This is, obviously, the Washington version of a "rumor." The New York phrase for it is "some speculative shit someone said while drunk, probably at a terrible party."

The New York media version would be, like, some drunk blogger at Tom & Jerry's saying, "I bet Michael Wolff is going to buy the New York Press and turn it into a glossy wedding magazine." Not something with much of a chance of happening, but, you know, it's not outside the realm of possibility, if you are the sort of person who spends a lot of time thinking about these people.

Anyway. Hillary Clinton is not going to replace Smilin' Joe Biden on the ticket.

When someone supposedly dies on Twitter, there are nothing but questions that aren't "Is this person actually dead?" Because who gives a shit if they're actually dead. There are issues here:

Do people actually trust Twitter?
Who do they trust?
Why? It's just someone with a Twitter.

But they do! And sometimes, that information is valid, and all it takes is one Tweet for Twitter to be the needle in a haystack screaming to be found. But Twitter, like the people who use it, is weird.

Which would explain part of the answer to the question, What do Kanye West, Lil' Wayne, Rick Astley, Britney Spears, Harrison Ford, Jeff Goldblum, Miley Cyrus have in common with Morrissey? They've all been "killed" by Twitter. But not the other questions they present:

Who starts the _____ is dead rumors? Anyone and everyone! It can be some high school junior, or, as is this case, the New York Times The Moment blog, trying to crowdsource information. If you suggest someone who isn't dead may be dead, you've started a ____ Is Dead meme.

Why did they start the _____ Is Dead memes? For all kinds of reasons! Said high school junior who, bored and stoned in his US Government Honors class, decides that John Bolton, who has a funny mustache, is dead. He can then raise his hand and start a discussion about John Bolton being dead! Or maybe someone hears something and decides that they need to know more, because they actually care about this person's impact in their lives (as is, possibly, the case with Moz and The Moment). But mostly, the impulse to declare someone dead who isn't has to come from a place of mischief. Having to explain that you're not dead, you're just waiting to be seated at Pastis, could be a serious inconvenience for you and your publicist. Or if you're not a publicist or don't have one, a "normal" person who has to go out of their way to call their parents and explain that the stress they just went through was for naught.

What would be considered a "successful" ______ is dead meme?

A+: Getting a mainstream media outlet to report on the death, or rumors of the death. Newspapers, newspaper's websites, breaking news websites or Twitter accounts (like Drudge or BNO), CNN, FOX, ABC, NBC, MSNBC, etc. If you can get someone to say something on the air about someone who's dead that isn't dead, without it being a denial, you've done an awesome job.

B+ to B: A personal denial. Get someone to admit that they're not dead through someone who isn't their publicist, either because their publicist's credibility was called into question, or because they weren't picking up the phone when they should've.

B-: A publicist denial. Fucking up a publicist's day isn't nearly as mischievous as fucking up Miley Cyrus' day, but still equally satisfying.

C+ to C-: High-profile news-denial. If a news outlet has to report and quell the rumor, at least you got it out there to the right people.

D+ to D: High-profile gossip denial. These people sort out death rumors professionally, and if yours is smart or obscure enough to make their job tough, decent, but otherwise, you're throwing them something slow and down the middle.

D- Subversive gossip and or news crowdsourcinng for an answer (see above, also, here), but add one grade notch for every 50,000 viewers they get a day.

F: You get re-tweeted a few times. That's it.

So, how do you do it correctly?

1. Pick your target correctly. Find an obscure figure who isn't exactly "popular" amongst Twitter's celebrities. Make sure they're not on Twitter, or Twittering when you put the rumor out there. This would be an example of a "Twitter Death Meme Fail":

They can't Twitter their reaction, and they can't have people with them who could Twitter a denial. A really great pick is someone who you didn't even know was still alive. Marian Seldes would be decent, so would Kathleen Turner, because then, you can get a bunch of insane Broadway gays to start freaking out and asking questions. Which brings us to the second step:

2. Find someone to help corroborate your story. Make sure to find someone with decent cred and mix of followers with mixed interests.

