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Carrie Prejean Attempts to Storm Off Larry King , Is Foiled by the Siren Call of Rolling Cameras [Tantrums]

Azaria Jagger — Thu, 12 Nov 2009 00:55:10 -0500

Lou Dobbs wasn't the only right-wing populist to attempt a dramatic CNN exit last night. Unfortunately, he's the only one who succeeded, because former Miss California and Christianist poster girl Carrie Prejean can't even throw a proper on-set hissy fit.

Larry King, the reigning champion of softball interviews, was apparently not soft enough for Ms. Prejean. When King broached the subject of the lawsuit Carrie settled with Miss California USA. (You know, the mediation where they screened her sex tape in front of her mom?) She complains that King is "being inappropriate," and after a full minute of wrangling, she removes her microphone and announces she is leaving—only to end up sitting there for another minute, grinning and playing the "I ca-a-an't he-e-ear y-o-o-ou" game until Larry cuts to commercial.

The ensuing commercial break was deeply suspenseful. Would Carrie be on set when we returned? I can only imagine what sort of harsh, frantically whispered words were spoken during these moments, because when the show returned, Carrie's microphone had miraculous been rewired and Mr. King apologized to Mr. Prejean. (Apparently she didn't want to take phone calls, and it was the caller, not Larry's questions, that so perturbed her?) A temporary rift in the time-space continuum healed and Larry King Live returned to being as heavy-hitting as a feather-stuffed cashmere pillow.

The Bedbugs, They Grow Stronger [Them!]

Adrian Chen — Thu, 12 Nov 2009 00:26:59 -0500

The Ohio Department of Agriculture is asking the Feds for permission to use propoxur—an industrial strength insecticide—in killing bedbugs. Says one health board member: "We are rapidly becoming overwhelmed." Help? [AP]

I Love the 1890s [Dandyism]

Adrian Chen — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 23:48:26 -0500

So it appears that fashion went directly from the 1990s to the 1890s in a single season. (We were in the 1990s last, right? I can never tell!) According to this Times fashion piece, Victorian style is hot hot hot:

Not only are men scooping up old-timey hunting and fishing wear—even bowlers!—but women are doing everything short of dusting off their whale bone corsets to get into the 19th century mode. Ye Olde Times:

This flamboyance is part of a curious new movement called Tweed Rides, informal gatherings of spiffily dressed ladies and gents cycling leisurely through town and disdaining finish lines. Tweed Rides began in London earlier this year and have spread this fall to Boston, San Francisco and Chicago. As the directions for this weekend's Tweed Ride in Washington, D.C., put it: "Leave the fleece, Lycra and outer shell at home. This ride is for the dandy.

First one to spot a monocle this winter wins $100.

Team Jon Stewart Wins Again [Go Team]

Adrian Chen — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 23:00:53 -0500

Sean Hannity just apologized for running footage on his program yesterday that inflated the size of a crowd at some awful protest. And he gave props to Jon Stewart and "The Daily Show" for calling him out on it. But...

...that last line sort of creeped me out: "Mr. Stewart, you were right, we apologize—but by the way, I want to thank you, and all your writers, for watching." It creeped me out because Hannity wasn't just talking to Stewart and the "TDS" writing team, here: He was also sending a winking, smartass shout-out to everyone who tuned in tonight solely for the satisfaction of seeing him eat crow. Team Jon Stewart.

I am a member of Team Jon Stewart, and you probably are too. Jon Stewart always seems to be on "my side" in whichever cultural/intellectual/economic battle he's mocking on that night's program. That is: nobody's side. As plenty of Times Arts Section pieces have reminded us: He is the sticker-upper-for-the-little-guy, the speaker of truth to power. His sharpened blade of sarcasm cuts clean through the half-truths of politicians to reveal that the emperor has no clothes, while his under-staffed but plucky researchers reveal mainstream media for the impotent court jester it is via embarrassing video montages.

Sometimes Jon Stewart does something like take on a conservative talk-show host (or an inept financial channel personality, or a terrible debate show) and team Jon Stewart goes crazy. Boo yah: We scored a point! When Stewart showed Hannity's show to be the steaming crapfest it is, a lot of people on Team Jon Stewart jumped up and down and waved big pom poms, in blog post form. The only thing keeping everyone from high-fiving Jon Stewart harder in the blogosphere was that one hand was fully engaged in patting themselves on the back.

But then you think about Hannity's smugness: "I want to thank you, and all your writers, for watching our show." Hannity probably will get a ratings boost from all this! And you think about how Comedy Central is owned by Viacom, which is a massive corporation that not only depends on and reproduces the economic inequity of American capitalism but is also directly responsible for giving Carlos Mencia his own comedy program. (CREATIVE UNDERCLASS RAGE ALERT) And since Jon Stewart probably got a ratings boost, too, Viacom will now have more money to control the world and create more shows starring Carlos Mencia.

And you begin to suspect, if you are paranoid and have a half-assed Sociology degree like me, that Jon Stewart's trick isn't actually being on "our side," but keeping up appearances. It's like the liberal What's the Matter with Kansas: After recording his show, where he earns big claps for calling bankers "assholes," he gets in his Prius and drives around the corner, where Sean Hannity is waiting—beaming and freshly scrubbed—to take him in his stretch Hummer to his mansion, where together they drink Old Fashioned's while watching an enormous bank of television screens which display live readouts of their ratings and their bank accounts, and everything is way up.

(Oh, also, Jon Stewart likes Freakonomics.)

"Stripper-mobile" Proves Every Las Vegas Stereotype Correct [Distracted Driving]

Adrian Chen — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 21:34:31 -0500

Just read an article about a truck that drives around Las Vegas with a stripper dancing in it, and boy are my preconceived notions about that place tired (from being completely confirmed.) Whatever happens in Vegas, is ridiculous in Vegas.

The article (which is incomprehensibly only the second most-read article on the Las Vegas Sun's website) focuses on the "safety" and "decency" concerns raised by locals re: the mobile sin platform, which was devised as an advertisement for Deja Vu Showgirls and is described thusly:

It's akin to a small U-Haul truck but with Plexiglas surrounding the brightly lit cargo area instead of walls. In the middle is a gleaming stripper pole. Swinging around the pole is a scantily clad young woman. Two of her fellow strippers are in the back of the truck too, awaiting their turns.

Puttering up and down Las Vegas Boulevard on Monday night, it was photographed by nearly everyone it pulled alongside, from CityCenter construction workers to an SUV-load of 20-somethings from Colorado.

Yes, that sounds pretty distracting. In fact, I would say if a driver making his way down the Strip was watching a DVD of Wall-E on a television screen that covered his entire windshield while simultaneously breaking up with his girlfriend via text message and solving a complex math problem on an abacus he would be only 76% as distracted as if he was watching the stripper-mobile wend its way through Sin City. Imagine seeing the Pope-mobile driving down the road, only the Pope was stripping in it. That's the level of distraction we're dealing with it.

Concerned citizens have been complaining to city officials about the stripper-mobile. But it turns out, unsurprisingly, that Las Vegas does not have any laws precluding women from stripping in a truck:

Nothing about the women or the truck is illegal, a Metro Police spokesman said. "As long as it's not impeding traffic, it's fine," Officer Jacinto Rivera explained.

Yes, everything is kosher so long as people continue driving their cars while they photograph the stripper-mobile, like in this CNN report:

And if the mere existence of the stripper-mobile does not prove to you that Las Vegas is a gloriously wasted blight upon America from which our eventual destruction will spring, consider the hilarious way councilwoman Chris Giunchigliani went about expressing her concerns about it:

I don't care about the content or that they're female dancers. I'm sick of the women, in fact - let's get some men up there for once. But this is just illegal.

Viva Las Vegas!

UPDATE: A blog calling itself the "Nevada Progressive" is defending the Stripper-mobile as an example of "free speech." Now the stripper-mobile has confirmed my preconceived notions of progressives, too!

