Whispered in our ears: Andrew Essex, former no. 2 man over at Details, has tried to take some staffers with him to his new gig at Absolute Publishing. Poor Essex and his refugees, however, got slapped with a decidedly unsexy noncompete agreement from Details' parent company, Advance Magazine Group. The agreement, which includes some sort of clause about staffing, ensures that Essex's poor minions will stay chained to their desks and unable to break free from the confines of Details' charticle factory. Another day, another humanitarian crisis.