It's great for NBC that they get to save mountains of production money by churning out Jay Leno Show episodes rather than shelling out to stage cop-show shoot-outs, but one of the biggest pillars on which this whole network affiliates contraption has been based is the lead-in networks providing their local stations for their local news shows. So for NBC the Leno equation works out dandy, with them reaping less ad revenues for Jay vs. a drama (particularly considering the sad state of their recent dramatic launches), but spending far less in production costs. But if you're an affiliate, and big chunk of your revenues comes from nightly local news, the fact that someone else is saving money by lowering your ratings is infuriating.

The canary in the coal mine of this bold experiment has always been how long will the affiliates sit still for this reinventing the broadcast paradigm. And today in the LA Times we get the first hint that the answer may be not much longer.

In the piece, one voice from flyover country makes his feelings about the new era pretty plain:

"I'm not pleased with what Leno is doing. I don't think anybody is," said Craig Allison, vice president and general manager of KSHB in Kansas City, Mo. Allison's late news is off slightly from where it was a year ago, and he's anxious about the months ahead.

"I don't think any NBC affiliate wanted to wake up in the fall with a weaker lead-in to their late news," Allison said.

The piece goes on, however, to make clear that NBC has largely been effective in silencing affiliate opposition by buying them off with extra ad slots that they can sell locally. And then, in good newspapery "to be sure" manner, the article offers up a quote to cancel out the above quote's support of the article's thesis.

"

We're quite pleased," said Brooke Spectorsky, longtime president and general manager of WKYC in Cleveland. So far the station's news performance is flat compared with a year ago, although there are "still days in which you squirm a little."

The LAT leaves it to us to imagine the gun held to Spectorsky's skull as he recited that line to its reporter.

However, whether the rumblings are perceived or real, if Jeff Zucker, and your GE bosses are currently looking to sell off their entertainment holdings, this is not the moment when you want anyone thinking that your entire operating model is about to come apart at the seams.

Elsie Poncher, whose husband Richard Poncher, is entombed above Marilyn at the Pierce Brothers Westwood Village Memorial Park in L.A., put her husband's plot of up for sale on eBay. According to the L.A. Times a Japanese bidder pledged $4,602,100, but went back on his offer shortly after he won the auction yesterday. The next highest bid was only $100 less than the winning offer. Poncher is giving the 11 other top bidders 24 hours to make her an offer for the coveted spot. She plans on using the money to pay off the mortgage on her $1 million home in Beverly Hills. At least she's not trying to blame "the economy."

Richard Poncher bought his final resting spot and the one next to it from Marilyn's ex, Joe DiMaggio, in the '50s, while the pair were divorcing. Elsie was going to have the spot next to her husband, but now she plans on selling one tomb and moving her husband's into the one next door. She plans on being cremated.

And for all of us who think we're clever for coming up with the "on top of Marilyn" joke, Poncher, who died in 1986, thought of it first and better.

[Elsie] said that when her husband was dying, he made a request. "He said, 'If I croak, if you don't put me upside down over Marilyn, I'll haunt you the rest of my life.' "

After the funeral, Poncher said, she conveyed her husband's wish to the funeral director. "I was standing right there, and he turned him over," she said. I guess she's no longer afraid of ghosts.

According to the LA Times, the perpetrator is a 20-year-old University of Chicago Illinois student named Firas Alkhateeb who made the image during his winter break from school using PhotoShop, naturally:

Alkhateeb had been tinkering with the program to improve the looks of photos he had taken on his clunky Kodak camera. The Joker project was his grandest undertaking yet. Using a tutorial he'd found online about how to "Jokerize" portraits, he downloaded the October 23 Time Magazine cover of Obama and began digitally painting over it.

Four or five hours later, he happily had his product.

Alkhateeb says that he then posted the image to his Flickr page where it sat largely unnoticed for a couple of months. Then an unknown individual found the photo, removed all of the references to Time, added the word "socialism" across the bottom of the image and posted it all over the streets of Los Angeles. The original image was found on Alkhateeb's Flickr by the LA Times after they were tipped off to it by a reader, but he closed the account after they contacted him because he wanted to "lay low" in the "very, very liberal" city from which Barack Obama's political career was sprung.