You need someone to breathe on the burning embers to get a flame, right?

3. Stay silent. Don't say anything else, especially when people ask you where you heard that. Tip off a few gossip blogs, or blogs that are in the periphery of gossip and/or news blogs.

4. Wait. Teach a man to fish, he'll be set for life. But teach a man to fish without telling him that screaming "BE CAUGHT, YOU FUCKING FISH" won't help, and he's screwed. Stay calm. Wait for this thing to erupt. Once you've put it out there, unless you have multiple accounts with lots of followers to help corroborate your own story, all you can do is see what happens. You've set a line out there, enjoy the natural course it's going to take. Maybe go for a walk, work out, play with your dog. Enjoy the time you have before you get back to your computer to find out from P-Nasty himself that one of the Baldwin brothers had an aneurysm while grilling tandoori chicken skewers.

5. Celebrate correctly. Twitter provides for all. Once you've successfully "killed" someone via Twitter, you should respect and honor their not-dead-ness with a seance. A Twitter seance. Or, a Tweance.

And there you go! How to kill someone with Twitter, correctly. Now, go out there, and get your death fetish on. And please report back to us with your best results.

Oh, and by the way: Morrissey isn't dead. We think. Nice work.

But would she dare leave the world of touchy-feely daytime syndication that made her?

Oprah's contract with CBS expires in 2010, the same year OWN is scheduled to launch, and she's certainly taking her sweet time deciding whether or not to renew it. Lady O has repeatedly given up supporting roles in major media outlets in favor of lead roles in the outlets she singly controls—like her magazine, which features the only cover shoots she's appeared in since its launch in 2000. (Then again, once you've got Vogue out of your system and Anna Wintour's begrudging respect, do you really need magazine covers anymore?) Her partnership with the Oxygen network scaled back considerably when she discovered she couldn't exert enough control to make it "reflect her voice." The lady likes to be in charge.

Since CBS owns rerun rights on Oprah's syndicated show until 2011, if she wants her familiar, couch-sitting, tear-jerking format to be on OWN, she'll be forced either to contrive a way to divide her schtick into two shows—thereby competing with herself, risking becoming redundant, and probably irritating the hell out of the powers that be at CBS—or ditch CBS entirely to start broadcasting her show by herself.

One question is whether OWN can succeed without The Oprah Winfrey show, which has always anchored the disparate branches of her high-consumption universe. She already has plans to outsource some of the personality-driven portions of OWN's programming to her proteges (god knows the Oprah-lite army is big—and greedy—enough) and relegate herself to a man-behind-the-curtain role. Erspamer's presence at OWN could help orchestrate that (the press release calls it an "injection of Oprah's DNA into OWN"), or it could be a signal that Oprah wants OWN to bear the mark of Harpo, which could just as easily mean melding the two. The others question is whether the Oprah Winfrey brand exists without Oprah's physical presence—and whether she would want it to.

Glenn Beck always says false things and then says, "I'm just asking questions." Like yesterday, when—after the White House threw Van Jones under the bus—he said, "Will Van Jones still work with the White House? [I] can't get answers." So some funny kids over at Fark decided to amplify that little trick thusly: "Did Glenn Beck rape and murder a young girl in 1990? We're not saying he's guilty, but he won't deny it!" And an internet meme was born—according to Mediaite, last week the top suggested Google search terms when you typed in "Glenn Beck" were "rape" and "murder" (they've since been scrubbed).

