Hot damn. Allen Salkin — the Seymour Hersh of the Sunday Styles section — hit the nail on the head this time. Salkin reviewed/profiled the DJ AM docu-show about addiction, and got some quotes. It's a teary, compelling affair.

There was a lot of ticking last night. Heidi's biological clock was making noise and so was the time bomb of Roxy working at People's Revolution. Oh, and Audrina was ticked off, but no one seems to care.

Were you waiting to hear that David Paterson has decided to drop out of the race for governor in 2010? That hasn't happened yet, but he has come to a decision on another matter of great political import. The governor declared yesterday that he wholeheartedly endorses the selection of Jay-Z as MTV's "Hottest MC" for 2009:

• More on Condé Nast's decision to shut down four magazines, including Gourmet, Cookie, Modern Bride and Elegant Bride: An estimated 180 people will likely lose their jobs as part of the move, although CEO Chuck Townsend says the company has no plans to shutter any other titles. [NYO, AdAge]
• If Comcast goes ahead with a deal to take a controlling stake in NBC, Jeff Zucker, NBC Universal's CEO, may need to find a new job. [NYP]
• Don Imus' radio show debuted on Fox Business today. [WP]
• Rich Ross, the president of Disney Channels Worldwide, is taking over Walt Disney Studios; he's succeeding Dick Cook, who was ousted on Sept. 16. [NYT]
• Universal Pictures has fired chairmen Marc Shmuger and David Linde. [LAT]
• CBS has been busy ridding YouTube of David Letterman's mea culpa. [NYT]
• Zombieland was No. 1 at the box office this weekend with a $25 million take. Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs dropped to second place. [Variety]
• It wasn't all bad news at Condé Nast today: The New Yorker landed its biggest ad buy since 2005 with a $1 million deal with HSBC. [Folio]

The Hills are on fire! Everyone is talking about last night's sixth season premiere, but it looks like Lauren Conrad leaving has doomed the show. Know what, who cares? The City is a million times better, anyway.

Some ignorant folk don't think "public speaker" Sarah Palin deserves her outlandishly steep paycheck. Eddie Furlong's hitting the coke pipe. And Penelope Cruz enjoys kissing both Charlize Theron and Scarlett Johansson. It's your Wednesday morning gossip roundup!

• Twitter is close to raising $100 million in new funding. And despite the fact it makes no money, the deal will value the company at $1 billion. [WSJ, CNN]
• A new survey finds that 86% of the public thinks the news media tries to influence public opinion. One reason to discount the data: Fox News came in as the country's most-trusted and least-trusted news source. And Bill O'Reilly ranked as "the most-trusted news anchor on cable TV." [THR, Poynter]
• MTV reports that it plans to go ahead with the drug-intervention reality series featuring DJ AM that was shot just before he died. [THR]
• Michael Moore's new documentary is off to a strong start, alas. [LAT]
• Tim Knight, Newsday's publisher, has handed in his resignation. [NYT]
• Corynne Steindler of "Page Six" is joining Bonnie Fuller's new website. [NYO]
• NBC Nightly News' audience is growing, believe it or not. [HP]
• Yahoo is spending $100 million to remind you it still exists. [BrandChannel]
• CBS has a brand new viewer today. Chief exec Les Moonves and CBS Early Show anchor Julie Chen had a son named Charlie this morning. [ET]

Stephanie Pratt's wallet could use a little help. Elton John's too old for kids. And Colin Farrell knocked up his girl. That and much, much more in your Tuesday morning gossip roundup!

Basically the entire nation has rallied around the idea that Kanye West is an entire asshole for ruining Taylor Swift's big moment last night. So, too, has Barack Obama, our president. But he won't do it on the record.

When Guest of a Guest speculated that last night's Kanye West-Taylor Swift incident at the VMAs was scripted it sent a shockwave through Gawker HQ. Brian Moylan thinks it's fake and Richard Rushfield thinks it's real. Punches are being thrown!

Tonight's VMA awards were messy. The transitions were sloppy. The performances were so-so. And the emotional outbursts were, well, tacky. Our evidence: Kanye West upstaging Taylor Swift's big win.

You were waiting for Mayor Bloomberg to offer up his predictions for the MTV Video Music Awards, weren't you? Well, he's officially weighed in: He says he expects Lady Gaga will have a big night when she goes up against Beyoncé for "Video of the Year" and "Best Female Video" on Sunday. [MTV]

Well, it's not bad, per se, but it's not necessarily great either. It follows the familiar Madge pattern of ripping off current street culture, thrusting and simulating masturbation, and singing about partying. Boyfriend Jesus Luz has a cameo where he plays DJ while M strips him tries to suck the life force out of him, but he doesn't show off his turntable badness like we thought he would. Luckily producer Paul Oakenfold is nowhere to be found.

A man who wanted to be on Paris Hilton's "best-friend" reality show has been arrested after sending in pictures of children in sexual positions, some "masochistic," as part of his application. And justice finds another asshole sicko. Hooray! [Houston Press]

It's official: MTV is going ahead with that horrible and unnecessary Teen Wolf series.

And it's not for wearing fur. No, a tipster says she saw the socialite and star of The City beating her pooch this morning.

The American television dream can come true, attention addicts! MTV has picked up a new reality show called "Downtown Girls", which will make one media refugee blogger type momentarily pseudofamous. Not Julia Allison, though!

Someone needs to tell AMC that vampires are the host monster now, as they shell out big bucks for a zombie show. Natalie Portman also gets a TV deal. And Legos (yes, the toy) are coming to the big screen.

• Vibe is rising from the dead. A group of investors led by former cable exec Leo Hindery and its luxury magazine publisher Uptown Media have acquired the magazine. They plan to resurrect the website in a few weeks. [WSJ]
• Laura Ling is shopping a book proposal with her sister, Lisa Ling. [WSJ]
• Twitter was the victim of another denial-of-service attack yesterday. [NYT]
• Facebook is testing out something called "Facebook Lite," which may or may not be a Twitter competitor, depending whom you ask. [ABC News, Guardian]
• CBS had planned to change up this year's Emmy Awards. But then everyone complained, so now it plans to go back to the way it was. [THR]
• A launch party for a new magazine? Could it be? Really? [AdAge]

• All is not well at ABC. The hoped-for comeback of Who Wants to Be a Millionaire? didn't happen and ratings have been so low, the network is now occasionally falling behind Univision. Yes, Univision. [NYT, B&C]
• The owners of Uptown magazine are in talks to acquire Vibe, which shut down in June. What they plan to do with it is anybody's guess. [AdAge]
• Tina Brown's Daily Beast is on the move: She's planning to launch a U.K. version of the Barry Diller-funded website within months. [Telegraph]
• Not every magazine in America is struggling, apparently! [Newsweek]
• Is MTV planning to leave Times Square? Quite possibly. [NYP]