The local reviews portal uploaded a cache of party pics to Flickr, a trove duly uncovered by Nicholas Carlson over at Silicon Alley Insider. It comes complete with the requisite provocatively posed women, mostly-naked men and naughty company icon (Santa). Those are the sort of party props that have become Yelp's PR calling card, lending the company a "let the good times roll" vibe that helps keep unpaid contributors supplying the company with free content.

In fact, this particular gathering, trampy as it may have been, looks reasonably tame compared to the debaucheries of years past; our last picture in the gallery below is a compilation distilling the positively fleshy feel of parties past (also documented here, here, here, here, here and here.)

UPDATE: It should be noted that this particular party was in San Diego; San Francisco-based Yelp will no doubt throw something similar in the Bay Area if it hasn't already (we hear it hasn't, yet, this year).

"That would be a lump of coal you're feeling, young lady, for your, uh, untoward extreme naughtiness. You're a very, uh, baaad girl."

Don't you wish you'd had the chance to sign this little angel, too??

Girl on far left rocking about 8x harder than everyone else in the picture.

"I can't speak for Mr. Leprechaun here, but I'm totally looking you in the eyes, lady."

Yelp photographers can literally smell the female tongue leaving the mouth.

"So many bad girls at this party, so little time to admonish them..."

Come, now, sir, you can do several buttons better than this. Several flies, even.

Ooops, we did it again, and, what do you know, at another Yelp party.

Santa presumably has his own private collection of these "girls on my lap" shots.

Everyone looks equally buzzed/sober. Nice pacing!

History teaches us what a truly wild Yelp party looks like.

The big bashes are off this year, a tipster tells us. Which is just as well: Last year, there were YEPs in New York, Los Angeles and the San Mateo headquarters; these plus the departmental parties meant that many Yahoos easily got to four parties a year, a tipster told us at the time. All the festivities came despite a wave of layoffs, which left Yahoo in the awkward position of having to set up metal detectors at its LA party, and of featuring Vegas-style showgirls in dollar-bill getups at the main headquarters party (see pic above) in the face of all Yahoo's bloodletting.

The 2007 party featured a Neil Diamond tribute band, so at least Yahoos apparently won't have to worry about any such torture this year. Ironically, though, 2009 has been a much better year for layoffs at Yahoo than 2008 was.

Know what any other tech companies are doing (or not doing) to celebrate the holidays this year? We're dying to hear about any conmpany parties: drop a line toryan@valleywag.com.

(Pic by Phil Hollenback)

The Business Insider wrote about the voicemail all Goldman Sachs employees received earlier this month. They were told not to organize small parties even if no firm money goes to pay for them.

By "small," Goldman means exactly twelve. Starting tomorrow, they can hang out outside of Goldman in groups of eleven, but not twelve.

The rule is set to stay in place for the month of December. Why? The firm believes that it would be inappropriate for its employees to be seen partying while the economy is still shaky and unemployment is high.

Twelve might be a good cut off because it's a very Christmas-y number. Twelve is also the number of the apocalypse (supposedly December 21, 2012), but since there are "Twelve Days of Christmas," it's probably more about that.

December doesn't start until tomorrow, so party it up tonight!

The firm has canceled its annual holiday party, just as it did last year. It also instructed the smaller business units that they should not organize their own smaller parties, which had been a long tradition at the firm. The parties are banned even if no firm money goes to pay for them.

But Goldman employees were surprised to hear that even parties within private homes fall under the ban. The firm apparently believes that it would be inappropriate for its employees to be seen partying while the economy is still so shaky and unemployment is so high.

Presumably, the ban only applies to gatherings organized as semi-official holiday parties for Goldman employees. We can't imagine that Goldman would tell employees they can't have a few friends and family over for a tree-trimming party.

AOL CEO Tim Armstrong (pictured) said in a memo to staff (below) that the company is looking to lose 2,500 workers, or a third of its total staff. He'll be forgoing his own 2009 bonus, and is offering executives up to nine months pay if they volunteer for buyouts, according to Business Insider. Interestingly, rank and filers are being offered a weaker deal than their recent colleagues over at Time Inc.; AOL will pay them three months severance, whereas Time Inc.-ers get that plus two weeks for every year of service. Apparently unions are nice things to have in situations like this.

As it prepares to offer shares to the public next month, AOL has been on a diet plan in other ways, too:

• After steady increases, ad revenue from a deal with Google started falling this year, according to Peter Kafka at All Things D. The deal provided $700 million in ad revenue last year, about one third of the total, but was off $42 million in the most recent quarter.
• AOL surrendered bustling celebrity-news site and cable network TMZ to Time Warner; Tim Armstrong said as recently as July that he hoped to "actively" discuss whether to retain TMZ with Time Warner and that "‘If the value of TMZ increases, it's a really good thing for us."
• AOL may sell MapQuest, according to Kara Swisher at All Things D.

Pic above by Yaniv Golan.