(photo via Roadsidepictures' Flickr)

Live Blogging Top Chef, Week 11 [Top Chef]

MisterHippity — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 21:00:00 -0500

Happy Veterans Day! Thank a veteran today? No? Do it now! Call any veterans you know and say thank you, OK? There's time before the live blog starts. And, no, veterans of Restaurant Wars do not count.

That start time, as always, will be 10 Eastern, when our favorite show gets under way on Bravo, and the live-blogging gets under way in the comments section below this post. All commenters are welcome to chip in on tonight's quip-fest—which should be a lucky one, because this is Episode 11, and today's date is 11/11, and 11 is a lucky number in Vegas. Or so Wikipedia tells me.

Hey, you know what else Wikipedia tells me? That tonight's guest judge, Nigella Lawson, "has been called the 'queen of food porn.'" This might help explain the allure of the preview clip I watched, in which Nigella and the Padma lounge in hotel beds wearing (only?) bathrobes, and call up room service asking for a chef to bring them something delicious for breakfast—and then smile slyly at one another. It looks like the start of the most awesome "food porn" flick ever made. Sadly, it's really just a start a quickfire challenge. But hey, I can always dream, can't I?

Before I do any dreaming, though, let me run through a few highlights from the last episode—the one two weeks ago, I mean (Last week they showed a reunion special, which sucked, so we won't discuss that here—although we did have fun live-blogging it). So, during Episode 10 …

Many of us were struck by Mike I.'s comment that he was "losing time like a banshee," mainly because we were unaware that banshees had poor time management skills.
We learned that Robin had hippie parents. Moral: Don't be a hippie parent.
Eli declared that Star Wars was "the only important thing Natalie Portman has done," thereby ensuring that he well never get laid by Natalie Portman. Or course, he never would have in the first place, so he didn't really lose anything there.
Toby young made it through the entire episode without saying anything stupid. But that's only because he never showed up.
When Mike I. was eliminated, several commenters spontaneously declared: "Ding dong the douche is dead!" And there was much joy in Live Blog Oz. Even the Winkie guards joined in the celebration—or at least, I'm sure they would have, if any Winkie guards had been live-blogging along with us.

By the way, if you're wondering what a Winkie guard is, click here. And if you want to see a selection of funny comments from our Episode 10 live blog, click here. When you're ready to live blog, don't click anything, just join me in the comments section below.

'Rapist Killer' and Other Crazies Stalk Twitterati [Twitterati]

Ryan Tate — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 20:26:03 -0500

Lev Grossman lost his whole novel when he changed flights; Rob Pegoraro carefully unfriended a touchy Facebook user; and a UK journalist discovered there are Twitter accounts worse than "rapist killer." The Twitterati battled a crazy world.

Novelist and journalist Lev Grossman really needs a computer backup strategy. Sounds like a consultation with massive computer nerd Susan Orlean is in order.

Just when CNN's Larry King thinks he understands The Twitter it... does... THIS! Oy.

If you weren't such a psycho about making friends on Facebook, the Washington Post's Rob Pegoraro might still be your friend on Facebook.

The definition of Bridezilla: When someone like the Daily Post's Debbie James would rather be followed by "rapist killer" than by your wedding-research Twitter account.

Demi Moore can't wait for you to get your "Being a Terrible Paparazzo in Public" ticket from the police. That's like eight million points on your DMV record, punk.

Did you witness the media elite tweet something indiscreet? Please email us your favorite tweets - or send us more Twitter usernames.

Layoffs at Newsweek [Print Is Dead]

John Cook — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 20:16:43 -0500

Newsweek laid off "about a dozen" editorial staffers Wednesday. The weekly posted a 48 percent drop in revenue in the third quarter, resulting in a $4.3 million loss. Memo from editor Jon Meacham after the jump.

Meacham sent this memo to his staff around 6 p.m. on Wednesday announcing the elimination of "about a dozen" positions at the magazine due to "market conditions." Meacham admirably admits that he has "no spin to offer" about the magazine's dire condition, but then goes ahead and offers some spin anyhow: "The different direction we undertook earlier this year continues to appear promising in terms of building and retaining an engaged audience." Can't blame him, really. Tough times.

To the Staff
From Jon Meacham

This has been a tough day for the magazine. Because the economic climate in publishing has become ever more difficult, we have been compelled by business considerations to eliminate about a dozen positions. We are parting company with colleagues who have done much to serve the magazine and its readers. As much as we would like it to be otherwise, market conditions mean that we are going to have to do our work with fewer people.

I have no spin to offer. I will say this, though: our new magazine and website have been well received by readers. The different direction we undertook earlier this year continues to appear promising in terms of building and retaining an engaged audience that we hope will be attractive to advertisers while we, like so many other organizations, seek new sources of revenue in order to fulfill our mission. Our situation is not unique. But we will keep working as hard as we can to find solutions that are.

In the meantime, thanks to you all for the work you have done and will do. To those who are leaving, we will miss you, and we wish you the very best.

The Huffington Post Unveils Its New Local Strategy: Unpaid Bloggers [Blogging]

Richard Rushfield — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 19:22:05 -0500

Last week, the Huffington Post unveiled the editor of its new LA-local site, one Billy Silverman who came with an illustrious resume having previously served as producer Brian Grazer's cultural attaché. Today, Silverman revealed the site's new strategy.

A note received by LA Observed reveals that in its local effort, the Huff Po is pretty much sticking with what they know: getting people to blog for free on the promise of fame, exposure and influence.

The email reads:

I am pleased to announce that the Huffington Post is coming to Los Angeles. We'll be launching a local edition of our news and opinion site in early December, and are hoping you would like to be part of it.

A key element of HuffPost LA will be a group blog where some of Southern California's most knowledgeable and creative minds weigh in on everything that makes Los Angeles such a diverse and unique city. Any subject is fair game, from state and city politics to cultural and business trends to the local sports teams. From the beaches to the desert, Michelin-starred restaurants to taco trucks, the Staples Center to Disneyland, the Lakers to the Dodgers, USC to UCLA, our bloggers will cover all aspects of life in Los Angeles.

We're hoping you'll add your voice to the mix, weighing in when you see something on the street that strikes you or find a worthy cause you feel isn' t getting the coverage it deserves. The HuffPost LA will let you react to the news or make some of your own.

There are no deadlines or commitments. You can blog as often or as infrequently as you like, in posts short or long. (We've generally found that between 400-800 words works best.) Its a great way to impact the local conversation.

Frosted Fakes, They're Grrrreat [Pic Of The Day]

Brian Moylan — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 18:58:47 -0500

[Panda sculptures at the Beijing zoo are covered in snow after Chinese scientists claimed to artificially induce the second snowstorm in the country's capital this year. Image via Getty]

Lou Dobbs To Become Emigrant Refugee from CNN [Exits]

Ryan Tate — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 18:51:56 -0500

Lou Dobbs will announce tonight that he's leaving CNN, sources tell the New York Times. The professional xenophobe's contract isn't up until 2011, but Dobbs reportedly met with Fox News chief Roger Ailes last month. Update: It's official. Video below.

Dobbs would fit much more snugly into the right-wing stable of shouting heads over at Fox than he did at CNN, where he made an awkward lie of the cable network's attempt to position itself as a non-partisan straight-news alternative to MSNBC on the left and Fox News on the right. But Dobbs hasn't exactly been a ratings dynamo: He was recently losing not only to Shep Smith at Fox but Chris Matthews at MSNBC and even Jane Velez Mitchell at CNN's HLN (formerly Headline News). Burn.

Maybe once Dobbs is unshackled from his CNN overlords he can finally make a bright future for himself in a foreign TV land, one that believes in true opportunity for downtrodden and wandering émigrés like himself.

UPDATE: Video of the announcement is above. Dobbs' comments have observers speculating he'll make some kind of political move.

