Yes, that's Britney Spears on the cover of Rolling Stone, with the least exposed flesh she's ever shown on the cover of that magazine. Her interview inside is similarly unrevealing, mostly recounting Britney's dating travails (of one beau, Britney said she was "trying to ask him questions, like, 'OK, you're into martial arts, so what kind of martial arts are you into?' And he was like, 'Oh, all kinds'"), though she does take the time to tweak Kevin Federline's skills as a father. It may not surprise you, reader, to learn that K-Fed's kick game is far superior to his parenting:

How to fill a slow holiday week for gossip about the Only Brand That Matters? Analyst firm Piper Jaffray has the cure: 12 unanswered questions about everything from Chinese iPhones (next year for sure) to netbooks (never, because "Apple doesn't do cheap.") Of course, the fun part about Apple predictions is they're always 100% wrong.

Don't let declining animation revenues and skyrocketing unemployment get you down; your Japanese knight in candy-colored armor will soon trot into town on his bug-eyed steed with succor for all. Or at least a more entertaining environment to enjoy whatever hallucinogens you turn to as the recession deepens: The iconic Japanese artist/animator/sculptor/merchandiser Takashi Murakami is opening an L.A. studio in 2009.The LAT reports today that Murakami, the "Japanese Warhol" and low-culture recycler who was received like a rock star at last year's MOCA retrospective, is leasing 9,000 square feet on N. Highland Ave. for his West Coast outpost. He and about 30 employees will commence blowing your mind with variations on Murakami's celebrated cheer-mutants KaiKai and Kiki, who will reportedly receive a feature-length treatment as the artist's housewarming gift to himself:

It's not such a bad thing that Valleywag Calendar will be gone after this week. The scarcity of upcoming events in the Valley means you'll have time to devote to the real things that matter this holiday season-shopping, eating, drinking, oh and family. But before you get festive, there are a few die hard groups still meeting tonight. The Openmoko User Group will be reporting back on their media player testing at the PariSoMa Coworking Space from 6-8 p.m. The Silicon Valley OpenSolaris User Group will be installing the latest bits of 2008.11 OpenSolaris at Sun Microsystems' Santa Clara Campus. And the SF Java Script Meetup will be casual networking about code at CBS Interactive, nee Cnet, at 5:30 p.m. If you really want to indulge your inner dork, DorkBot SF will be at Retox to chat laser cutters, touch screens for live mashups, and space tourism. Fly me to the moon!

Do Barack Obama's "press conferences" and "podiums" and "fancy logos" lead you to believe that the president-elect actually has any power? Fox News has published an explosive expose revealing that the "'office of the president-elect holds no authority" under the Constitution!

Last week, we sent some some spray-on tanning lotion to Ed Liddy, AIG's embattled CEO, just to make up for the pricey junkets that are no longer available to senior execs at the company. But it looks like we may have to send him some coupons, too. Under pressure from Andrew Cuomo, the company has announced it will pay Liddy $1 a year in salary and will also freeze the salaries of seven other top executives. [Dealbook]

[Didn't Lloyd wear sunglasses in that one scene in the car? Oh well. That's Ashley Olsen, one half of the Bobsey Twins, leaving Hermes in LA yesterday; image via WENN]

I could spend all day unspinning Henry Blodget's hyperbolic headlines. "eBay Traffic Plummeting" actually means "eBay traffic gradually declining." Unique visitors for October were off 10 percent from a year ago. That's a much smaller slip than the traffic at my local Starbucks. But still, yeah, we're all gonna die.

Several months ago I found out that someone had hired a private investigator to go blundering around my hometown, harassing old acquaintances and trying to dig up dirt on me. I wrote all about it here. Unfortunately, that wasn't the end of the situation. Another private eye has been asking around about me here in NYC as recently as last week. But here's the good part: I now know who hired the PIs to go after me. They were angry about things I've written. To the culprit(s)—and I know you'll read this—now is your chance to email me and explain yourself. You should do so in the near future. If you don't tell me your story, you may find that someone else has told it for you. [I also know that there are people who knew that this was going on, but who were not responsible themselves, and who believe the whole thing was sleazy. I encourage you to email me as well.]

