It's hard being a celebrity: James Franco is getting mobbed by fellow students at Columbia; presumably the coeds will never provoke from him the sort of battery Kanye West allegedly inflicted on his oglers.

• Kanye West was charged with three criminal misdemeanors, including battery, for smashing a paparazzo's camera at Los Angeles International Airport. He's got to love that TMZ video will probably help convict him. [Gatecrasher]
• The Heath Ledger-directed animated music video for Modest Mouse's "King Rat" will be released later this year, the band said. [Us]
  
• How do you get your publicist to fire you, then brag to a gossip page about it? For Vin Diesel the trick was to flake on a day-long press junket for Fast & Furious 4. [P6]
  
• Marc Jacobs and Lorenzo Martone, his boyfriend and rumored fiancé, put a $13 million West Village townhouse under contract. Leave it to a fashion designer to know when to pounce on the best sales. [P6]
  
• MFA student James Franco is getting mobbed outside of his Columbia lectures. As if that's not bad enough, the university considers him and his career beneath comment. [P6]

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