Last week, an anonymous 34-year-old computer science student decided the meme needed a home, so he started GlennBeckRapedandMurderedaYoungGirlin1990.com, complete with a fake arrest report and a plethora of information on the "case":

We think the gag strides the border between clever and stupid: Accusing someone, even in jest, of raping and murdering a young girl is tasteless and damns the whole enterprise with useless hyperbole. But the site's mimicry of Beck's bullshit tactics is right-on: "We await evidence that he didn't rape and murder a young girl in 1990!" In any case, it's a relatively harmless little internet parody that now Glenn Beck is making sure you know about by trying to shut it down:

His lawyers are claiming that the site is a "defamatory domain," which it would be if any reasonable person could come away from the site believing that Beck actually did rape and murder a young girl in 1990. But it's an obvious attempt to parody his style, and his efforts to shut it down will only increase the number of times "Glenn Beck raped and murdered a young girl in 1990" are encountered by Google's indexing bots.

According to the site's proprietor, who wouldn't give us his name and therefore should be regarded with suspicion, Beck's lawyers have gone after the domain registrar, the hosting service, and even the data center that houses the servers on which his site lives.

"They basically tried to contact every level to shut it down," he says. "My hosting service isn't happy with the situation, but they're standing by me until they get a court order." The anonymous proprietor says he won't reveal his identity because "I don't want my house to get egged," and says the site is designed to "release frustration" about the way the right wing distorts political debate.

"I'm not actually accusing him of these things," he says. "He uses these techniques."

The paper trail of Beck's efforts to shut the site down can be found here. We contacted Beck's personal publicist, who declined to comment but confirmed that Beck believes the site to be defamatory and is trying to get it taken down.

Anyway, that's the story of GlennBeckRapedandMurderedaYoungGirlin1990.com, the site that promotes for parody purposes the false rumor that Glenn Beck raped and murdered a young girl in 1990. And here's the gag that started the whole thing:

"The boss hears from two sources," Goldfarb says, "that Hillary Clinton is considering stepping down as Secretary of State this fall in order to run for Governor of New York."

"The boss" is... Weekly Standard founder Bill Kristol, right? If Bill Kristol says it, than it is the opposite of true. That is the only constant in American Politics. But on the other hand, the guy does know from women politicians who quit things early.

No, seriously, this doesn't make sense. She has one of the best political jobs in the world already, New York State is a mess and governing it is a shitty job, and, uh, David Paterson's staff is 75% Clinton vets. If Paterson gives up early and Cuomo reveals that he killed Jonbenet Ramsey then maybe this happens.

(We'd maybe be a little more inclined to believe it if Murdoch still owned the magazine! But even then it'd be in Page Six, wouldn't it?)

Dan Abram's "GossipCop" reminds us that Perez broke the news of Fidel's death on this day in 2007. (And had GossipCop been around back then, they would've promptly "fact-checked" Perez by printing a routine denial from Fidel Castro's publicist.) And ever since that death, the Cuban media has periodically released new photos of a gaunt and sickly looking Castro hanging out in various flashy Adidas tracksuits.

Yesterday, the Cuban state-run tv aired video of Fidel that they claimed was shot on Saturday, and then the state-run youth newspaper ran a photo of a fit-looking Fidel meeting with the President of Ecuador. But the real news is that Fidel is wearing a short-sleeved white workshirt instead of one of his Run-DMC costumes!

Let's take a look back at some of Fidel's best posthumous looks.

I was driving, and swerved a little bit, even though both hands were on the wheel. Someone honked at me.

"What was that?" 

They repeated themselves.

I switched on Bluetooth and pulled over to the side of the road to hear the story. You see, earlier in the day I'd given my phone number out to someone who sent me a cryptic email wanting to talk Apple. This must have been them. (Later on I verified to a high level of certainty that they were in the position to have access to the information and after talking to them for over an hour, I believe them to the same level of certainty.)

"The device, which I've held mock ups of, is going to have a 10 inch screen, and when I saw it looked just like a giant iPhone, with a black back— although that design could change at any time" they said, "with the same black resin back, and the familiar home button." That's obvious.

"But it will come in two editions, one with a webcam and one for educational use."  

Educational use?

They continued to explain the device as something that would sit between an iPod/iPhone and a MacBook, and would cost $700 to $900—"More than twice as much as a netbook," they said.