UPDATE: Maybe not; a CNN statement says "Lou has now decided to carry the banner of advocacy journalism elsewhere."

Is Missing San Francisco Mayor Secretly Sobbing with 'Life Coach?' [Mysteries]

Ryan Tate — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 18:42:18 -0500

How does the young mayor of a new-age left coast city cope with a major political setback? By disappearing for days on end with his all-important "life coach," as failed gubernatorial candidate Gavin Newsom is rumored to have done.

The San Francisco mayor/golden child hasn't been seen in public since Oct. 30, and his staff had no idea if he went to Hawaii as reported because he didn't tell them anything. Now the local Board of Supervisors is debating whether Newsom might be hunkered down with a city-funded svengali, according to Brock Keeling at SFist:

It is rumored that the San Francisco Mayor spent little time with anyone else other than his life coach during the last few days of his gubernatorial bid. Said life coach also might have accompanied Newsom to Hawaii last week... Supervisor Chris Daly asked the city controller to look into whether or not city funds were used to pay Newsom's life coach.

It's a great move on Newsom's part: Making a grand show of his pain and introspection will only make his future claims that "I have truly changed!" or whatever all the more believable. Especially since, as Keeling points out, life coaches are well known to dedicated reality TV viewers. Those are any wife-fucking recovering-alcoholic gay-marrying mayor's core constituents! (Life coach footage below, via SFist.)

(Top pic: Newsom by darthdowney on Flickr)

Moonie Times Collapsing [Newspapers]

Pareene — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 18:14:25 -0500

Talking Points Memo is reporting on the ongoing implosion of a right-wing newspaper. All because the cult leader owners are having a family feud!

The Reverend Sun Myung Moon, leader of the Unification Church and King of Peace, owns the Washington Times, along with the UPI wire service, the New Yorker Hotel, a gun manufacturer, a large segment of the American sushi industry, and a couple members of congress.

Moon has always treasured the attention of American politicians, and he spent a lot of the '80s sucking up to Republicans. The Times was kinda like his New York Post, only if Rupert Murdoch literally thought he was Jesus.

But now, Moon is very old. And so he is handing over various bits of his church and his businesses to his many children. Apparently, a war between Moon's Harvard-educated sons Hyung-jin Moon (whom Moon appointed to run the church) and Hyun-jin "Preston" Moon (who controls the Times) led to Preston firing a bunch of Times executives (including the publisher) last Sunday, because they refused to back him in his fight with his brother.

The paper loses millions of dollars a year, but Moon never minded, as long as it fought communism and homosexuality in American society. But now Moon seems to think that maybe it is not serving its purpose:

That vision is of, among other things, an assertively right-wing newspaper that would stand up for family values — and remarks made in September by Rev. Moon, known simply as "Father" to church members, shows he thought the paper wasn't living up to its brief.

"The Washington Times has to take responsibility for people going to hell in America," he declared, referring to, among other sins, "homosexuality and lesbianism." And yet, at the same event at the church's East Garden estate in Westchester County, NY, Rev. Moon appeared to come back to his belief that the newspaper was a worthwhile endeavor.

The sermon, titled "Western People Are Different From Eastern People," is not entirely coherent. At one point Rev. Moon boasted that he is the "original ancestor" of the Times, asking "Did the CIA help with making the Washington Times? Did George Bush help with making the Washington Times?"

Times employees have no idea what is going on. There were armed guards at the offices the day the firings happened. The editor is expected to be fired any minute now. And soon there might not be a money-losing ultra-conservative crazy-person second daily newspaper in America's Capital, which would be a real shame.

Yes, We Watched Melrose Place Last Night, and It Was Worse Than Usual [Programming Announcement]

Brian Moylan — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 18:02:05 -0500

We have no more bad things to say about this show (please, try it yourself in comments). We're probably done giving this show the full recap treatment. If next week's return of Heather Locklear isn't utterly trashtastic, we're through.

Dollhouse Cancelled; Begins Journey to Nerd Martrydom [Cancellations]

Richard Rushfield — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 17:51:55 -0500

In the eyes of the fanboy international, geek auteur Joss Whedon will always be too good for television. And lucky for him, Fox didn't ruin those creds by calling the nerds' bluff and keeping his show on the air.

Fox announced today that is snuffing out the brief candle of Dollhouse, Whedon's latest series starring Eliza Dushku as a secret agent whose memory is deleted after each of her missions.

The launch of a new Whedon show is treated in nerddom with the pomp and ceremony of a royal wedding and the build-up to Dollhouse's launch seemed a year long extravaganza of set visits, plot leaks and junketeering. But when Dollhouse finally reached the airwaves, it met very mixed reviews and stumbled to find an audience. Grudgingly, Fox brought it back for a second season, but put it on in a doomed Friday night slot.

The life of a Whedon show is only really a throat-clearing prelude to its afterlife in which the failed show is converted into a modern classic. Whedon's last show, for instance, Firefly was on the air for a mere 14 episodes from 2002 - 2003, but that was enough to fuel a big screen adaptation and eternal worship as the platonic ideal in swashbuckling sci-fi dramas.

But first must come the backlash and out there across the internet can be heard the sound a million geeks posting calls to the barricades to protest Fox's treachery, proving to them once again that commerce is the enemy of art and that something as special as Dollhouse is too good to live in such an imperfect world.

And for Eliza Dushku, now that the burden of actually filming is behind her, she can move on to the far more satisfying journey of spending the rest of her decades on the planet touring hotel convention facilities and taking the podium to answer questions about the exact meaning of that look she shot her co-star in episode seven.

The Unrelenting Push for the 2010 Blockbuster Is Aready Beginning [Trailer Park]

Brian Moylan — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 17:50:57 -0500

We may not have anything left of our environment or economy by 2010, but at least we'll have something to keep us interested in the cinema. And the marketing machine is already starting. Check out the coming attractions!

So far the only things that are really releasing trailers are the big budget comedies and action pictures. We threw in the trailer for A Single Man even though it opens this year and it's an indie movie because we wanted everyone to think we watch more than popcorn flicks. We also watch The Hills and lots of porn. But we'll put A Single Man on our Netflix queue, but we're not promising we watch it before sending it back so that we can get The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants 2 for the third time instead.

Here are some new(ish) trailers for upcoming movies and our snap judgments.

Date Night
Starring: Tina Fey, Steve Carell, James Franco, Marky Mark
Reminds Us Of: 48 Hours, for some strange reason.
Plot Summary: A boring suburban couple go out for a big night in the city. They impersonate another couple and all hell breaks loose.
What Looks Good: Tina Fey and Steve Carell together at last and being hilarious.
What Looks Bad: This whole over-wrought, high-concept plot seems way too over-the-top for this duo.
Final Verdict: We'll see it, but we're going to complain that it wasn't as funny as one episode of 30 Rock.

Clash of the Titans
Starring: Liam Neeson, Ralph Fiennes, Sam Worthington
Reminds Us Of: Clash of the Titans, take one.
Plot Summary: Greek gods, lots of fighting, special effects.
What Looks Good: Medusa, the giant scorpion things, the monster they ripped off from Pan's Labrynth, Sam Worthington.
What Looks Bad: Since there isn't even an iota of narrative, the story is probably going to suck. But that's not why you buy a ticket to this anyway.
Final Verdict: Our eyeballs are dancing and our brain has checked out. Sounds like a great Saturday night.

A Single Man
Starring: Colin Firth, Julianne Moore
Reminds Us Of: Mad Men, that other retro movie Julianne Moore got an Oscar nomination for, the perfume bottles on our grandmother's vanity.
Plot Summary: Based on this trailer, we have no clue. Something having to do with how sexing Julianne Moore leads Colin Firth to want to do it with young boys.
What Looks Good: Art direction, wardrobe, performances.
What Looks Bad: This trailer reeks of a movie that is 20 minutes too long.
Final Verdict: Yes, please. We go see everything Julianne Moore is in, even though she hasn't made a good movie in a long while. Also, Oscars.