Armstrong's memo to staff:————-

AOLers –

"Employees First" is the way that we have run the company since April and that mantra is something I take very seriously because our company is a collection of people and our brands are the work of our teams. We started by working together to determine AOL's strategy, then the correct structure for the strategy, and, as we have discussed, we are now faced with making sure we have the correct cost structure for the strategy. You have seen daily and weekly updates on Project Everest and many of you have been involved in trying to align our resources to maximize AOL's opportunity.

AOL's cost structure is something we have worked on for the past four months, and we have spent hundreds of hours reviewing ways to fix the cost structure as well as the revenue growth engine. As we are coming to the conclusion of this work over the next few weeks, it is clear that we will need to have a significant reduction of costs at the company and across almost all functional areas and geographies. Headcount costs are going to be a majority of the cost reduction recommendations coming out of Project Everest.

As I mentioned in our last Project Everest update, the idea for a voluntary layoff was suggested and we agree that it is an option that gives people more choice and decision-making ability instead of waiting for the final cost recommendations and involuntary layoffs. Starting December 4th in the United States and ending a few days after we spin out from Time Warner, we will allow employees to choose a voluntary exit from AOL. Additionally, tomorrow we anticipate beginning the communication process for voluntary layoff programs in certain international locations. We will be looking for up to 2,500 volunteers. For context on the target volunteer number, over the next several months we will be looking to reduce approximately one-third of our overall workforce at the company. We will need to do an involuntary layoff if we do not reach the target numbers through the voluntary option.

The reduction in costs is aimed at making AOL competitive for the future of the Web and it will allow us to focus the company on growth in the non-access areas of the business. After the cost reductions, we will have a company that is aligned and structured to drive our strategy in a competitive way. The number of potential reductions isn't aimed at getting us through 2010; it is aimed at resetting AOL at the correct baseline for the future.

As a member of our team and the person who takes accountability for the results of the company, I am making the decision to forego my 2009 bonus. That decision is a personal one and is not a sign for the future payout of the overall bonus plan for employees. That plan is based on performance and overall company outcomes and it will be management's recommendation to the compensation committee of the Board to approve our performance-based bonus payouts for 2009. These are challenging times and today's news is difficult. But every day we are making changes and progress and we are on our way to re-engineering AOL for success. – TA

AOL is expected to complete mass layoffs after its spinoff from Time Warner is complete, supposedly by the end of this year. But it sounds like some cuts are too obvious to wait. One hundred firings is modest for a company of around 6,000 workers; AOL continues to work on "Project Everest" to plan the rest, our tipster said. If you know more, email us.

UPDATE: Kara Swisher at All Things D, who has written two books on AOL, was told by her sources that 100 or so layoffs are indeed coming down today. PaidContent later reported likewise.

Meanwhile Electronic Arts is laying off 17 percent of its workforce after the company saw net sales drop 12 percent from the prior year. Which, if you think about the state of the economy, is bizarre: Why aren't you unemployed people out there buying more videogames? Staying home is cheap.

(Image via Zazzle t-shirt/sticker)

Or at least that was our experience clicking through the song previews. Which is actually kind of a selling point, since we so often feel that way, during the holidays. We've collected some of the most beautifully nasal, haggard, mumbled — i.e. signature Dylan — vocals in the clip above, from"Hark the Herald Angels Sing," "O' Little Town of Bethlehem," "O' Come All Ye Faithful" and "Silver Bells," respectively.

We expect listeners will be more partial to tracks like "Here Comes Santa Claus," "Christmas Blues," "Christmas Island" and "Winter Wonderland." You can always spring for the $21 vinyl version; a needle makes everything sound more Christmas-y.

Because everyone knows that Irish people are nothing more than filthy drunks who reek of booze-stink all the ever lovin' day, the morning shows used the occasion to talk about beer and whiskey and magic drunk-getting coffee and, you know, drank it! Well, on CBS' Early Show they were taking demure little pretend sips and doing fanciful jigs. But Hoda... Hoda went full Kotb and glug-a-lugged throughout her entire hour. Temporary co-host Billy Bush (Kathie Lee is currently lying in the middle of the street in a pool of her own Jameson, her wig ablaze) was a terrible enabler, encouraging Hoda like so many Claire Huxtables to chug-a-lug. Hoda, watch how they do it on CBS. They don't actually get crunk. You could learn something.

Actually wait, don't. Keep on keepin' on. You're more fun (read: bearable) this way.

Thanks to video intern Nicole Keller for the clips!

It's so easy for journalists to let down their guards during the holidays. Sure, many put in work, here and there. But it's sandwiched between the long naps, stuffed bellies, indulgent drinking and late nights that come with stretches of vacation. We're not saying anyone was drunk here, just that everyone tends to fall off their game during the holidays.

And when most of one's peers are producing subpar work, and hardly anyone is watching/reading/listening anyway, letting go a little becomes even easier.

Anyway, what were we saying? Oh right, watch the funny man fall down! It's in the clip up top.

There's a compilation of older reporter pratfalls here.

(Thanks to the tipster who sent this in. Video via YouTube.)

Eh, maybe. The two Street Team members we heard from were certainly happy about the money. One called it "a nice gesture on MTV's behalf." Another called an MTV executive a "class act" in the comments section of last week's story on Viacom's apologies. (There are several new comments there from Street Team members.)