To make up for that cost and make the device more than just a big iPod there was, this person claimed, there was talk of making the device act as a secondary screen/touchpad for iMacs and MacBooks, much like a few of the USB screens that have come out in recent months from Chinese companies. Very interesting.

They went on to say that although the project has been going on under various names between four and six years, the first prototype was built around the end of 2008. Adding, "The time to market from first prototype is generally 6-9 months." That would place the device's release date in this holiday season, at earliest. (Update: Added, at earliest in light of John Gruber and Jim Dalrymple beliefs that the date is further out, however. Dates are easy to push out.) They then said, "There was a question of what OS the device would run, too." (Other people I've talked to have implied this remains a huge secret. Update: in variation. Obviously, it'll be OS X.)

My call dropped on some windy road off Skyline Drive. Fucking AT&T.

Later, I asked, was there a code name for the project?

"Yes...[redacted]." 

I thought about it for a second, googled the term, and it all made sense. 

"Don't publish that name, please," they requested.

Don't worry, I won't.

In a Decider.com column, Gawker friend Max Silvestri relays a bit of a story involving Gallo:

My drinking partner knew an employee [at a bar called The Rabbithole], whom we'll call Diego, and after serving us some french fries (which are great, owing in large part to the fact that they were french fries), Diego somehow quickly segued into a story about how one time he was allegedly hanging out with a coked-up Johnny Knoxville and a coked-up Vincent Gallo (this story was clearly already taking the bullet train straight to Integritytown). Gallo tried to hit on Diego's girlfriend (model, obviously), so Diego shoved him.

Silvestri, you see, was using a sophisticated "sarcasm" technique to deride this "Diego's" story as untrustworthy, as is abundantly clear if you read the column. Now, the column has this note appended:

(Editor's note: After this column first ran, Vincent Gallo called The A.V. Club to make it known that he does not do cocaine and thus would not, in fact, have been "coked up.")

Fine, fine. Just stop acting so cokey.

Blog Alaska Report, who's reporting on this, asserts the rumor as truth, in addition to noting that Sarah Palin has purchased land in Montana, and possibly plans to move her family there.

AlaskaReport has learned this morning that Todd Palin and former Alaska governor Sarah Palin are to divorce. Multiple sources in Wasilla and Anchorage have confirmed the news. A National Enquirer story exposing previous affairs on both sides led to a deterioration of their marriage and the stress from that led to Palin's resignation as governor of Alaska.

The Palins were noticeably not speaking to each other at last Sunday's resignation speech in Fairbanks. Sarah ditched Todd (MSNBC) right after the speech and left without him. Sarah removed her wedding ring a couple of weeks ago. Sarah has recently purchased land in Montana and is considering moving the family there. Sarah Palin is originally from Idaho.

They're citing a Blogspot Blog, a National Enquirer story, and the tensions between Sarah and Todd at her final press conference as the basis for this report. Not exactly the most credible sources they've got there, but the Enquirer's certainly been right about some things, and Alaska Report also qualifies their story by writing that they were the first to announce Palin's candidacy for Governor and her status as the Vice Presidential nominee. So, there's that.

If any of this turns out to be true, it would explain a great deal: Palin's book deal signing/cashing in, all the talk about tending to her family regarding her resignation, her The-Media's-Been-Mean media offensive, all of it. But most likely: the resignation. Which, in and of itself, is the revelation that she was telling the truth, and bearing down for what's likely to be the hard media rain/scrutiny that's about to be comin'.

UPDATE: It looks like Meg Stapleton, Palin's spokeswoman, responded to these rumors on, uh, Facebook:

Yet again, some so-called journalists have decided to make up a story. There is no truth to the recent "story" (and story is the correct term for this type of fiction) that the Palins are divorcing. The Palins remain married, committed to each other and their family, and have not purchased land in Montana (last week it was reported to be Long Island).

