO's apartment? [Footnoted]

Media Bubble: 'Rolling Stone' Has a Publisher! Yay!

Jesse · 04/25/06 02:30PM

• Jann Wenner finds himself a new RS publisher, to replace the one he forced out in February. He'll drive away this one soon enough, too, no doubt. [NYP]
• CBS Radio, which fired Opie and Anthony from WNEW a few years ago, hires them for Stern's old slot on WXRK — booting David Lee Roth. [USAT]
Cookie or Playboy? You make the call. [Media Mob/NYO]
• Those male socialites the Times discovered on Sunday? Yeah, one of them shtupps (or, at least, used to shtupp) the guy who wrote the story. [WWD]

Media Bubble: Who Cares About Rate Base, So Long as Your Shirt Is Tucked In?

Jesse · 04/24/06 03:46PM

Details missed its rate base on eight of 10 issues in 2005. Fun. [Ad Age]
• Martha Stewart launches Blueprint today in a bid to reach younger readers. There should probably be a joke about Alexis here, but we can't think of one. [NYP]
• Daily Candy remains for sale. [NYM]
• Punch Sulzberger has allegedly said that he'll read the Times on the computer when he can take a computer into the bathroom with him. Now, apparently, he can. [NYT]
• Kurt Andersen thinks we're in a tech bubble again. How does he know? Because Michael Wolff wants in. [NYM]
• Simon Dumenco answers the questions you didn't ask, including whether he has a clothing line and what his jingle sounds like. [Ad Age]
• Existentially speaking, who is Brian Williams? [MW]
NYT M.E. Jill Abramson's grandfather could have invested early in Paramount Pictures but didn't. [NYSun]

Media Bubble: All About the 'Times'

Jesse · 04/20/06 03:55PM

• Will the shareholder revolt at the Times Co. finally force the Sulzbergers to address their Pinch problem? Could well be, Arianna say. [HuffPost]
Times site goes down for four hours last night; world survives. [AP via Newsday]
Times to consolidate its four weekly suburban sections into one. We told you this a week ago. [Newsday]

Media Bubble: Scott McClellan Has Already Addressed That Question

Jesse · 04/19/06 02:51PM

• Scott McClellan resigns as White House press secretary. Don't get too excited; not like the next one will be much better. [WP]
• Morgan Stanley reassures that it's not trying to force the sale of the Times Co. No, it's just trying to turn it into another Gannett. [NYT]
• This week, Conde Nast discovers internet video. [WWD (second item)]
• Plame-entangled reporter Matt Cooper to become political editor of Time.com. Which is a prison of its own sort. [Media Mob/NYO]
• Gay Talese is a meticulous writer who misses deadlines. [NYO]
• The secret to good TV news? Banter. (Oh yeah? Then why aren't we hosting Meet the Press?) [NYO]

Media Bubble: Pulitzer Winners Are Just Like Us — They Have Lunch!

Jesse · 04/18/06 04:00PM

• Pulitzer winners lunch together — before the awards are announced! Scandal! [E&P]
• Morgan Stanley wants to end NYT Co.'s two-tiered stock structure, which keeps the Sulzbergers in control. Much as we like to make fun of the Sulzies: Dear God, are these people insane? [TheStreet.com]
• A day after the Times discovers sponsored copies of the Daily News, it also learns of staff upheavals at the Village Voice. [NYT]
• New Penthouse will be more like old Penthouse — and it'll be run by a chick. [MIN]
• The more he knows the more he knows how much more there is to know. [E&P]

Media Bubble: Gossip Columns Important to Those Concerned About Gossip

Jesse · 04/17/06 12:50PM

• Page Six traffics in buzz, apparently. [NYT]
• Uncle Bob Schieffer might stick around to do end-of-show commentaries on Couric-led CBS Evening News. And also to show off his legs, of course. [Philadelphia Inquirer]
• Breaking: Daily News distributes sponsored copies! [NYT]
• It's hard to be a teen magazine. [Mediaweek]
Real Simple loses two top editors; Details's Dan Peres tucks in. [WWD]

Media Bubble: Slow News on Good Friday

Jesse · 04/14/06 12:55PM

• Hachette looks to trim payroll costs (huh, feel like we've heard that before someplace); and Time's Jim Kelly throws a party for Joe Klein. [NYP]
• Feeling you haven't been reading enough memoirs lately? (And, really, don't we all feel like that?) Not to worry: There'll be twice as many next year. [WSJ]
• And the newspaper business continues to slowly die. [NYT]
• In new Howell Raines memoir, only two chapters of 43 are about the Jayson Blair saga. [E&P]
• Jann Wenner's longtime assistant is set to leave the company, and, remarkably for that shop, everyone likes her. [WWD]