But it's a safe bet that MTV is planning to seek more money from the philanthropic foundation that sponsored its 2008 election "Street Team" of citizen journalists, the Knight Foundation. Paying bonuses could help mitigate the fallout from how it handled the last $700,000 grant, unapologetically (until the end) withholding paychecks for weeks or even months.

Plus there's the PR benefit of doing right by screwed-over charity workers.

We'll grant that the $500 was a praiseworthy act of decency. But we also won't begrudge anyone who refers to the payments as "interest" rather than "bonus."

And, hey, is MTV paying any of the non-Street-Team freelancers we were hearing from as recently as ten days ago? If you have any news, email us.

• We rode the bus home with the Real World Brooklyn and talked about dysfunctional families and what we got.
• Obama had a holiday, too. He went golfing and mourned his grandma. The paparazzi came too! Blago picked up the slack while he was gone.
• Then an awful Santa went on a holiday massacre. People killed themselves and died.
• 2008's almost over, which means obligatory list-making! We looked back, fondly, on who had sex with the wrong people. Also: who fought with who? Who did the best job commenting? The year also provided ample opportunities for people to embarrass themselves via the media.
• Russian Vogue: suspicious.
• Twitter sucks. Try to wean yourself off it in 2009.

• A beautiful thing waiting in the green room — but is it a Hooters waitress in full short-shorts uniform, or just poinsettia?
• The Hooters girl's teleprompter delivery is maddeningly affectless.
• The female anchor, getting repeatedly poked by her male cohosts, starts mumbling in the middle of a segment on selling unwanted items on eBay.

He's just added his 500th friend, but he feels kind of weird about it. (Not curated enough.)

It seems like the holidays are when people, bored at home with nothing to do except get eggnog-sentimental, get active on Facebook. The Wall Street Journal is reporting painful instances of un-friending. Our own anecdotal, extremely perfunctory research reports an influx of high school friends "getting back in touch" via Friending.

This is the time of year, apparently, where people either binge on Friending, or purge.

Rolling Stone

Now he can take his annual long vacation in Sun Valley without that "to do" hanging over his head. Asshole.

Wenner's Us Weekly alone throws off $75 million a year in profit. Wenner Media revenue is around $400 million annually. The company couldn't wait 10 days to fire some more people?

It doesn't matter how much severance the ex-employee sare getting. That's not the point. The point is that Wenner would rather enjoy a less stressful vacation, or save a few days vacation pay, than do the right thing and suck it up for another week and a half so these people can enjoy the holidays. The Dec. 10 round? Fine. But Dec. 19? You terrible jerk.

One of the layoffs was a writer Wenner hired away from Newsweek in October. Another layoff, an editor, came from GQ in March. Maybe you can ask for your old jobs back, guys! (Ha ha, just kidding, they're taken, forever.)

"It was heartbreaking, but we just had to make some tough choices," Rolling Stone Managing Director Will Dana told Keith Kelly of the Post.

Well, you guys certainly made some choices. The dick choices.

May yours gifts turn to coal, every last one of them.

(Picture via Scrooged)

Marie Claire's is of course only the latest message to illustrate the perils of forgetting to put addresses on the Bcc: line instead of To:. Fox News' Susan Estrich and Mediabistro's Laurel Touby have similarly embarrassed themselves.

But Marie Claire included some A-listers among the usual stew of New York media people. Their email addresses are now overexposed! Time for new GMail accounts or whatever! Which is easy enough, but reconfiguring iPhones and BlackBerrys could waste literally days, collectively!

A partial list of victims:

• Tina Fey
• Ashley Olsen
• Maggie Gyllenhaal
• Rachel Weisz
• Lindsay Lohan
• Jeremy Piven
• Oliver Platt
• Sandra Oh
• Sean Avery
• Nina Garcia

Keep them in your prayers!

One of the many downsides of working for Huffington is that she draws no boundaries between her personal needs and her professional needs; between her emotional reactions to your work and some objective ideal of good performance.

The upside of being treated like a part of the emotionally volatile Huffington household: The matron feels obliged to bestow quality holiday gifts. Last year it was designer sweaters from Ports 1961 and Adam Lippes. There is agreement among recipients we've spoken with that some were truly nice, especially the men's designs, but others were either generally "fugly" or just didn't look good on certain figures.

But the sweaters were very memorable! Everyone was apparently quite curious about what the follow-on gift would be this year, when most New York publishers seem to be canceling any and all discretionary holiday spending. We'd heard from one curious HuffPo-er before the answer came: Sweaters again! And still from Ports 1961 and Adam Lippes.

One major change: In this year's celebratory holiday post, the sweaters were mentioned right up in the headline, both brands were plugged in the second sentence, and there was a catalog-like collection of sweater pictures, like these two:

This might look like an ethically questionable editorial plug bestowed by HuffPo staffers on their designers who outfit them, but do have pity: Snapping these pictures was probably far easier than coming with kind words of praise for their demanding boss. And everyone deserves a nice break this time of year.