In addition to (some of) Playboy, AMI has the National Enquirer, Star, and zombie RadarOnline. And then a bunch of muscle magazines! Perfectly capturing America's true, vapid obsessions with unattainable celebrity, unattainable sex, and unattainable bodies, all under one roof. As for Playboy, they say that the money they'll save with this deal will let them bring a touch of class back to the ol' cover page:

Though Mr. Jellinek said buzz-generating covers need not be costly, citing a recent cover with "Simpsons" cartoon star Marge, Mr. Flanders said freeing up cash for celebrity pictorials is a chief aim of the deal. Actress Tara Reid will pose nude for the first time in the combined January/February issue.

A bargain at any price.

Ha, New Yorker media man Ken Auletta moderated some panel about "The Future of Funny," which of course sounds the opposite of funny, but it turned out to be funny mostly because of Judd Apatow mocking Ken Auletta's questions. Be warned: Anything about funny things should be funny or it will be made funny at the expense of the least funny person. And that person will inevitably be you.


Houston Chronicle reporter Moises Mendoza: "I'm not on death row. Stop with the e-mails, the dirty looks and the questions. I'm not Moises Sandoval Mendoza. I'm a different Moises Mendoza - a law-abiding one." Yea right, Mendoza. Google don't lie.


About half of cheap-ass Americans say they're willing to pay for online news content, and those who would pay said they're only willing to pay an average of $3 a month. This means that half of America will soon stop reading newspapers online, and the other half will pay just enough to ensure newspapers go broke.


"Is Playboy's Print Future In Jeopardy?" Yes.

Sure, writers came up with the idea for the episode well before Playboy somehow convinced Fox that the public needed to see Marge Simpson's cartoon boobs in this month's centerfold; but what could have been a bright side to one of the strangest turns the series has taken since almost getting sued by Rio de Janeiro in 2002 was instead a middle-of-the-road episode which proved once again why, sadly, the only time people talk about "The Simpsons" these days is when one of the main characters takes off her clothes for a magazine even teenage boys haven't masturbated to since, like, 1998.

At a Time Magazine panel last night designed to hype speculation over who the stupid "Person of the Year" will be, two distinct, stupid favorites emerged: Twitter, and The Economy. Neither of which is a person. Christ. Even "You" was technically a person, despite being the stupidest choice ever. How about "Americans Who Are Getting Stupider," as a dark horse candidate?


It looks like money issues could finally force Hugh Hefner to sell Playboy. The company's stock went erect yesterday amid reports that it's in discussions with Iconix, which specializes in turning around brands that have fallen off. If you listen to wild blogosphere estimates, Playboy is now worth significantly less than Gawker Media. That's when all the models disappear.


Optimistic words are flowing forth from the mouths of fashion magazine executives! Conde Nast's Tom Florio says Vogue's profits will double next year! Other fashion mag publishers are equally gung-ho about next year! That's the benefit of getting to compare your profits to the worst year ever, in history. They will be better than that.


CNN had been pouring lots and lots of greenback$$$ into producing an entire online-only, all-day newscast on its website, for some reason. Now they're laying off four of their online anchors and cutting way back on that whole project, because they remembered, hey, we have a whole channel on TV, already. Always thinking!

In an article that might as well begin "Long live the shriveled dick!" the Media & Advertising section's profile on Hefner that ran this weekend—entitled "The Loin In Winter," and get it? Get it?!—is like the most fun visit to the urologist's office you're ever going to have. Sure, it's about his media legacy, or you'd think it'd be about his media legacy, but in the end, what's Hugh Hefner's Sunday NYT profile really about? I dunno, let's say you're writing it. What do you want to read about?

Hugh Hefner leaned back on a red loveseat, the saggy one...

Mr. Hefner, the legendarily libidinous founder of Playboy...

He still works full days on his magazine, flies to Europe and Las Vegas, pops Viagra, visits nightclubs with his three live-in girlfriends - each young enough to be his great-granddaughter...

"I feel strongly that the pop culture is a thinner soup today," he said. "It used to be a thick porridge."

