Google's chairman Eric Schmidt has a new girlfriend, who's just like all his other girlfriends. Also in today's Valleywag roundup: Wikipedia's co-founder is burning through his money fast and Twitter will now take bribes for access to the top of your stream.

  • Google's former CEO Eric Schmidt is famously prone to creepy TV gaffes, so maybe that's why he's constantly cozying up to broadcast journalists. The married chairman's new girlfriend is Lisa Shields (pictured), according to the New York Post; the Council on Foreign relations communications VP and 45 year old divorced mom is also a former producer for Good Morning America and Primetime Live and ran an internet show on PlumTV. That gives her a resumé remarkably similar to that of Schmidt's ex Kate Bohner, a former CNBC correspondent who launched a well-stocked YouTube channel called KBTV, and to that of Schmidt's other ex Marcy Simon, who worked as a producer at WCMH-TV in Columbus, Ohio, before moving into PR. Schmidt's wife Wendy is also steeped in the journalism world; not only did she go to j-school at the University of California, Berkeley, but she also helps raise money for the school, at one point sponsoring a mixer featuring Bohner's ex Michael Lewis.

    Schmidt is rumored to have an open relationship with his wife, so it's presumably no problem that he's been squiring Shields for nearly a year, sailing her around the Caribbean and south of France on his yacht, according to the Post, and dining with her this summer in the Hamptons. No problem for Schmidt, at least, but Shields would be well advised to curb her expressive impulses: Schmidt sent his lawyers after Bohner when she seemed to be blogging about moments from their relationship, including the time he lent her an iPhone prototype. The first rule of dating Google's chairman is apparently to never let Google index your relationship with Google's chairman.
  • Wikipedia's co-founder Jimmy Wales is a high roller without much in the bank, according to divorce court documents unearthed by writer Gregory Kohs. In the papers, Wales says he spends around $20,870 per month, including $1,000 on vacations, $3,000 on legal fees, and $2,000 on "miscellaneous." Subtract out Wales' after tax income, and he's burning about $4,500 per month in savings, Kohs calculates, despite a net worth of just $470,000, most of it tied up in his home equity. Maybe it's time for the internet entrepreneur to buy a more serious, less sultry set of business cards and apply for a day job like nearly everyone else who edits Wikipedia.
  • Advertisers you're already following on Twitter can now buy their way to the top of your tweet stream, so they don't get lost in the shuffle of everyone else you follow. Twitter is only selling these spots to a "select group" of advertisers, probably because the transition from overfunded social experiment to actual business can be quite scary.

[Photo of Lisa Shields via PlumTV. Photo of Schmidt via AP]