Friedman is set to meet tomorrow with Fox News chief Roger Ailes and John Moody, the news network's executive vice president for editorial, the source said. Friedman will have a chance to plead his case, but the meeting could well end with the columnist losing his job.

Friedman is in hot water for posting to FoxNews.com Thursday a review of the forthcoming movie Wolverine. The freelance columnist based his comments on an unfinished version of the movie that leaked onto the internet last week. "It's so much easier than going out in the rain!" he wrote. "I was completely riveted to my desk chair in front of my computer."

You can imagine how this went over at Wolverine producer 20th Century Fox, which last week called in the FBI to find out who leaked the film. The studio complained corporate sibling Fox News, according to Nikki Finke, and parent company News Corp. publicly condemned the review and requested its removal. Fox News promptly deleted the piece.

Finke wrote that Ailes then fired Friedman, a development seemingly confirmed by a statement News Corp. supplied to the New York Times, reading, "Fox News… terminated Mr. Friedman."

But Fox News' only statement on the affair (also given to the Times) is that "This is an internal matter that we aren't prepared to discuss at this time."

And in fact Friedman has not been fired, according to the Fox News source, although he could well be terminated during tomorrow's meeting. The delay in firing Friedman (despite News Corp.'s announcement) could be read as a play by Ailes to assert the news division's independence from film studio 20th within the News Corp. empire.

The meeting also gives Fox News time to reconcile its own definition of journalistic ethics with 20th Century Fox's. The film studio says Friedman shouldn't have broken the law in the service of a story. But Fox News seems more comfortable with such mischief. Network anchor Shep Smith wasn't fired after he was arrested for running over a competing reporter with his car so he could snag parking space, even though the incident resulted in felony battery charges (later apparently dropped without explanation).

When Bill O'Reilly's former producer accused the Fox News host of sexual harassment, producing lengthy conversation transcripts O'Reilly never denied, sibling publication the New York Post slammed her in a story headlined "'Lunatic' O'Reilly Gal Went Nuts in Bar." O'Reilly settled the suit and, of course, retains his job.

And Fox is unrepentant about stalking a liberal blogger, sending a camera crew to tail her from her apartment across state lines to Virginia.

According to Viacom insiders familiar with the situation, the campaign immediately began to draw the ire of upper management the second it was launched. You see, Friday Night Lights airs on Friday nights, the same night that Best Week Ever premieres a new episode each week. Although the shows are not direct competitors, Vh1 production execs were less than thrilled that the flagship site of their new Digital Programming unit was using Viacom funds and bandwidth to promote a show that airs on NBC. The irony here is rich, especially when you consider that the entire concept of Best Week Ever revolves around content generated by sources outside of the walls of Viacom AND includes significant amounts of programming aired on other networks.

So, what will become of the campaign? At press time, the answer is not clear. All of the archived posts still remain on the site, but not only have there been no new posts on this topic in over a week, the petition is no longer operational. If you know anything else about this situation, please drop us a line at tips [AT] defamer.com. Until then, developing...

From: Office Of JoAnne Griffith
Sent: Wednesday, December 12, 2007 2:53 PM
To: M_MTVN__ALL
Subject: More Important News for Freelance and Temporary Employees

As you know, we've been holding information sessions over the past several days to discuss our freelance and temporary employee benefits. We've had many insightful conversations and heard a number of your specific concerns.

As a result of the input you've given to us directly through the sessions and your managers, we want to announce the following changes:

· We are expanding our freelance and temporary medical and dental benefits options to include the United Healthcare plan under which many of you are currently covered. This means anyone who is eligible for benefits in 2008 can opt for medical and dental coverage with United Healthcare at the current rate of contribution, or you can elect instead to enroll in the newly offered Aetna plan.

· The Aetna plan has certain advantages that may make it the preferred option for many of our freelance and temporary employees. Based on your input, however, we want to make sure that those of you who prefer the United Healthcare plan have that option.

· As a result of this change, the freelance and temporary employee payroll conversion to Cast and Crew has been delayed until February 1, 2008. Therefore, the December 14th deadline to submit your Cast and Crew paperwork has been postponed. We will inform you of the new deadline early in the New Year.

· We've implemented a process for evaluating freelance and temporary employee positions for possible conversion to staff positions. This process is currently underway and decisions will be communicated by January 31st, 2008.

In order to address additional questions, HR representatives will be available to discuss individual circumstances and concerns at the following times and locations:

· New York: Thursday, December 13th
11:00 a.m. - 1:00 p.m.
1515 Broadway, Conference Room 44-02

· Los Angeles: Thursday, December 13th
11:00 a.m.
2600 Colorado Ave., 5th Floor LEG Room

Employees in other regions should contact their HR representative directly with any questions or concerns.