I have no idea what that last one means. But mostly, yes, they use his penis as a metaphor for his business. Which is interesting, because it's true: despite all of the Viagra of reality shows and Marge Simpson spreads, despite all of the erectile dysfunction drugs and stimulants Playboy's tried to pump into itself, it's still growing old with age, shriveling, unable to shoot anything but profit-loss pulling blanks! If we think about the great media penises of our time—Graydon's "monstah" cock, for one—hell, if we had concrete evidence on this sort of thing, we might be able to better understand the futures of media properties (which is to say nothing of media's floppy woos). For example: what's the future of the New York Observer now that Kushner's peen is under the lock-and-key of new hardcore Slumlord defender wifey Ivanka? Measured output or steely restraint? There's an entire field of research to be had here. Media overlords, step forward: we're here to help.

As for Hugh, well: he's worried about his legacy, and the company's considering acquisition offers for the first time in their history, something previously thought to be a null idea while Hugh was alive. But that might be where the metaphor ends. Hef's still battin' 'em away with a stick:

When Mr. Hefner's relationship with Ms. Madison ended, he said he got letters from women around the world begging to move in. "They were climbing over the gates," he said, beaming. Mr. Hefner chose three new live-in girlfriends, 23-year-old Crystal Harris and twins Kristina and Karissa Shannon, 20.

Media empires, even when they're dying, literally and figuratively: still an aphrodisiac. If you're still trying to figure out why people are still trying to get in this business, you're clearly not paying attention.

[Photo via Getty Images/Jim Ross]

As one blogger put it: "Dear Matt Groening: You are a dirty, dirty man." Indeed. There're more here.

• The reprehensible yet fascinating Kelly Bensimon fluttered about a party the other night asking people to smell her because she wanted a Tom Ford perfumer to make her a new scent. Which we're sure makes sense in her mind and her mind alone. [Page Six]
  
  
• Dina Lohan's absolutely livid that ex-hubby Michael would go on television to claim Lindsay has a drug problem. So she's talking to the tabloids, instead. Oh, for the record, she insists Lindsay's doing a-okay. Relatively, at least. [Page Six]
  
  
• Marge Simpson will be on the cover of Playboy and has a 3-page spread. Is it wrong that we're curious? [TMZ]
  
  
• Three years after he referred to TR Knight as a "faggot," Isaiah Washington still can't get work. [MSNBC]
  
  
• It's a done deal: a bench warrant has been issued for Michael Jackson dead doc and deadbeat dad Conrad Murray, who owes $13,000 in child support. [Inside Edition]
  
  
• Donald Trump's one cold son-of-a-bitch. Daughter Ivanka writes in her new book that Marla Maples was once a few minutes late getting to their private plane, so he left her behind on the tarmac. [Page Six]
  
  
• Hmm. Maybe Jon and Kate Gosselin aren't quite as childish as we imagined: they managed to get along for their twin daughters' birthday party. But, of course, it's only one day. [NYDN]
  
  
• Geri Halliwell should have her celebrity powers revoked, because she wore a dress from seven-years ago. If you see her, spit on her. [Daily Mail]
  
  
• Nicolas Cage, whose popularity continues to astound us, reportedly owes the government about $6 million in back taxes. National treasure, indeed. [TMZ]

• Two shitheads allegedly tried exhort $25 million from John Travolta after his son Jett's death. If he didn't pay, they would release the 16-year's medical documents. Well, now they're on trial and poor Travolta had to testify about the 40 minutes he spent trying to save his son's life. He also admitted, finally, that his son was autistic, something he had never said before. [LA Times]
  
  
• Art imitated life for Jennifer Aniston during filming of The Bounty. A source claims that an assistant walked in on Aniston crying after filming a scene that reminded her of long-lost Brad Pitt. [Page Six]
  
  
• Conservative darling and failed beauty queen Carrie Prejean's really, really trying to hold onto those 15-minutes: she's modeling slutty Halloween costume. [TMZ]
  
  
• Ellen Pompeo had a baby. And it's a girl named Stella. [WaPo]
  
  
• Samantha Burke squeezed out Jude Law's baby a week early. We guess she wanted to get that sweet, sweet tabloid money sooner, rather than later. [Times Online]
  