Kick-Ass
Starring: Aaron Johnson, Christopher Mintz-Plasse, Nicolas Cage
Reminds Us Of: Napolean Dynomite after karate class, Kevin Smith's wet dreams.
Plot Summary: A bunch of kids decide to put on costumes and become super heroes.
What Looks Good: The costumes are cute, and we bet there is going to be some great comedy.
What Looks Bad: Surprisingly this trailer does its job and makes this thing look really appealing. Good job.
Final Verdict: We're going to wait to read reviews before buying a ticket, but we're sold on the concept.

Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time
Starring: Jake Gyllenhaal, Ben Kingsley, Gemma Arterton
Reminds Us Of: Video games, that we need to go to the gym.
Plot Summary: There's a dagger that stops time and evil people want it, so a prince and his sexy lady have to go through the desert to get rid of it.
What Looks Good: The special effects, Jakey G. and his slutty princess.
What Looks Bad: The accents! The accents!
Final Verdict: This could either be Pirates of the Carribean good or The Mummy bad, both of which are pretty low bars.

Frank Beddor — [Pullquote]

Gabriel Snyder — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 17:36:41 -0500

screenwriter, revealing the pitch he used to convince Ridley Scott, director of Blade Runner and Alien, to direct the board-game movie Monopoly, to the Los Angeles Times. Read the rest and weep, Silver Lake.

Google's Kid-Friendly Balls [How We Live Now]

Ryan Tate — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 17:15:05 -0500

If Google shows your child its balls, the internet is safe to use. Pro tip!

Never Say Advertising Is Not a Talent [Advertising]

Hamilton Nolan — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 17:11:01 -0500

The amazing process of creating the marketing phrase "Strawberry Flavored Juice Drink Blend."

When I see these guys, with their Mediterranean ... [From Comments]

iplaudius — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 16:42:42 -0500

When I see these guys, with their Mediterranean visages and spectacular physiques, I imagine them as the descendants of ancient Roman soldiers, lost and confused in a modern world. Lacking the old measures and symbols of valor and achievement, they are constantly embroidering themselves with the simulacra of battle scars and aristocratic finery: eyebrow shaping, complicated hairstyles, scorched-earth depilation, glittery T-shirts, pimped-out V8 chariots, and other bright accoutrements. As with their ancestors, the drama of their lives again and again returns to ostentatious displays and violent contests of wealth and power and sex. It is the drama of the arena, the curia, and the opera house, brought low for the subjects and the times.

Sean Hannity Promises to Respond to Comedy Show That Fact-Checked Him [Punditry]

Pareene — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 16:40:45 -0500

We all saw the Daily Show fact-checking Fox clip, right? Where Hannity reused 9/12 rally footage and pretended it was from last week? Guess what: Hannity is going to "respond" tonight, on his show! So we'd better all watch!

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According to Dylan Stableford: "A rep for Fox says that Hannity will address the issue on his show tonight."

Seriously, what will he say? The video evidence is obvious, and Hannity is heard babbling about how it is "Thursday" over footage from a Saturday in September, thus making some sort of "we didn't intend to deceive we just used rally file footage" argument a nonstarter.

But, you know, this is Sean Hannity, who does not care about "the truth" or "honesty" or "not booking insane antisemites on the show and not mentioning that they are insane antisemites," so who cares what he will say.

It will probably just be something like "the Jews sneaked in that other footage and tricked me into airing it, because I, Sean Hannity, am an antisemite who hates the Jews."

People Begging Google to Be Their Stalker [Wtf]

Ryan Tate — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 16:37:08 -0500

Google said it can now keep a detailed list of everywhere you go, play your trips back like movies and generate "alerts" for unusual movements. Who wants this? The CIA? Nope: ordinary modern humans are asking to be tracked. Insane.

Google said in a blog post that it has been inundated with requests to add a "history" function to its Google Latitude, a mobile phone app that shows where your (authorized) friends on the service are located at any given moment. This would be the exact "feature" that Google intentionally disabled at launch to allay concerns about privacy, to much praise from civil libertarians. Google will add logs to your Latitude service now if you flip a switch, and it can also send you "Location Alerts" if you're especially enthusiastic about Orwellian internet services.

Why do we need this? Google's Chris Lambert explained:

I stopped at an awesome BBQ place on my way back from Lake Tahoe this summer, but I couldn't remember the name when my friend was asking about it a few months later. I pulled up my location history for that weekend, found where I was stationary on the drive home, and the restaurant name showed up in Google Maps.

I believe it was Benjamin Franklin who once said, "They who would trade liberty for BBQ soon have none, deserve neither, and end up eating Prison Loaf thanks to small-town CSI wannabes with subpeona power."

[via Gizmodo]

(Top pic by gerlos on Flickr)

Just Take the Best Vacation You Can Afford, Which Goes to Hell [Recessionomics]

Hamilton Nolan — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 16:14:02 -0500

The Way We Live Now: On the move. There is nothing tethering us to this dusty, tortured, goforsaken country any more—no jobs, no safety, no prospects. Once we hit the lottery or rob somebody or something, hello, vacation!

Tell us, Nomadic Family Traveler Jeanne Dee, how is it that you live your whole life just traipsing about the world with your family, on some sort of nonstop vacation? The answer is "budgeting." For just $25K per year off savings and investments, these people hopscotch about the globe while all the youth of England lay around like bumps on a log without any jobs and nobody in Iraq can make a dollar unless they're blackmailing Blackwater for it.

Also now's not a bad time for a luxury Caribbean vacation. Just FYI.

Who cares if burglaries are down because everyone is home, unemployed? Right here in the US of motherfucking A, the average Joe can't get one of the scant few jobs just because of a 20 year-old conviction for threatening two bums with a hairbrush, which was totally self-defense. If you'd been carrying a US Army ID card, you never would have had a problem in the first place, because muggers would let you off scott free, because of patriotism and a kinship between killers.

Unless you are personally named Norris Henry, 76 year-old Rikers Island guard turned New York Lottery winner, I feel pity for you in this time of economic woe, in America. If it makes you feel any better, China's looking just fine. Go there. Call it a vacation. Never come back.
[Pic via]

The Lesbian and Gay Center of Los Angeles [Open Caption]

Brian Moylan — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 16:10:11 -0500

[Samantha Ronson is going to have to try harder to make Lindsay Lohan jealous than by hanging out with the very virile, ladies' man Adam Lambert at Bardot in L.A. last night. Image via X17]

A Year Condé Nast Would Like to Forget [Magazines]

Gabriel Snyder — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 16:02:13 -0500

Final tally: ad pages dropped 32% (or 8,359 pages) at Condé Nast in 2009.

An Era Truly Ends as Grunge's Muse Takes a Hallmark Movie Role [Eras]

Richard Rushfield — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 15:46:17 -0500

For a brief moment in the early 90's, the X Generation dared to dream that the world could be a better place. Or at least it could be a more, kinda less, in your face, making such a big-deal-about-itself place.

For those few years while Grunge was king, its people lived a modern day utopia of laying on the couch watching old sitcoms, sneering at anyone who got all-excited about themselves, dressing as though we had been laying in a bed of moss for a month and creating an art form that existed entirely in air quotes. It was a magical time and through it all, one impish band-hooking-up-with actress reined as the era's muse.

The years that followed have not been kind to the grunge ethos as earnestness and ambition have replaced sarcasm and slack. But through all the twists of fortune, the lost peoples of grunge could still look to one tiny flame burning on the distant horizon. As long as Winona Ryder continued to rob department stores, make demented rants on stage and hook up with even more musicians, somewhere, the Grunge Era lived on.

But now all that is over. With the news that Ryder will make a Hallmark Hall of Fame Movie the dream has finally ended. Granted it is a movie about the life of Alcoholics Anonymous founder Bill Wilson, which although it is a very very earnest topic, at least it will have serious drinking in it, so one could say it has a toenail in grunge. But still..

