Apple's iPad could make it the king of old media, arbiter of taste and technology alike. So magazines and newspapers have begun a series of countermoves that could turn the quietest dogfight in media into the most vicious.
"They're an elitist pestilence," Andrew Breitbart says of liberal Hollywood celebrities in this Wired profile of the conservative internet publisher. And then, after saying that, Andrew went to a Manhattan nightclub to drink Cristal with rich people.
It's not yet clear how well the app will perform on Android devices or as an iPad app, as our colleagues at Gizmodo point out — or whether Apple will even allow the Wired app on its tablet device. Then there's the question of pricing. Wired editor Chris Anderson mentions getting people to pay for content in the video,…
[This new picture from the European Southern Observatory's new VISTA telescope of the future makes the Orion Nebula look like a bit of swirly sci-fi goodness. Image via ESO via Wired]
• It's official: Oprah says she plans to call it quits in September 2011. [ABC]
• Layoffs: The BusinessWeek cuts continue (and include a handful of the mag's more notable names); meanwhile the AP body count now stands at 90.
• Sarah Palin sold 300,000 copies of her book the first day, alas. [TDB]
• Condé Nast and…
Condé Nast says it is already racing to repackage its magazines for Apple's forthcoming tablet, starting with Wired, even while toeing Apple's line that the device doesn't exist. Publishers are clearly betting Steve Jobs can save their business model.
The founders of Reddit.com confirmed the rumors first aired here two weeks ago: they are leaving Wired Digital, which acquired their site in 2006. Bad news, but not unexpected. Here's Reddit's growth after spoiled Condé Nast execs took it over:
Chris Anderson has plenty of distractions from editing Wired, including a lucrative sideline on the global lecture circuit and a tour to promote his new book. Anderson's prior commitments even removed him from the office on Wired's layoff day. (Updated)
• The New York Times says it will cut 100 newsroom jobs, or roughly 8% of its editorial workforce, via buyouts and/or layoffs. [NYT, NYO]
• The Condé Nast cuts continue today at Wired, Glamour and Lucky. [Gawker]
• The bad news for NBC: It's facing blowback from its affiliates over Jay Leno's 10pm show. The good news:…
We hear Wired had its own round of editorial layoffs today. What's going on at Conde Nast? A very bad Monday. In a very bad month. Let's review:
For a digital bible, Wired has been turning surprisingly analog over the past year. The latest regressions: The publication just fired two top editors from Wired.com and may soon lose the founders of Reddit.com.
• Time Warner sucked wind in the second quarter as profits fell 34%. Newly-independent Time Warner Cable, however, posted a profit. [AP, Reuters]
• McKinsey has set up shop at Condé Nast. What it is the consulting firm's actually doing (or recommending), however, remains a mystery. [NYO]
• Barry Diller's IAC posted a…
Wired editor Chris Anderson has fully morphed from a journalist, who knows what it's like to have to interview other people, into a celebrity, who has no time for these fucking reporters and their boring questions. "Journalism," what's that?
Just after announcing it would bring in McKinsey & Co. for some horrific cost-cutting, Conde Nast has released its official projections for its crucial September ad sales. We knew the numbers would be bad; they lived up to expectations.
The Independent has a massive piece today on YouTube and how, despite having close to 350 million users worldwide per month, it's set to lose almost half a billion dollars this year. And it's all your fault, naturally.
Big Ideas Author Malcolm Gladwell, a Manhattanite of the New Yorker, has issued a smackdown review of Free, the book from Big Ideas Author Chris Anderson, a Berkeleyan of San Francisco's Wired. If that's not provocative enough, Gladwell sounds downright grumpy.
• ABC and NBC will face off on Thursday night with competing tributes to Farrah Fawcett, who died today. But you probably expected that, no? [NYT]
• David Letterman beat out Conan in the ratings last week, the first time the Late Show has dominated the weekly ratings since 2005. [THR]
• Rosie O'Donnell will debut a…
How did the Virginia Quarterly Review connect Chris Anderson's book to Wikipedia, thus unraveling a plagiarism scandal? A strange use of parentheses.
Chris Anderson's plagiarism scandal is still unfolding; Brooklyn writer Ed Champion has found instances where the Free author copied material he was supposed to be summarizing. But there was grumbling about Wired's editor long before his book scandal.
Chris Anderson has been caught lifting huge chunks out of Wikipedia for his book Free. The irony speaks for itself. But it's worth noting that the Wired editor's excuses are disconcertingly clichéd.