  
• Lily Allen realized no one wants to buy her records anymore, so she's quit music forever. [Perez]
  
  
• Real Housewives of New York troublemaker Kelly Bensimon succeeded once again in grabbing some ink by posing in Playboy. But, like a wuss, she won't be showing her puss. [Page Six]
  
  
• Tinsley Mortimer makes her prince boyfriend carry her purse in silence. [Page Six]
  
  
• Not content to design just dresses, Zac Posen now wants to design an apartment building. [Page Six]
  
  
• Chynna Phillips says she fell into a 10-day depression after learning that her father John had been having a long-term affair with her half-sister, Mackenzie Phillips. She was not, however, surprised. [NYDN]

Young Hollywood legend Brett Ratner is certainly a man who wears many hats. Director, author, host, boyfriend and friend to all of show business. So surely when you hire the great Ratner to direct your TV commercial, you understand that you don't get all of Brett Ratner.

The folks at Slashfilm have dug up a couple critical pieces of Ratnerology. First they discovered the newly released Playboy-themed Guitar Hero commercial:

A masterpiece of the Guitar Hero/Risky Business re-staging genre to be sure.

Thinking no doubt of future generations whose historians who will win doctorates studying this landmark piece of advertising, the Guitar Hero team has also placed online a series of outtakes from the ad, providing some glimpses into the artistry of Brett Ratner.

Most striking of all, as Slashfilm notes, is the moment which occurs 57 seconds into the video, where, as the camera rolls and the Playmate Guitar Army marches past him, Ratner appears to be sitting in his director's chair talking on a cell phone. As Playmates cluster around, he lowers the phone, gives them an annoyed look and issues some sort of very important directorial command, no doubt asking the to take their little TV commercial somewhere else while he's on a very important call. The faces of the Playmates, surely awed by his power telephoning, are not visible.

Later in the clips, Ratner turns his attention to the shoot for a moment and see more clearly what makes the director of Rush Hour 3 a giant of our age when like De Mille descended he issues the order "Rock out girls!" calls "Action!" and after Hef croaks out the line, "I love variety," throws aloft his hands in victory, grinning broadly and declaring with all the accumulated wisdom of his years, "That was great."

And it was.

Police sources in Jenkins' native Canada, where authorities believe he fled after murdering Fiore, say that the 32-year old took his own life in a British Columbia hotel room.

"We were able to determine that it was Ryan Jenkins," said Sgt. Duncan Pound of the RCMP's Federal Border Integrity Program, during an early evening news conference. "At this point it would be speculation as to how long he had been there."

The find came just hours after RCMP said Jenkins was in Canada...

Honestly, we feel a bit cheated on this one: not only are we firm believers that murderers should feel justice's swift kick, but the brutality of this crime - Fiore's body was found in a suitcase sans teeth and fingers and was identified via her breast implants - only enhanced our thirst for a relatively happy ending, not a hanging.

Fiore was married to Ryan Alexander Jenkins, a contestant on the VH1 reality show, Megan Wants A Millionaire. His bio appears to have been removed by the network, but Steve Huff at True Crime Report caught a screengrab of it earlier before they did. In it, the Canadian investment banker boasts that he "has left many amazing women in his life primarily because he wanted more women," and that "the only time he cheated on his ex was when he wanted to break up with her."





The show is currently airing on VH1 and TMZ reported tonight that Jenkins was among its "final contestants." The gossip site also says that Jenkins met Fiore while she was stripping in Las Vegas after he was booted from the show, and that they married two days later.

Fiore, who recently moved to LA from Vegas with Jenkins, was last seen Friday night, some reports say at a poker tournament in San Diego, while others say at her home in Hollywood. Her remains were discovered by a homeless man digging through the trash for plastic cans at around 7am on Saturday morning. Fiore's mother said that her daughter was employed by Playboy as a representative and a coordinator for something called "Girls of Golf."

Jenkins' publicist says that he will cooperate fully with police investigating the murder, even though authorities believe he may be attempting to flee to Canada, his home country. Authorities also say that it was Jenkins who reported Fiore missing on Saturday morning. He then disappeared completely.