Given the milestone, it seemed a good moment to take a look at the icon's of grunge and see who has stayed true to the dream during the long disapora.

ICON: Kurt Cobain
GRUNGE ACCOMPLISHMENT: The era's troubador
WHERE HE IS NOW: Deceased
BETRAYAL OF GRUNGE ETHOS QUOTIENT: Almost entirely pure, however a posthumous cartoon appearance in Guitar Hero game raised eyebrows.

ICON: Layne Staley
GRUNGE ACCOMPLISHMENT: Lead singer, Alice in Chains; sung the definitional Grunge lyric "He who tries, Will be wasted"
WHERE HE IS NOW: Died of an overdose in 2002
BETRAYAL OF GRUNGE ETHOS QUOTIENT: Low. It's hard to beat a drug overdose for grunge purity.

ICON: Douglas Coupland
GRUNGE ACCOMPLISHMENT: Wrote the not particularly Grungey book which gave the name to Generation X
WHERE HE IS NOW: Living in Toronto where he has just written Generation A which according to his website champions, the act of reading and storytelling as one of the few defenses we still have against the constant bombardment of the senses in a digital world"
BETRAYAL OF GRUNGE ETHOS QUOTIENT: Enormous.

ICON: Doc Martens
GRUNGE ACCOMPLISHMENT: The era's official footwear.
WHERE HE IS NOW: Forced to abandon production for a time in their native UK and give up their vegan non-leather line, Doc struggles along as a novelty/nostalgia act.
BETRAYAL OF GRUNGE ETHOS QUOTIENT: Low.

ICON: Courtney Love
GRUNGE ACCOMPLISHMENT: The era's Yoko Ono
WHERE SHE IS NOW: Has relocated her long run disaster show to New York.
BETRAYAL OF GRUNGE ETHOS QUOTIENT: Her sell-out is total, complete and unquestionable, while on another level she remains somehow the brand's truest proponent.

ICON: Perry Farrell
GRUNGE ACCOMPLISHMENT: Lead singer of Jane's Addiction, creator of Lollapalooza.
WHERE HE IS NOW: An earnest global warming campaigner, occaisional Jane's reunion attendee and flogger of various palooza spin off's/
BETRAYAL OF GRUNGE ETHOS QUOTIENT:When he created Kidzapalooza, he took a step beyond possible grunge redemption.

Al Gore's TV Network Firing 80 People Due to Wild Success [Layoffs]

Ryan Tate — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 14:59:20 -0500

Current Media said it would shed 80 people, confirming earlier reports, and will make its unconventional format more boringly traditional. This might sound bad. But the San Francisco cable network assures us it is evidence of amazing success!

Current announced it will eliminate 80 jobs while shifting away from its trademark short-form video packages and "towards proven 30-60 minute formats" from more outside sources. This would mean less video production in Current's Bay Area home base, as reported previously by former Valleywagger Jackson West at NBC Bay Area.

Which means everything is totally awesome and on track, according to a Current press release:

This re-organization was not the result of a need to cut costs. Current Media will have its most profitable year. This financial stability will allow the company to re-allocate resources in order to put further emphasis on areas of the business believed to best position Current Media for continued long-term growth.

Financial stability leads to ~~sad job layoffs~~ glorious resource re-allocation, gotcha. More good news: Current journalists no longer have to travel all the way to North Korea to hear propagandist doublespeak!

UPDATE: Current COO Joanna Drake Earl said in an interview that the layoffs hit San Francisco and Los Angeles offices the hardest; and while the firings were not "driven by a need to cut costs," they will indeed result in a net reduction of costs.

She added that "It's always a very sad day to eliminate positions" but that the layoffs were "about being a good media company listening to our consumers... any media company in the business of show production is... watching the dial" in terms of results and adjusting as necessary.Indeed, it sometimes seems like Current is becoming more like the traditional media companies it was intended to serve as counterprogramming against, what with the outsourcing of production, devotion to "consumer" feedback (like ratings!) and layoff rounds.

But Earl said the company remains "very committed" to audience contributions, albeit in "different ways" than through collecting short-form videos, a format now dominated by YouTube and "somewhat confusing" to viewers anyway, according to Earl. Not all short shows have been eliminated; some, like Vanguard Journalism, have actually been lengthened.

So maybe Current TV can grow with its hippie, San Francisco soul intact. That's going to mean acting more like ruthless capitalist media barons. But it's probably the best hope for the remaining employees at the all-too-baffling (and all too obscure) cable network.

(Pic: Gore at a Current TV event last year. By Simone Brunozzi.)

Hearst Is Amazingly Not Broke [Media Crack]

Hamilton Nolan — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 14:52:01 -0500

In your woebegone Wednesday media column: Hearst gets money, layoffs at Current TV, Conde Nast gets internet religion, and Sesame Street characters are the swing votes in Fox News' war for righteousness.

What's this? Keith Kelly says that Hearst is sitting on a $1 billion "war chest," and that the company "is said to have revenues over $7 billion and to be profitable — as well as debt-free." Hey Hearst, Conde Nast is calling—they want to know what your secret is! For making money! Haha! Man. Somebody should definitely have the Hearst CEO repeat that one to Si Newhouse at some point. At a party or something. Just slide right over and lay it on him. That would be so funny.

Current TV is laying off 80 staffers, about a fifth of its work force. Interesting quote from them! "This re-organization was not the result of a need to cut costs. Current Media will have its most profitable year." That's a new sort of explanation, for this type of thing. Our condolences to the departed.

Conde Nast is doing something related to the internet! Says here Conde is "embracing magazine Web sites more as enhanced platforms for the titles' editorial missions rather than simply as companions to the print product." Does that mean they will have good magazine websites instead of not so good ones? Time will tell!

The Ombudsman of PBS is now forced to write columns on the topic of whether Sesame Street characters are biased against Fox News. People are stupid.

Welcome to Our Newest Obsession: Jersey Shore [Heightened Reality]

Brian Moylan — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 14:48:01 -0500

Usually the commercial breaks during The Hills are for rolling our eyes at the inanity on the screen. Last night, however, they were for awesome, thanks to the new promos for Jersey Shore. Get ready to have your mind blown!

This is the new MTV reality show about a group of guidos living in a beach house for the summer. It's like one of those crappy email forwards full of pictures of guys with bad designer clothes, prickly hair, and fake tans throwing gang symbols at the camera, but it's actually alive. This is such a genius idea that we can't believe it hasn't been done before. No, Growing up Gotti does not count. We have the promo for you, but we have to ease you into it. Here are all the things that are going to be great about this sociological experiment. December 3 can not come soon enough.

Hair: The coiffure of the guido in his native habitat is a thing of beauty. As distinctive as the fluke of a whale and as arresting as the plumage on a turkey's tail, it is an amazing sculpture of gel and ingenuity. This is not so much as vanity, but artistry. You should buy an HD television to watch it in all its majesty.

Muscles: A guido without muscles is like a paraplegic without a wheelchair—he just wouldn't be able to function. Also, they make him spectacular to behold. Especially when he is in contest with others of his species.

Tanning: Hipsters have the ashen death pallor that is cultivated through hours of cruising the city at night and afternoons spent lying in a filthy unmade bed contemplating the importance of Animal Collective. Guidos just lie in a magical bed for 10 minutes a week and—Bam!!—they are a wonderful golden brown color. The darker they are, the more dedicated they are to their craft. We like ours to be the color of wet infield clay, but really we can appreciate the full color spectrum of browns.

Sunglasses in Nightclubs: This is not behavior that is exclusive to our subject but it it one they excel at over all other cultures. It has something to do with the tackiness and size of the sunglasses in comparison with the substandard lighting systems of the nightspots that they frequent. Also, they can not put them on the top of their heads, in case they crush the gel sculpture that is resting there.