"After Obama was elected, you had all of these people who basically saw him as the second coming of Christ," Alkhateeb said. "From my perspective, there wasn't much substance to him."

"I abstained from voting in November," he wrote in an e-mail. "Living in Illinois, my vote means close to nothing as there was no chance Obama would not win the state." If he had to choose a politician to support, Alkhateeb said, it would be Ohio Democratic Rep. Dennis Kucinich.

So yeah, good luck wrapping your brain around this one.

The new LAtimes.com rolled out today, and it's not so bad at first glance—lots more black-and-white than their old site, mimicking NYTimes.com. One difference, though: At NYTimes.com, you can scroll down the page and find listings for World, US, NY/Region, Politics—"news" things! Scroll down from the top of page at the new LAT site and you find: Health, Food, Education, Technology, Sports, Blogs, Columns, Opinion, Photos & Video, Summer Hot List, and "Your Scene, Your Comments." Did you miss the, say, 'International news' section? It is way up at the top in tiny tiny type. Below the top fifth or so of the page, there is no "hard news" at all. They had to make room for the Summer Hot List somehow!

Then there is this thing:

The new Newsday.com does have its own Facebook-like status report on top (cute!!!) but does not, apparently, have "news." Do pictures count as news?

This (and a bunch of layoffs) is what you get for $680 million.

You know what you're in for when "Perez Hilton is not sorry" opens up Robin Abcarian's piece on the creature formerly known as Mario Lavandeira, who's now a "tastemaker," according to the title of the piece. Other things you, the reader, are made aware of Hilton's complete lack of repentance for: posting the Dustin Lance Black pictures as a self-proclaimed gay icon, the early speculation on Michael Jackson faking his death, his altercation with Will.I.Am (though he notes he's still only not "entirely" unapologetic for using the word "faggot" in Hilton's fight with the Black Eyed Peas frontman).

"I've built my brand on being a bitch," said the gay celebrity blogger. "So what?"

Truth. His most recent offenses include shuffling over dead boxer Arturo Gatti's grave, and making a mockery of race relations in his Advocate profile when he applauded himself for using a gay slur as opposed to a racist one.

The LAT's reporting still doesn't get to the root of who his third writer is (besides his sister) other than "a recent college graduate..he declined to name."

"Why do you want to know that?" he said "It's all about me!"

And the Hilton show it most definitely is. The good question is what Abcarian actually got, which amounts to pretty much nothing. And there's almost a pattern of kindness on the part of the L.A. Times to Hilton; their coverage of him doesn't extend past a Q & A that also lets Hilton flaunt his brand. The most significant thing the Times managed was Hilton's obvious insecurity and distaste for a gay community that couldn't care less about counting him amongst their numbers, while riffing on his Advocate cover story:

He was furious about the Advocate piece, in which the writer was dismissive of his intellect. ("He's not a deep or nuanced thinker and seems generally unwilling . . . to look critically at himself. . . . He doesn't strike me as all that intellectually honest," wrote Benoit Denizet-Lewis.) "He basically called me stupid," said Hilton. "I am not stupid. I don't think I have to prove that to anyone."

Or maybe it's just an insecurity about aptitude. There's no doubt that Hilton might be, if not deep or nuanced, at least an intuitive thinker into what some people want to read. But as he prepares to launch his "nicer" site, it'll be interesting to see what kind of person develops based on the success or failure of the new venture.

An out-and-out failure might be an affirmation that his only asset is his willingness to forgo considerations of any stripe of moral fortitude, while a success might prove to Hilton that bigots can file down the lowest common denominator on their way to possibly less lowbrow ventures. Whatever the case is, it's almost relieving to see Hilton's one-dimensional nature move forward, because it makes him easier to understand. There's a great line from psychiatrist Aaron Lazare's 2004 book On Apology, in which Lazare writes: "(The apology process)...illustrates how the phenomenon of apology can be a window into the human emotions and behaviors that maintain and restore human dignity," something Hilton doesn't seem to long for. Maybe there's just nothing else there. Sometimes, an asshole's just an asshole. It's easier to leave it at that.