Less than one week ago, Governor Palin asked the media to "quit making things up." We appreciate that the more professional journalists decided to question this story before repeating it.

Meg Stapleton

Todd and Sarah Palin To Divorce [Alaska Report]

Sarah Palin: No Truth to Latest Rumors [Facebook]

It appears that the Daily Express heard from an "inside source" (who we suspect either doesn't exist or reads Gawker) that the Ray Oscar winner was in the running for the role, because of his innate abilities:

Magnificent singing voice, totally convincing acting ability, like Frank himself, born the wrong side of the tracks, rags to riches, makes it big against the odds, has his brushes with authority. The guy's a gift.

So giddy with this bizarre news were other tabloids that they ran with it, even though the whole thing is obviously bollocks. But try telling that to publications like the Telegraph, who heralded the "colour-blind casting" rumor with abandon, and to Brit-in-exile Tina Brown, whose Daily Beast website posted the news this morning.

But yeah, we bet you quid to quinces that someone's just having a laugh. Though who knows! I mean, guys, we have a black president. Anything can happen! Racially speaking!

Message from Alain Lemarchand, President & CEO, Hachette Filipacchi Media U.S.

Dear colleagues,

I strongly believe that one of this company's primary commitments to you, our employees, and to our customers is to implement a solid strategy that ensures our ability to compete. Therefore, I am constantly evaluating how we can improve our company's efficiencies while protecting our high standards and the quality of our products.

After reviewing extensive analysis I have come to the conclusion that outsourcing certain functions in IT and Finance is the next step for us to take. It has been a hard decision to make. A number of other publishing companies have had success with outsourcing, and we expect that this move will generate savings while making us more flexible for the future. We will partner with a highly regarded global provider with strong media and publishing experience as well as knowledge of innovative best practices.

In the coming weeks, the vendor's representatives will visit our offices in New York City to complete the analysis. Colleagues in Finance and IT may be asked to participate in informational interviews, and this is an important step to ensure that we make thoughtful and informed decisions as we proceed. The outsourcing will start in the third quarter, and the transition is expected to be completed by the end of the year.

I will keep you informed. I appreciate everyone's cooperation and support during this process because this move is very important for the company.

Alain Lemarchand

Page Six has anonymous sources saying Spitzer wants to try to make his comeback as New York attorney general if Andrew Cuomo runs for governor in the next election.

The sources say Spitzer, forever tarnished as Client No. 9 of a prostitution agency, expects Andrew Cuomo to run for governor next year, leaving open the AG job...

Noted one longtime observer, "The whole idea of returning to Albany is preposterous. You can't go home again. He's a pariah. It wasn't just the prostitutes — there was also Troopergate," the use of state troopers to spy on Republican leader Joe Bruno.

So! P6's sources are Republican operatives, apparently. Or just one of the thousands of powerful Spitzer enemies! (Roger Stone?) Even if this story were true, it's a non-starter. WTF is Spitzer's comeback plan this soon after his "career-ending" scandal? He'll ride the wave of populist resentment against Wall Street back into office? Not a bad thought, but forget it, dude. At least half of those populists who liked how Spitzer fucked with Wall Street are also religious moralists who'll never forgive him for fucking with hookers. Your scandal was bigger than the average affair, Eliot. You'll be back, oh yes! But you have a five year time out, minimum.
At least you have the real estate business.

1) "This C list movie actress with A list name recognition who used to be kind of a big deal, but now is only a big deal in her mind chain smokes constantly when she is doing any kind of photo shoot. The reason? Her goal is to make the clothes smell so bad that the designer or magazine will give them all to her for free." [CDaN]

2) "This former A/B list movie and television actor is driving producers crazy with demands on the set of his new movie. It seems that our actor has some very odd spiritual beliefs and he is willing to only shoot during certain hours of the day because to do otherwise will harm his soul. I think he has smoked way too much pot." [CDaN]

3) "This star, who has recently become popular for his work and partying persona, has some problems. Let's call the problems, more of an addiction. Let's call the addiction more along the lines of an illegal obsession. In Thailand. With underage girls. He claims it only happened once, and he was ignorant to her age. Why have his phone bills then, been calling repeat ‘agencies' in Thailand almost every day?" [BlindGossip]

One insider told us three staff were let go Wednesday; another says that the total is seven — mostly writers — when you include permalancers. That's out of maybe 17 staff and permalancers, give or take, the second tipster said.