Mating Rituals: As much as we hate the idea of their species propagating, we can't get enough of the intricate dances where the males try to woo the females. The female's plumage to attract a mate is equal to, if not surpassing, the males. When the two get together, it's like rubbing French manicured nails over a nylon stuffed with honeydews. Also, they often lead to...

Fights!: We don't know whether it's macho posturing, roid rage, or something in the water in parts of New Jersey, but when it comes to sparring in public the only creature that does it better are the ones classified as Real Housewives. The muscles, hair, tans, sunglasses, and mating rituals all assemble to create these fights, which are greater than the sum of their parts. Much like Voltron, but with better hair and bigger sunglasses.

OK, you are now ready to watch the trailer. They should put this on The Discovery Channel, it's so beautiful.

Über-Programmer Ditches Yahoo Over 'Lame' Microsoft Deal [Exits]

Ryan Tate — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 14:29:16 -0500

No one likes Yahoo's search deal with Microsoft. Wall Street wanted more up front money; tech elites called it an abdication, a "shame" and "seppuku." Now Yahoo is losing a programming icon over the embarrassing arrangement.

Rasmus Lerdorf, inventor of the PHP programming language, confirms he is leaving the company. "It has only been a couple of days," he told us by email yesterday. "I really don't know what is next yet... I am enjoying having a bit more time to play with pet projects this week."

Lerdorf, whose widely-used programming and templating system has been especially popular among Web startups, declined to elaborate on why he left Yahoo. But he was blunt about the matter on Twitter this past summer, just moments after Yahoo announced a pact in which Microsoft would power its search results — previously handled by in-house code — while Yahoo would continue to sell ads against the results:

If we had to guess where Lerdorf might end up, we'd lay our money on Facebook, a PHP shop and a fast-growing one at that. The massive social network has no doubt pushed Lerdorf's language to the edges of its performance envelope. More importantly, the young company shows no inclination to outsource software development to one of its largest competitors and turn itself into a second-tier advertising network.

(Pic by Aaron Hockley)

Outrage-Off: Bill O'Reilly vs. Bryan Fischer [Outrage]

Hamilton Nolan — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 14:14:06 -0500

Nidal Hasan, a Muslim, killed a bunch of people at Ft. Hood. This is a challenge to the right wing to come up with the most outrageously crazy thing to say, about Muslims. Today: Bill O'Reilly vs. Bryan Fischer.

We could not help but to enter Bill O as a contender after his classic "Devil's advocate" bit last night:

Let me play Devil's advocate here: Barack Obama wants to win hearts and minds in the Middle East. Which is a good thing. And you know that, as a soldier, we can't kill all the Muslims. So we want to win as many hearts and minds of good, moderate Muslims as we can.

Not kill them all? Provocative! His competitor is Bryan Fischer, the "Director of Issues Analysis" for the American Family Association:

It is time, I suggest, to stop the practice of allowing Muslims to serve in the U.S. military...
Of course, most U.S. Muslims don't shoot up their fellow soldiers. Fine. As soon as Muslims give us a foolproof way to identify their jihadis from their moderates, we'll go back to allowing them to serve. You tell us who the ones are that we have to worry about, prove you're right, and Muslims can once again serve. Until that day comes, we simply cannot afford the risk. You invent a jihadi-detector that works every time it's used, and we'll welcome you back with open arms.
This is not Islamophobia, it is Islamo-realism.

The preposterousness of allowing Muslims to not be killed, or the Islamo-realism of banning them, just in case? Vote now!

[Pic via]

In Which Dan Baum Annoys Every Jew He Knows [Whoops]

Pareene — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 14:08:21 -0500

Any mass email with the subject line "Jews" is going to be trouble. That is an ironclad rule. So Dan Baum, the famously former New Yorker writer, should've maybe rethought this one.

Baum sent an email to every single Jew on his contacts list asking them to write letters to Senator Joe Lieberman asking him to support health care reform. This is funny and stupid in many ways. Like: Lieberman represents American Jews, as a whole? (No, he represents Connecticut insurance companies. And right-wing Jews.)

From: Dan Baum
Subject: Jews

I'm the last guy in the world to try to organize people by religion, but we Jews may be the only people to whom Senator Joseph Lieberman might listen. He is threatening to filibuster the health-care bill to remove the public option. He has been an obvious problem for years, but this time he can do genuine damage, and it's possible a deluge of calls and emails from Jews nationwide will give him pause. Please take a minute and either call his office — (fair warning, the mailbox was full) or (860) 549-8463, or send him an email... This is the text of the message I used, but you could compose your own:

"As a fellow Jew, I am appalled by your threat to filibuster the health care bill now working its way through the Senate. I appeal to your conscience. Do not block access to affordable health care for millions of Americans. Please support the bill." This will take only a minute to do. Once you've sent a message to Sen. Lieberman, please forward this email to all the Jews you know. We could make something happen.

Various poor wording choices and mistakes in tone—the sorts of things that are huge deals to Old East Coast Jews Who Work In Media, i.e. everyone the list he sent this to—displeased the recipients of this honestly well-intentioned missive. Like you are not supposed to say "as a Jew" because that means you are an annoying Jew, and you are not supposed to assume that other Jews think the same way as you do, even though as a whole America's Jews are almost uniformly liberal on matters of domestic policy, and have been since forever. Still: unacceptable! Which is why Jeffrey Goldberg, in order to embarrass and shame Baum, published his email along with a mocking response from another Jew who is not named!

And the second email, with its terrible strained Borscht Belt humor, is so much worse. So, Jews on Dan Baum's email list: please out this farbissener!

The Hills : Trolls, Ogres, and Scary Godmothers [Recaps]

Brian Moylan — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 14:07:37 -0500

Heidi got some puppies for her birthday, but that's not enough. She has her prop neighbor child over to try to convince Spencer it's time to have kids. We know she's not ready, but she's already practicing by telling stories.

That's right, she's been weaving fairy tales for little Enzo next door, and entertaining him when she's not using him to manipulate others or completely ignoring him because she's fighting with her mess of a husband. Let's listen to what our little Snow White tells the kid while they're hanging out in her glass coffin.

"There was once a pretty, pretty princess who lived in a far away land called Realitytelevasia. She had long hair and was really thin and dreamed of having a recording contract. Her name was Heidi, and one day she met a magical traveling salesman, Spencer. He had blond hair and a bad attitude and he told Princess Heidi that he could make all her dreams come true. They got married and moved to the jungle with a bunch of other princes and princesses, but they hated it there, so they left and claimed that they were abused so that people wouldn't think they were stupid.

When they got back to Realitytelevaisa, Princess Heidi found out that Spencer had some magical juice and it would give her babies and take all her troubles away. But if he gave up the juice, then Spencer would be trapped with Princess Heidi for life and he would have to give up all the fun things he loved like drinking 40s, hanging with his bros, and hitting golf balls in the back yard. So, one day he snuck out of his glass castle in the sky and went to go see an evil ogre who he thought could turn the juice off. He said that he could, but it would be very painful and he would ruin Salesman Spencer's goods for life, and that he would never get his juice back again.

He thought about how mad Princess Heidi would be if he shut the juice off for good, because an ancient curse said that if she didn't have the juice by the time she was 30, then she would turn into an awful screaming wombat and would eat Salesman Spencer limb from limb. He left the ogre and went back to the glass castle and when he saw Princess Heidi she was with her favorite munchkin who had been following Salesman Spencer all along. The muchkin told the princess about the trip to the ogre and she got very upset. "What do you mean you want to your juice to dry up? I want the juice!" she screamed. "I want you to have the juice, and I would love to give it to you," Spencer said, "but not now." "Give me the juice! I must have it! I must spawn!" she screamed as her voice lowered an octave and she grabbed onto shirt shaking him. "No, you can't have the juice," he said.