Media Bubble: 'NYT' Turns Off TV Division

Jesse · 04/13/06 03:11PM

• As expected, the Times dumps its unwatched Discovery Times channel. [Media Mob/NYO]
• Did Bill Keller's gin-heiress wife kill Boldace? Probably not, but she sure didn't help. [WWD (second item)]
We love conflicts of interest; the Pulitzers board, not so much. [E&P]
Forbes media kibitzer James Brady wonders, "Is Cosmo editor Kate White the smartest dame in the business?" Of course she is, Jim. Until you find someone else to slobber over next week. [Forbes]
New Yorker fashion director Michael Roberts moves to Vanity Fair, presumably preferring a publication that does little things like fashion spreads. [Media Mob/NYO]

Media Bubble: Because ABC's Biggest Problem Is Leaked Email

Jesse · 04/12/06 01:26PM

• Problem-ridden ABC News hunts for GMA email leaker. This much we know: It wasn't Krucoff. [NYO]
• Howell Raines' new memoir is good. [WP]
• Is Conde considering moving publishers around? Perhaps. [WWD]
• "The Feds yesterday arrested two young Wall Streeters and a mole at a Business Week print shop for running a trans-Atlantic insider trading scam that enlisted investment bank colleagues and a stripper to rack up $6.7 million in ill-gotten gains." It's ledes like this that make it impossible to stay mad at the Post. [NYP]
NYT names a new real-estate editor; Joyce Cohen has fun with capital letters. [HuntGrunt]
• 'Times' gets new ThuStyles deputy editor; remarkably it's not a gay man. She is, however, a former Observer m.e., which the Observer doesn't mention. [Media Mob/NYO]

Media Bubble: At Least We'll Have Matt

Jesse · 04/11/06 04:25PM

• 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]

Media Bubble: Katie Couric Blah CBS Blah Blah Younger Viewers Blah Blah Blah

Jesse · 04/10/06 04:30PM

• Will Katie Couric make the evening news relevant again? Color us skeptical. [NYT]
• This week's new New Republic — now less wonky! — spends its cover and nearly 4,000 words analyzing Thursday Styles and its star columnist, Alex Kuczynski. (Turns out, the section and her column are both morally indefensible. Who knew?) The big question, however, is left unanswered: What does it mean for Israel? [TNR]
• Steve Dunleavy is taking all the Page Six stuff hard. "I bleed for the paper, I really do." Poor Steve. [NYer]
• And, shockingly, the News is reveling in the Post's misfortune. [NYT]

Media Bubble: The Joys of Renegotiating Your Contract

Jesse · 04/07/06 03:20PM

• Bonnie's rich AMI contract is up at the end of June, and — as one of her mags gets shut down and another's redesign is more or less undone — negotiations are underway. Great timing, eh? [NYP (second item)]
• Newspapers execs met in Chicago, surrounded by dinosaur skeletons. Sexy Jon Fine enjoys that metaphor, as he should. [BizWeek]
• Who does Spin hire to replenish its now-virtually-empty staff ranks? An alt-porn auteur and star, naturally. [FBNY]
• Injured ABC anchor Bob Woodruff sends note to colleagues, releases photo. We're very pleasantly surprised to see that he does, in fact, still look like an anchorman. [AP/USAT]
Forward politics writer E.J. Kessler to move to New York Post op-ed gig. Because people jump from socialist to conservative papers all the time. [Forward]
• All the standard kvetches about media? Wrong, wrong, and wrong, says Bill Powers. [NJ]
• Arthur Gregg Sulzberger, the son of Pinch who we've attempted to saddle with the nickname Prince, to leave the Providence Journal for The Oregonian in Portland. Wonder where he'll end up? [Providence Phoenix]
NYT Congress reporter Sheryl Gay Stolberg to become paper's White House reporter. [Media Mob/NYO]
• The Voice loses another, this time investigative reporter Jennifer Gonnerman. [Media Mob/NYO]
• Are Conde Nast editors being shut out of Devil Wears Prada screenings? Um, no. [WWD]

Media Bubble: It Is the Best of Times for Celeb Weeklies, and It Is the Worst of Times

Jesse · 04/06/06 04:02PM

Celebrity Living notwithstanding, of course. [WWD]
Times crossword calls a scoundrel a "scumbag," and readers are incensed. Naturally. [Slate]
• Katie decided to move to CBS because her daughters said she should. [NYT]
• But the Couric girls' advice causes biz challenges for both nets. [WSJ]
• Which is just as well for Jim Romenesko, who's sort of obsessed with her. [Media Mob/NYO]

Media Bubble: AMI Learns That Firing Employees Saves Money

Jesse · 04/05/06 03:50PM

• Yesterday's American Media bloodletting will cut the mag publisher's workforce by 9 percent. [WWD]
• And will save the company about $10 million. [NYP]
• With Katie Couric heading to CBS, NBC is days away from a deal to bring Meredith Vieira to fill her clickety stiletto heels. [NYT]
• Gabe Sherman agrees: Times Discovery Channel might be on its way out. Plus Hearst in the new tower, Lapham at Michael's, and Raines at Harvard. [NYO]
The New York Times has finally done something to make Jack Shafer happy. So now he'll cancel his subscription. [Slate]
The Week names Nick Kristof Columnist of the Year. We imagine Andrea Peyser is devastated. [E&P]