Haha, douchebag Donny Deutsch is now an MSNBC anchor. Related(???): Howard Dean is guest-hosting Keith Olbermann's MSNBC show tonight and tomorrow. What is brewing over at MSNBC? Ayahuasca is our guess.


Yo check out how awesome this Pulitzer prize-winning former Copley News Service dude named Jerry Kammer is: "When Gannett bought the paper, they turned Arizona into a colony. As history shows, the purpose of a colony is not to provide for the well-being of the natives; it is to generate profits for the home country, which in this case was Gannett corporate headquarters." Preach! "The Gannettoids aren't uniquely guilty. They're just part of the steady ascendancy of buccaneer capitalism in our country. Look at Wall Street, where the bastards went wild with the smiling benediction of Alan Greenspan, whose every non-move was directed by the Gospel of Ayn Rand...I used to think my politics were moderate or slightly left-of-center. But the perversions of capitalism that I've seen during my career as a reporter (including several years covering Charlie Keating and the plundering of the S&Ls) have persuaded me that Karl Marx was right when he said capitalism would be destroyed by its own excesses." This cat is off the hook. Nuff respect, Jerry Kammer.


Now, contrast Mr. Kammer—a former journalist—with John Fund, who wrote this on the august editorial page of the WSJ just yesterday: "Ms. Palin appeared liberated by leaving office and used blunt words to take her media critics down a peg. 'You represent what could and should be a respected, honest profession that could and should be a cornerstone of our democracy,' she said. 'Democracy depends on you, and that is why — that's why our troops are willing to die for you. So how about in honor of the American soldier, you quit makin' things up.'...
Ms. Palin will no doubt have a future as a stump speaker and political commentator in the lower 48, and her media critique certainly will find receptive audiences."
The lesson: former journalists are far wiser than current ones. Or maybe it's just: John Fund is stupid.


New York Times reporter Sheryl Gay Stolberg's teenage daughter was quarantined in China with suspected swine flu. Who will be next? And will they be able to parlay their swine flu experience into a New York Times story? The answers are "Thomas Friedman's second cousin" and "you betcha."


The LA Times is all fucked up: somebody clicked on the "Print edition" version online and got this screenshot this morning. Here's hoping this is not the actual print edition!

The Times Alexandra Le Tellier ponders the burning questions:

Can you imagine if TMZ's story spread on Twitter before Jackson's family even learned of his death? And who was TMZ's source anyway? The site's managing editor, Harvey Levin, said he and his staff made hundreds of calls, but he didn't divulge whom they spoke to, which makes one question whether they confirmed the news with a reliable, accountable source — as is required by the Los Angeles Times — or if they spoke to someone who was violating patient confidentiality.

This is really funny, of course, because TMZ didn't get it wrong. They got it right, long before anyone else did, and for that they should be credited with breaking a major story.

But you know who did get it wrong, what with their "reliable, accountable" sources and all? The LA Times! Long after TMZ had reported Jackson's death, the Times was still reporting that Jackson was in "a coma," wrong reporting that trickled down to CNN, which was still sticking with the coma story sourced by the LA Times long after people across the nation were already in the streets talking about the death of Michael Jackson.

There are times when you just have to admit defeat and move on to fight the next battle. This was one of those times. Sadly, nobody bothered to tell the LA Times.

How Would We Have Reacted If TMZ Had Been Wrong About Michael Jackson's Death? [LA Times]

So what world leader or esteemed person of letters did UCLA get to replace Franco, the noted sleep-deprived grad student/part-time thespian? The LA Times reports:

UCLA announced that Brad Delson, lead guitarist for the popular rock-rap band Linkin Park, will step in to replace movie star James Franco as commencement speaker at Friday's graduation ceremony for the College of Letters and Science.

A committee of administrators, faculty and students turned to Delson after Franco withdrew, and officials expressed gratitude that Delson accepted the invitation on such short notice to address an audience expected to number 10,000 in Pauley Pavilion.