"You will give me the juice!" Princess Heidi ordered, waving her magic want at Spencer's crotch. From it grew an enormous vine that went all the way up into the clouds. Princess Heidi climbed all the way up to the top of the vine hoping to find a pot of magical baby juice for her to drink, but it wasn't there.

Instead, she found a poor washerwoman named Kristin, who told Princess Heidi that she was dating a prince, but he got turned into a frog by his ex-girlfriend the Awful Audrina. Now Washerwoman Kristin was lonely. But she found a new prince named Brody. They had danced at a ball a few times, and the prince had been held captive for many years by a tranny troll named the Jayde Dragon. Prince Brody had finally escaped the dragon's clutches and had run for the washerwoman.

Kristin loved the prince more than she loved separating whites from darks and wanted very much to marry the Prince so she's never have to wash again. She demanded to go visit with the Queen, the prince's mother. The queen has been placed under a magic spell that permanently made her skin brown, her lips plump, her hair blonde, and her waist thin. To make the spell work, she had sold all of her brains personality. But the spell did work, but when Kristin tried to talk to her, all she did was giggle and drool on herself from inside her hollow plastic shell. But the Queen gave her consent to the Prince's union with the washerwoman, even though the Prince still had to agree.

They left her palace and went to a ball in a magical land where woman hang from hoops in the sky and there are tiny little jugs of ale that make all the men and women beautiful and make them misbehave spectacularly. Just as the Prince and WW Kristin were starting to get close, the Jayde Dragon flew in with her minions. "How dare you get close to my man," she bellowed as fire came out of her mouth. "Get the fuck out of here with your minions," the washerwoman said. But the Jayde Dragon has the shape of a woman and the strength of a man, so she did not listen. She just shoved her tiny talons at the Washerwoman and tried to pluck her eyes out.

But suddenly the Prince got on his steed and rode away. It seems that, even though he lives in the great kingdom of Realitytelevasia he is deathly allergic to drama. His eyes start to puff up and his throat starts to close when he was exposed to it. When the epic battle between the Jayde Dragon and poor washerwoman Kristin broke out, it sent him into a life-threatening attack. The next morning, he realized how weak he looked and went to get his knickers cleaned at Kristin's house. He told her that he was done with the Jayde Dragon and her evil clutches for good, but he had to be with someone who could keep him free from the evil stench of dangerous drama for the rest of his life. Kristin thought that might be a problem, especially since Frog Justin Bobby was about to be ribbiting in her doorway again.

As this was happening, Frog Justin Bobby was sharing a meal with the Awful Sorceress Audrina, who derives all her strength from her tiny little eyes. They used to be a couple, but the sorceress tired of his well-coiffed beauty and cast him back into the world for other women to claim. But once they had him, she wanted him back. It's always the way with those magical sorceresses. Glinda was the same way! So, to keep him from dating washerwoman Kristin, she put a curse on Prince Justin and turned him into a frog. Kristin sent him back to the sorceress to be fixed, and she turned him back into a man, and gave him a shave and a haircut for good measure.

But now that he was returned to his true shape, he didn't want to stay with Awful Audrina anymore. He wanted to be back with Kristin, because he would much rather be with someone crazy who lives by the sea than someone who is crazy and lives not by the sea. He's a surfing prince, and he needs to be close to the waves. So he tells Awful Audrina that her hexes will not work on him anymore, and, even if he is still a frog, he is going to hop back to the ocean to be with Kristin.

She slams down her magic wand and says, "Fine!" and then hops on her broom to fly off into the sunset. All the way she cries tears, beautiful magical tears that Princess Heidi collects in a bucket. They are even more powerful than the juice of any traveling salesman, and she will use those tears to create a life of happiness for herself and all the creatures of Realitytelevasia.

Frank D. LoMonte — [Pullquote]

Gabriel Snyder — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 14:05:49 -0500

the head of the Student Press Law Center, defending the right of Dalton seniors to publish an article about Anthony Kennedy's visit with students without the Supreme Court Justice's approval, to the New York Times.

James Franco's Not Done Sleeping in Class [Higher Education]

Brian Moylan — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 13:48:01 -0500

The Yale Daily News that came out on Friday (we know, we're late) is decorated like a retro teen mag for their interview with James Franco. Oh, and Hollywood's gayest actor is considering moving to New Haven for his PhD!

It wasn't enough for Franco to sleep in class at both Columbia and NYU, where he is currently getting his MFA in creative writing (we have one too, James!), now he's going to go to Yale to get his doctorate in English. At least that's what a close reading of the subtext of this article told us. Let's just hope he doesn't get anxiety of influence from Harold Bloom, whom Franco seems to have an inappropriate man crush on.

Speaking of influence, the Yale newspaper has no problem at all ripping off Bop! (the article is below, or you can read it here). Is this supposed to be ironic? Because there is nothing that seems tongue in cheek about the big sloppy kiss of an interview where Esther Zuckerman does everything but lay down and ask Franco to father her children. She loves Freaks and Geeks! She's seen all his movies! She writes Esther Zuckerman-Franco in little hearts on the cover of her binder for Post-Colonial Structuralism and the Poems of Elizabeth Bishop seminar!

We shouldn't be too mean to her, because we love him just as much, especially now that he's trying to bridge high and low culture with a role on General Hospital. The first promo for his stint on the show came out yesterday, and it looks amazing. He plays an "artist whose canvas is murder." So he's a highbrow artist on a lowbrow soap. He's an A-list actor in a D-list genre. He he plays a character named Franco. META! Harold Bloom just let Franco into his PhD program just based on this stunt alone. PS—9 days and counting until it starts!

How New York Times Trend Stories Get Made: Glee Edition [Journalismism]

Hamilton Nolan — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 13:38:28 -0500

All you do is take some element of popular culture, like a popular television show, and then ask, provocatively: Is society itself changing in response to this pop culture thing? Today: Glee makes chorus groups "cool" again.

A New York Times Style section freelancer sent out this query today to Help A Reporter Out, the email service that connects flacks to reporters in need of sources. RESPONSES ABOUT THE COOLNESS OF HIGH SCHOOL CHORAL GROUPS ONLY.

Summary: Sing along with "Glee"
Media Outlet: New York Times
Region: United States
Deadline: 01:11pm EASTERN - 17 November
Query:

Story is for Styles section of the NYT. The topic: how is the hit show
"Glee" affecting kids' participation in school choral groups or choruses
Are they joning in droves? Are they, in fact, startang their own such
groups. Is the show suddently making it, yes, COOL, to be part of a school
chorale Would like to hear from high school students, high school teachers
and music educators. NO OFF TOPIC RESPONSES PLEASE

The Spitzer Files: How TV Talking Heads Get Their Cues from Flacks [Spitzer Files]

John Cook — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 13:20:23 -0500

In our third installment from the Spitzer Files—our collection of e-mails between Eliot Spitzer's flack and reporters at the height of his hooker scandal—we congratulate the reporters who actually try to learn things before they go on TV.

On March 10, 2008, the New York Times broke the story of former New York Gov. Eliot Spitzer's hooker habit, and cable news went insane. One of the gratifying things we found in the 1,300 pages of e-mail correspondence between Spitzer's flacks and reporters (which we obtained under New York's public records law) was that some reporters who were booked as talking heads actually made an effort to know what they were talking about before they went on TV. Of course, it's hard to get too much information at the last minute — which is one reason no one on cable television knows what they are talking about — and often the natural impulse of reporters is to check in with a flack for guidance.

The day after the Spitzer news broke, as speculation over his future was at a fever pitch, Financial Times reporter Brooke Masters, who wrote a book in 2006 about Spitzer's rise to power, was booked to appear on CNN. She sent a frantic e-mail to Spitzer's communications director Christine Anderson ten minutes before she was scheduled to go on, asking, "what tone should I take when asked if he will resign?" She signed off with, "Help."