The staff-permalancer split may explain conflicting reports over what happened at Wired.com. Gawker and Silicon Alley Insider heard the site was gutted, but Condé is now saying only three staff members were let go. Perhaps that number is higher when you throw in people who were technically contractors. (We've put in an inquiry with the company.)

It's sad to see Ars so severely reduced. Not only for Condé, which not one year ago paid as much ($25 million+) for the site as it did for Wired.com, but also for the art of publishing online. Old-school print editors complain about at a certain lack of depth in Web-only publications; Condé Nast's own Graydon Carter said that the medium is weak at "telling long stories."

Ars proved that wasn't the case. One hopes it can keep doing so now that it's been thoroughly chopped up by an older, supposedly wiser firm.

SAI says that Wired.com was "gutted." We've heard the same, although exact numbers are hard to come by (we still hear 20 or so layoffs total). One layoff victim, we hear: Wired.com managing editor Leander Kahney, who was once mistakenly fingered as the writer behind Fake Steve Jobs, by Nick Denton.

There seems to be some feeling that Wired editor Chris Anderson protected his print side at the cost of his online team. Choosing sides is guaranteed to make somebody mad. If you know more, email us.

The rumor we heard yesterday about King magazine folding has been confirmed. You'll have to get your ass elsewhere, gentlemen.


Multiple sources tell us that 20 or more employees were laid off at Conde Nast Digital today. Designers and product management types were among the casualties. The Conde crumble continues. Also, a tipster tells us that the Boston Globe laid off four full-time union employees this week, all of whom were women, they say. And we hear that yesterday's Forbes layoffs actually stretched into today, because the company couldn't get to everyone yesterday. Harsh.


Bill Keller is getting salty! The NYT editor wrote Vanity Fair a kind of pissy letter dismissing its recent piece on Pinch Sulzberger. "I'll bet on Arthur Sulzberger finding the answer to that question [of journalism making money] before Mark Bowden does," Keller wrote. Zing! We must admit, we do like Bill Keller. He's a feisty one.


Oh hell, those two poor Current TV journalists who got caught sneaking into North Korea are now facing up to 10 years in prison there, according to the wacky NK government. Good lord. If that's not a bluff, it's time for some Rambo.


The list of Pulitzer Prize finalists hasn't leaked this year as usual, probably because everybody in newspapers is too sad to care much.

UPDATE: Another tipster tells us that Conde's plan is to keep receptionists on "editorial floors," and let everyone else go. If that's true, the toll on the magazine staffs (though not on the receptionists who do get fired) would be reduced.

Tipsters tell us that the receptionists—who sit on each floor to greet and announce visitors, receive packages, and answer phones—will have their last day on Friday. Sad! They're naturally some of the most popular people in the building, being the only ones with a professional obligation to smile at everyone and act civil and useful.

On top of that, this move is probably a part of CEO Charles Townsend's latest round of company-wide cutbacks, but it can't be saving Conde that much money—the receptionists are some of the lowest-paid (if not the lowest-paid) people in the whole building.

And what now? What will the visitors think? Sure, calls can be routed through the main switchboard, and packages can be handled by the central mailroom. But what happens when you arrange to go visit somebody in the Conde headquarters? Will they have a phone sitting on a desk on each floor, with a list of extensions to call? Will you just have to call before you get there and have them meet you in the lobby? It's a sad state of affairs. Any of the departing receptionists in question, feel free to email us with your personal story.