Brad Delson? Brad Freaking Delson? Are you kidding? No offense intended to Mr. Delson, noted by the Times as a UCLA alum who has established a scholarship fund at the school, but if we'd spent $100,000 on an education at UCLA, one of the more prominent institutions of higher learning in the country, and our graduation speaker was a guitarist for pop/rock band, we'd be mildly disturbed. Then again, we suppose Brad Delson is better than P.O.D. drummer Wuv Bernardo, who we heard was UCLA's backup in the event Delson couldn't clear his schedule.

How does it feel knowing that Arizona State is laughing at you right now UCLA?

Rock Star to Replace Actor for UCLA Graduation Speech [LA Times]

They went and sold an ad to NBC for their new cop show Southland, set in LA. An ad on the front page. That's in the format of a fake front page story! WOWZA. That's trashy! But the Tribune Co. is bankrupt and the newspaper biz sucks and the LAT is dying and they're gonna take what they can get, DEAL WITH IT, newsroom.

The real joke here is on NBC, of course, since the show will inevitably fail anyhow.

The LA Times, which now has an editorial staff of like, ten people? maybe? met some shady "political operatives" who love this wonderful new media landscape, because it allows them to plant whatever bullshit they want and watch it grow into cable news stories and "serious" analysis pieces.

Well, Times, some of us have been on this beat for a while! But hey, you got some neat quotes from your unnamed political hack sources.

One operative told me this week about planting attacks on opponents in partisan blogs, knowing the stories could bleed into mainstream news outlets, without leaving any incriminating fingerprints. Another described how he got green reporters to write stories (no campaign cash wasted!) on ads that the candidate had no intention of ever paying to put on TV.

By "green reporters" do you by chance mean, say, the entire staff of The Politico? They sure did a lot of that this last campaign season! (Hell, everyone did. They are just the most transparent about their symbiotic relationship with the venal hacks they allow to use them to "drive the stories" or whatever they call getting a Drudge link and a segment on Hardball.)

Here is a sad bit:

The consultants cited a few recently departed veteran journalists who wouldn't fall for such funny business: Time magazine's Jay Carney, the Chicago Tribune's Jill Zuckman (the Tribune, like the L.A. Times, is owned by Tribune Co.) and our paper's Dan Morain, who took a buyout last month and went to work for a lawyers' lobbying association.

Anyway, breaking: there is a lot of bullshit out there and everyone just repeats it, all the time, unquestioningly, because all the smart people were laid off.

A tipster tells us that "Men's Health and Women's Health are merging advertising and marketing staffs today," a move they say will be accompanied by "big layoffs." If you have more info, email us. [UPDATE: Another tipster says "Looks like it was only one dude." If so, big whoop over not much, on our part. Please continue to emails us more info. UPDATE 2: "Rodale, publisher of brands such as Prevention and Men's Health, has cut another 20 sales-side employees," Mediaweek reports.]


The American Society of Newspaper Editors, which is, by the standards of newspapers, a pretty important organization, is canceling its annual convention, because they figured out that attendance would be low because all newspaper editors are currently bogged down writing layoff memos. Sad.

David Simon was a Baltimore Sun reporter on the police beat before he went and made The Wire and (hopefully) millions of dollars. And now he's so fed up with the god damn state of the city and the police department and the reporters there since he left that he had to go and start making calls again, himself, just recently, to get to the bottom of a crime story! And furthermore he sure as hell didn't see any "bloggers" or "citizen journalists" out there finding out the facts! Some people think David Simon is a jerk cause he's always mad and lashing out at ill-chosen targets, but I think David Simon is a great man, in his own angry way.


The LA Times: not paying its freelancers. Pay up, fuckers!

Ladies Home Journal is accused of violating the advertising/ edit wall in its recent issue featuring Ellen Degeneres. Well they took the cover photo from Cover Girl, the company for which Degeneres is a spokesmodel, and which bought ads right next to the cover story on Ellen, so yea. Still it's just incredibly hard to get outraged about crumbling journalism standards at Ladies Home Journal.

Media earnings news: Time Warner posted write-down losses of more than $24 billion in the fourth quarter, thanks to plummeting values at its cable and magazine businesses, and at AOL. 1,250 layoffs TK. And Disney's disappointing earnings this quarter made its stock sink further today. But Bob Iger found a shiny nickel on the sidewalk!