Pic via Jasmine Fiore's Modeling Portfolio

Rumors circulated last week that Montag didn't actually get fully naked for her upcoming six-page spread, rumors she attempted to shoot down when she told Life & Style yesterday, "I'm not wearing anything in the Playboy pictures...my skin is my accessory." But tonight TMZ is reporting that the rumors of Montag's non-nude spread are actually true, saying that a source told them that the magazine agreed to a strict dictate in order to get her to do the shoot: "No nipples, no vagina, no ass."

It's been estimated that Playboy paid $500,000 to get Montag to do the "barely PG-rated" spread, which is sort of astonishing when you consider that the magazine is hemorrhaging cash worse than most other magazines. Maybe for all of his obvious personal faults, Spencer Pratt's actually got a bit of shrewd business acumen in him, shrewd enough to milk a few easy bucks out of a desperate, near-death nudie publication anyway, which, when you really stop and think about it, seems to be exactly the type of thing Spencer Pratt was put on earth to do.

• Tom Cruise busted a move to Beyonce's "All The Single Ladies" when he saw her at her Staples Center concert in L.A. Poor Katie Holmes. This is the exact, precise, scientifically measured middle-ground between a touchdown dance and waving the rights to someone's soul in their face. Still, it's not nearly as bad as when he dresses the kids up and does "Defy Gravity" with them as the flying monkeys and him as Elpheba and makes her play the role of Steven Schwartz and scream at him from the audience, but still: pretty mean, you know? It's the wizard who should be afraid. Of me. [NY Daily News]
  
  
• Speaking of gay tragedies, two stagehands died in a stage collapse at a Madonna concert, and French police are launching an investigation into it. She paid tribute to them in concert: ""You may have heard of it... When they were building my show in Marseille, where we're going next - we don't know why, but one of the cranes fell... Two men lost their lives, it was a great tragedy to me." [Daily Express]
  
  
• And speaking of just straight-up tragedy, Hollywood producers are still total assmunches-yes, assmunches. There's no better word to describe the one behind Mischa Barton's newest film, as he's pissed that she went insane and had to be placed in the crazy house and is taking his frustration to the press. Honestly, dude, talk about loose marbles, you were the one who thought she was still bankable, first of all. Second of all, you're a dick. [NY Daily News]
  
  
• Jennifer Anniston's new movie that she's filming with Gerard Butler is pissing off New Yorkers left and right. First, she annoyed Daily News staffers by getting in the way of them pissing. Now, she's getting in the way of West Village residents by getting in the way of their dogs pissing. The production manager on the movie is apparently a total meanie, and she won't return the calls of the sad West Village residents who don't like noise and things on their nice block because they paid a few milli to live there, you know? On that note, I hope someone pours Birdbath coffee in their ears or something silly because if I lived in the West Village I would basically be deaf to everything but the schadenfreude of broke muh's like me, which I would record and consequently play back at half-speed and remix it with, I don't know, Thievery Corporation or something and play it at my parties where I serve fried chicken canapes in my garden and bitch about how Design Within Reach is out of reach of poor people but too in-reach of me, which makes it basically the silliest design store ever, and who buys chairs in America anyway, really? Also, Jennifer Aniston is still painfully single and I still think "Daughters" is the best song ev-ar. [Page Six]
  
  
• Jon Gosselin's new girlfriend was just a Drunkie McPlastered in high school: ""I remember on a school trip once, she got completely wasted," a source notes to E!. Okay, first: a source? Glad to know someone from E! is meeting in the basement of an Omaha parking lot or whatever and looking over their shoulder before being like, okay, tell me exactly how much of a floozie this chick was in high school, I promise: you will be protected. Also, you know she was that girl on the school trip who busted out the booze to the Mormon kids and taught them what Seven Minutes In Heaven was. SWOON. [E!]
  