Anderson responded that no announcement would be coming that day, but that Masters' "tone should probably be that the options aren't good." On CNN that night, in a taped segment for Anderson Cooper 360, Masters said, "Unless he can completely reinvent himself, his old method of dealing with the world and his old attraction as a politician is gone."

When we let Masters know that we were publishing the exchange, she wrote in an e-mail that "I knew I was going to be asked what Mr Spitzer would do, and I am a reporter not a pundit so I was trying to gather the facts." Which we commend her for. Still, it's worth remembering the next time you see a reporter analyzing a story on cable somewhere, that — at least for the ones who did their homework — the facts, and the tone, sometimes come unattributed and off the record from people who are paid to manage reporters.

Another reporter who checked in with Anderson before going on TV was them-Time magazine deputy managing editor Adi Ignatius, who now edits the Harvard Business Review. Oddly, Ignatius — who had covered and profiled Spitzer for Time — was booked on ABC News and NBC News as a supporter of Spitzer's, to balance out the detractors offering gleeful quotes on his self-immolation.

On March 10, a few hours after the story broke, Ignatius e-mailed Spitzer's chief of staff Marlene Turner asking if he could speak to Spitzer or anyone else in his office about the governor's state of mind before going on ABC News's World News Tonight. Turner referred him to Anderson. World News didn't use any of Ignatius' tape, but the next day, NBC Nightly News invited him to speak as "someone who knows and likes Eliot," and he asked Anderson for access to Spitzer or anybody else who might know his thinking. Anderson responded that she'd be happy to talk to him.

That night, Ignatius was identified on a Nightly News segment as a Spitzer "supporter," and he told correspondent Mike Taibbi that "it's going to be very, very, very difficult for him to stay in office."

Ignatius and Masters were right to find out as much as they could before being presented to television audiences as informed analysts (or in Ignatius' case, a partisan). But it's interesting, to us at least, to see laid bare the role that flacks can play behind the scenes in managing the tone and direction of talking-head coverage during a PR disaster.

The Hollywood Reporter and Billboard Sold to Who's Who Publisher [Trade Round Up]

Richard Rushfield — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 13:03:05 -0500

Changing the ownership of two of show biz's major trade journals will either change everything, or change nothing at all. In Hollywood, you're always safe betting on the latter

• These late days of print media bring some strange potential owners out of the woods to poke around at the fire sale and see what kind of bargains they can land on unmatched, only-slightly-singed argyle socks. The Wrap reports that the venerable journals, the Hollywood Reporter and Billboard have been sold by their parent company Nielsen to James Finkelstein's News Communications Inc. publisher of Who's Who and The Hill. Also included in the sale, The Wrap reports, Backstage, Adweek, Brandweek, Mediaweek and Editor & Publisher. [The Wrap]

• After a strong debut, the ratings for ABC's V took a tumble last night with 29 percent drop-off. [Hollywood Reporter]

• Carrie Underwood's hold on the music charts has not let up. "Play On", the former Idol star's third album easily took the top slot on Billboard's Hot 200, selling 318,000 copies in its first week out, knocking the soundtrack to Michael Jackson's This Is It down to #2. [Billboard]

• There was an actual bidding war over content in Hollywood yesterday and in the end, Peter Chernin's New Regency walked away with the prize. Chernin beat out Universal and Warner Brothers to snatch up the rights for My Name is Memory, the first book of a trilogy about a college couple whose souls have been intertwined for hundreds of years. [Variety]

• Simon Cowell has topped primetime TV's top-earners list. According to Forbes, the Idol judge/America's Got Talent creator rakes in $75 million a year, soaring past Donald Trump in the #2 slot at $50 miilion. [Forbes]

• To promote its new film Nine, the Weinstein Company has signed a deal to annoy ABC viewers in unprecedented ways. According to the deal with the network, the film will be written into the plotlines of a variety of ABC shows including its daytime soap operas, will be featured on Dancing With the Stars. [Variety]

• And if you're keeping score, it hasn't been a great week to be Nikki Finke. Not only does she inform blog readers that she is down with the flu, but she gets beaten by Sharon Waxman on the Hollywood Reporter story (assuming it pans out) and her biggest scoop of the year, the news about Oprah's departure from her syndicated show, still has yet to be confirmed by anyone else, with all sources still, a week later, publicly saying that no decision has been made. It may yet turn out that Oprah will end up making the leap, but some are wondering is it possible Nikki jumped the gun claiming the deal was done?

No, That Is Not Anthrax [Rants]

Hamilton Nolan — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 12:55:03 -0500

So far this week, the UN missions of six separate countries have been temporarily shut down and decontaminated because they received envelopes full of flour in the mail. This whole "anthrax" thing is overrated.

What are the chances that any particular envelope full of unknown white powder is, in fact, full of deadly weaponized anthrax? Quite small! Exceedingly small. Vanishingly small. The original 2001 anthrax attacks were so spectacular precisely because it is so fucking hard to pull off something like that. Much easier to send bombs, really! Said bioweapons expert Richard Spertzel, "In my opinion, there are maybe four or five people in the whole country who might be able to make this stuff, and I'm one of them." Also: "And even with a good lab and staff to help run it, it might take me a year to come up with a product as good."

Here's what that means, in practical terms: The envelope full of white powder that you just opened in your Congressional office or governmental office or media outlet office or UN office is full of flour or baking soda or maybe even cocaine, but it is almost surely not full of anthrax. So stop evacuating place and shutting everything down. For chrissake. Some nut in Texas knew he could force the UN one-world foreigners to run in fear with less flour than it takes to make a cookie, and that's exactly what he did, and now it's worldwide news. Contrast that with what these places could have done when they got that envelope: Nothing. Set it aside, let the cops come test it, and keep working in the meantime. There's at least a 99% chance that you'll be fine.

We've said this before. Anthrax! It's a ridiculous thing. Just forget it. Do you smell that? No? That's because we had our operatives fill the room you're in with sarin, a colorless, odorless nerve agent 500 times more toxic than cyanide. You better evacuate now, because it kills in less than one minute.

Kidding! But sending you an envelope full of white powder would have been only marginally more difficult than that. So, seriously. Until further notice, just put it in the trash can. At least make the crazies come get you in person.

Re-Tweet Redesign Helps the Rich Get Richer on Twitter [Loser-generated Content]

Ryan Tate — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 12:25:52 -0500

Twitter is offering a new way to quote other people's tweets. The new "re-tweet" feature is both less useful and more confusing than the ad-hoc system that preceded it. But that's OK, because it bolsters rich celebrities and dot-com millionaires.

Under the old rules of Twitter tradition, you "re-tweeted" another user by placing the letters "RT" before the quote and after any commentary you yourself added, like so:

If you use the new built-in re-tweet system, the original tweet would be copied into your stream under the byline of the original tweeter, like so:

The obvious problem: You lose the ability to actually say anything about what you're quoting if you use the new system. Also, all your followers are going to get a strange and potentially confusing avatar of someone they're not subscribed to in their stream.

On the bright side, this system is great for Twitter Inc. "Retweets potentially reveal very interesting data," Twitter CEO Evan Williams writes in a blog post about the new re-tweeting feature. Indeed, the feature offers a metric with which to rank tweets and thereby the results of Twitter searches and Twitter users themselves. Twitter could sell this data, provided free by its users, to the richest and most favored bidders, just like the microblogging startup did with the actual content of tweets.

The feature also helps Twitter's celebrity power users. Writes Williams:

RTs can actually be easily faked, which has become a form of spam, wherein well-known people are shown to be promoting something they never twittered about.

But, hey, if you don't like this new re-tweet thing that is so awesome for celebrities and Twitter Inc., you can always opt out. As Williams writes (emphasis from original), "you can turn off Retweets for everyone you follow (individually)." So just click "OFF" 200 times? Sounds super-easy!

(Top pic: Twitter co-founders Williams and Biz Stone, by Mathieu Thouvenin.)