The Washington Post will no longer pay employees extra for things like online chats, videos, and blogs. Eh.

The Daily Beast started out really strong! Now traffic is down. But Tina Brown still has millions of dollars to burn before they think about folding, so have no fear! This whole situation gives Michael Wolff an excuse to give triumphal quotes. For some reason!


Oh, we've located a sector of the media that's not doing horrendously: locally owned alt-weeklies in small markets. Congratulations to them! In contrast, the Village Voice is a non-locally owned alt-weekly in a large market, and we hear that there was a manhole cover explosion outside its offices today. This is all connected.



A tipster sends us this screen grab to point out: the LA Times now has no compunction about letting the New York Times plant ads all over its site. Where's yer ballz, Zell?!?!

"At yesterday's discussion of Tribune's bankruptcy and other journalism cuts at USC, L.A. Times editor Russ Stanton was asked by one of his staffers about the latest newsroom gossip that the Times was considering getting rid of its national and foreign bureaus. (The most live rumor is that the Washington Post has offered to provide foreign and national coverage, and Tribune is listening.) Stanton is reported to have replied, 'You can assume ... everything and anything is being looked at.'"

Think about this: The LA Times, which only a decade ago was all hot to challenge the NYT as the greatest paper in America, may now fire its National and Foreign bureaus, entirely.

Those are important bureaus.

If this happens that LA Times will be no different from the Staten Island Advance, so, nuff said. And in terms of journalism pride, the LAT taking all that copy from the Washington Post would be kind of the equivalent of the LAT editor putting on a ball gag and letting the Post editor penetrate him with a strap-on as long as he wishes, and then asking for more, and also paying for the privilege. (But not really being into that sort of thing, deep down). [LAO; pic via]

Mark Willes got the nickname "Cereal Killer" because of his penchant for ordering huge job cuts, and because of his background as a General Mills executive in charge of the Cheerios division. He took over at Times-Mirror in 1995, and set about cutting costs. He laid off 900 total employees at the LAT and the Baltimore Sun. And he bragged that he wanted to take "a bazooka" and blast away the wall between the news and business departments.

That predisposition ultimately led to a huge scandal at the LAT in 1999, when it was revealed that the paper had made a deal to sponsor the new Staples Center arena in Los Angeles, and agreed to split advertising revenues from a special Sunday Magazine supplement about the Center with the center. In essence, the subject of the stories in that section was being paid from it. It was a big deal at the time, and it was part of Willes' legacy.

And now Tribune still owes him Retirement and Deferred compensation of more than $11 million. Chew on that, newsroom. [Although LAO points out the upside: all deferred compensation to former employees has been discontinued, so Willes will have to line up along with the rest of the creditors to plead for his money. Jon Fine lists more former execs in the same situation.]

A guy allegedly actually named Aston Grimaldi II, of Dune Capital, is offering $150,000 for a copy of the tape. So why doesn't the LA Times just sell theirs to him? They're a Tribune paper. The company's strongest asset is a parking lot, for god's sake, and that's up for sale. They need every last penny they can get.

Plus you would bring a smile to the twisted visage of John McCain, American hero! The only losers would be Hussein Obama and the paper's secret "source," a terrorist. U no U want 2 sell it LAT, LOL!

See, over the weekend the FAS-FAX circulation numbers came out and basically everyone lost. Circ was down more than 5% for the LAT. Meanwhile, on our coast, the Newark Star-Ledger is slashing 40% of its newsroom staff. They are trying to sell the paper but no one wants it.

It is basically a bad time to enjoy getting a paycheck. Sadly, the Newspaper Industry is not too big to fail.

Los Angeles is a remarkable place that deserves a remarkable newspaper...that is THE Southern California news brand for another 127 years. It will. Like all of our papers, the pattern is FEAR OF CHANGE...then ACCEPTANCE OF CHANGE...then EXCITEMENT AND CONTRIBUTION TO CHANGE. They may be in the Fear /Acceptance zone. Totally natural. Just wait til the excitement stage happens.

Just wait. [LAO via John Koblin of the fine New York Observer]