  
• JoJo Simmons-son of Rev. Run of Run D.M.C.-got a very small punishment for his pot bust and resisting arrest charges. When you're the son of a celebrity, it's like that. Don't ask me, because I don't know why. But that's the way it is. [NY Daily News]
  
  
• The Hills' Lauren Conrad is deflating the fun behind Heidi Pratt's inflated assets to Playboy in an upcoming issue, noting that they're "not going to pay for themselves." No, Lauren, they certainly won't, especially if people are reading Playboy for the articles. Which, uh, everyone does, right? Also, plenty more smacktalk where that came from. "I don't call magazines and let them know about things so they can write stories." OHHH SNAP. STORIES, YO! Also, Conrad wore a burnette wig as a "social experiment," which is kind of like the Stanford Prison Experiment, but different, because it's a prison of the mind, man. [NY Daily News and E!]
  
  
• The "Octomom" LadyThing had to take one of her 19 spawn to the hospital yesterday because he drank some kind of "salt based solution." [TMZ]
  
  
• Cameron Diaz is convinced she has protective angels following her every move. What she doesn't understand is that agents' assistants actually get overtime and can expense jetpacks for this kind of thing. [Daily Express]
  
  
• Michael Jackson's death is again a breaking point, this time for his sister, Janet, and her mans, Jermaine Dupri, who have now separated following Michael's death. I would write something funny here but I'm already sad for Jermaine Dupri because I feel like people forget just how awesome the "Money Ain't A Thing" video-Dupri's magnum opus-was. Also, now that he's no longer with Jackson, Money Will Most Definitely Be A Thing. [NY Daily News]
  
  
• Really sad: Alan Ball watched his sister get killed in a car crash when he was younger, which basically explains all five seasons of Six Feet Under, and gives the first episode-where the family's patriarch is killed in a car crash on Christmas-entirely new dimensions. [Daily Express]
  
  
• Andy Dick's son, Lucas, is far funnier than his Dad. Especially when he's slagging on him, like he did to his face at Caroline's the other night: "I'll come home to find a big party at our house and my father will be rolling around naked in ketchup on the floor, and I'll think, 'Oh yeah, it's Tuesday.'" There's an entire David Sedaris-esque career to be had, here, because this is both sad, hysterical, doesn't sound the least be true, and yet, more than likely is. We'll be watching you, Little Dick. [Page Six]

Playboy actually first excerpted Nabokov's Ada or, Ardor back in 1969, when they were a very popular and highbrow titty mag. But the years have not been kind to Playboy, because the years invented the internet, and everyone forgot both how to read and how to masturbate to magazines.

And do you know who we don't envy? Playboy's literary editor, Amy Grace Loyd.

So. Vlad Nabokov, one of the most brilliant English-language authors ever, had not finished his last work, The Original of Laura, when he died. And he demanded that it never be published, because he was a bit of a perfectionist. Vlad's son Dmitri complied with his dad's wishes for many years, until he decided to just let it be published, because why not. So "super-agent" Andrew Wylie took over, and Amy Grave Loyd attempted to woo him with orchids, a reference to Ada.

Ms. Loyd was disappointed, figuring the honor of first serial was more likely to go to a place like The New Yorker, which had its own long history with Nabokov, and had in fact just last summer published one of his newly translated short stories. Ms. Loyd's worry was not unfounded: Mr. Wylie had indeed sent Laura to the The New Yorker months earlier. But as it happened, according to a source at the magazine, the fiction department was not interested. (Fiction editor Deborah Treisman had no comment.)

On the first of June, Mr. Wylie changed his tune and wrote to Ms. Loyd asking her what, hypothetically, Playboy would be willing to pay for an exclusive.

They were willing to pay more than they have ever paid for a book excerpt before, and they were willing to pay this much without even reading a word of it. And it kinda turns out that the book might not be very good! "There are parts of it that are much more cohesive than others. But I found it fascinating in that way," Loyd says.

But 5,000 words of The Original of Laura will run in the December Playboy, presumably next to reviews of the latest in hi-fi gear, Canadian whiskey ads, Gahan Wilson cartoons, a lengthy Q&A with Mort Sahl, and nude pictures of Barbara Carrera. Pick it up at your local newsagent!

The image associated with this post is best viewed using a browser.


Perhaps it's better that the children stay away?

The image associated with this post is best viewed using a browser.

Prejean, who made the media rounds last week floating a similar "I was set up by haters" theory, and her lawyer Charles LiMandri are launching an offensive against California pageant officials, telling E Online that Keith Lewis, the poor sap whose horrible lot in life is to be director of the California pageant organization, tried to get her to see some gross gay movie knowing full well that it would assault her delicate anti-gay sensibilities and that she'd refuse to attend.

"[Lewis] wanted her to go to the debut of a docudrama supporting same-sex marriage," the attorney claims. "The people [who] produced it were going to be there explaining their journey as gay men toward same-sex marriage. She said, 'I'm just not comfortable doing that.' I wrote back to [Lewis'] attorney saying, 'She won't do the pro-traditional marriage stuff as Miss California. But don't ask her to do the pro-same-sex marriage stuff either.'"

Prejean's lawyer also claims that Lewis tried to trick her into posing for Playboy, knowing full well that his client's high moral fiber would never allow her to do such a thing like taking off her clothes in front of a camera.

"She had just gotten a request to do a Playboy shoot with partial nudity-this was several days after [Donald] Trump reinstates her," LiMandri says. "[Lewis] knew she wouldn't do that stuff, and he was trying to set her up, saying, 'You can pick your photographer. You can pick the photos.' And then he'd be able to fire her for sure."

So yeah, Carrie's the victim of ill-timed wind gusts and some sort of vast left-wing conspiracy. So now she'll "write" a book about it all and pose for Playboy and in two years she'll be a co-host on Fox & Friends, which is right where she belongs.

Carrie Prejean's Lawyer: She Was Set Up [E Online]

Image via Splash

The image associated with this post is best viewed using a browser.Richard Branson says he does not want to buy Playboy. Oh how we wish he did, though. As you can see, he's sad about it. If only there were a rich, horny, middle-aged billionaire out there, who loves models.

The image associated with this post is best viewed using a browser.The BBC is launching a channel for kids, right here in the USA. American kids will not be stupid any more.

The image associated with this post is best viewed using a browser.Jacques is a new quarterly that calls itself "America's only new luxury erotic magazine." Since we know that there are no new magazines or luxurious things in America right now, it's probably true! Anyhow the naked parts are very tasteful and all so check it out.

The image associated with this post is best viewed using a browser.NBC got only 4.4 million prime time viewers last week—the lowest-ever total for any network "outside of the summer doldrums of June, July, August or early September." But not to worry: the network's considering creating a new 5 p.m. daily "lifestyle show." Which will turn things around.

The image associated with this post is best viewed using a browser.Rumor is that international playboy (wait for the joke to reveal itself) Richard Branson is interested in buying Playboy Enterprises (there it is). Last week the rumor was Hef might sell for $300 million and 72 blonde non-virgins. We cannot think of a more appropriate owner than Branson, so go for it! (Although David Carr says it's not happening).

This is a photo of writer Michael Idov originally taken for the aborted Russian rich-people magazine Snob. Bask in it.
UPDATE: In fact, Michael Idov informs us that Snob is not dead at all! He writes:

The shoot was justly discarded because I had a story running in the same issue as the story that mentioned me. You'd agree that having both would be a bit too much. Even for a publication called Snob.

It's also not a rich-folks magazine, incidentally (it's a kind of solemn scuppie post-glossy along the lines of Monocle and Good; the title is ironic), but everyone makes that mistake, and they've certainly set themselves up for it.

The image associated with this post is best viewed using a browser.The Observer has more on NYT Social Media Editor Jennifer Preston, solidifying the impression that, while she is clearly an enormously qualified journalist and newspaper editor, she perhaps is not so up on this "social media" thing. "Jennifer is extremely enthusiastic," says NYT digital guru Jonathan Landman. "She's not an expert to start with, but I don't think that's a terrible handicap here in real ways. Nobody's an expert." Really, nobody?

The image associated with this post is best viewed using a browser.The Hartford Advocate, an alt-weekly, decided to outsource an entire issue's worth of writing to India, for fun. It didn't save them money, and they're not advocating it as a media strategy; it was just kind of a goof. If management likes it too much, they may come to regret it.