The year-end demolition derby that is Oscar season is ramping up, and among the next big films to face the gauntlet is Gus Van Sant's Harvey Milk biopic, Milk. Already the recipient of oodles of pre-release buzz (so there, says Focus Features), its release Wednesday will cap a period of real-world gay activism that has unmistakable parallels to the events in the film. Senior editor S.T. VanAirsdale and associate editor Kyle Buchanan have already seen the movie and are ready to share their thoughts; so which editor wanted to see more James Franco, and which wanted to see more of James Franco's stunt phallus? Read on to find out!KB: So, Stu, you and I have both seen one of the year's most anticipated movies, Milk. I'm curious about our reactions, because we both came to from a different place. I saw it before the election, and you saw it after. Also, I'm a gay man, and you're not (aside from that one time at summer camp). STV: True, true. KB: So what did you think of it? STV: I liked it! Well-made prestige Oscar bait. KB: On a scale of 1-10, how would you rate its Van Santyness? Or perhaps, on a scale of Finding Forrester to Gerry? STV: 1 being Finding Forrester, Milk is right around a 3. KB: It's pretty straightforward, except for the occasional fun pop touch. I liked the film too, although I felt it ends better than it begins. The beginning is verrry biopic-y, every introduction is portentous and expositional. STV: It's a problem throughout, though. KB: People say things like, "Let me tell you something, CLEVE JONES..." I am pretty sure I never use people's last names when talking to them. Though maybe I would if I knew they'd be famous one day! STV: Try it with me some time, let's see what happens. KB: Do you think we'll see a single review of this film that won't mention Milk's parallel to Obama, or Prop 8? STV: This one won't be it, I guess. I hope so, though. KB: The Prop 8 stuff is pretty hard to ignore, considering Milk is trying to overturn the anti-gay Prop 6 in the movie. He even makes some remarks, like that the anti-Prop 6 ad campaign was "closeted," that I heard about the "No on 8" campaign. STV: So we need 100 critics saying it's relevant?

Tim Geithner, the president of the New York Federal Reserve Bank, is the next United States Treasury Secretary. That job is suddenly more important than all the other cabinet positions, because the economy is cratering. Is he a good pick, because he's knowledgeable and not a banker and will think big? Or is he a terrible pick because he's a Rubinite and killed Lehman and the whole recession is all his fault? No one knows but many will speculate wildly. A number of Wall Street types—speaking to Times DealBook columnist Andrew Ross Sorkin on the condition of anonymity because the recession is actually their fault—say Geithner is baaaaad. Banking industry experts agree!

What happens when you start laying off investment bankers and magazine editors? Bank robberies go up, naturally. [NYP]

Even though every magazine is dying and Christmas has officially been canceled, one brave publication is soldiering on with an expensive (non-Holiday) festivity anyway. It's Vanity Fair's legendary Oscar party (one year they had colored cigarettes in bowls! It's like the Governor's Ball, only cool!), which was sadly canceled last year because of the Communist writers' strike. Everyone assumed it would be nixed again this year, in light of everyone being broke, but bossman in charge Graydon Carter says it's on, baby:

If you have a romantic view of the ad industry from watching Mad Men, this may end it forever. Yesterday Agency Spy broke the news that the ad industry had ground to a halt (not just because of the recession) as everyone spent their time forwarding a video showing two ad agency people having sex in an office. We speculated that it would eventually come out. And, well, it did. The video is amateurish, and the sex isn't sexy at all. Think more Pete Campbell and less Don Draper. Use discretion, one and all. We've semi-censored it, but it's still probably NSFW.

Say what you want about Lydia Hearst, but she takes her spokesmodel duties seriously. At last night's premiere of Australia at the Zeigfeld Theater, the socialite and erstwhile columnist wore a dress that was, she told the Daily Transom, inspired by the film. But what, exactly, does a floor-length purple halter with Japanese buttons up the side have to do with Baz Luhrmann's epic about an aristocrat and a cattle herder in pre-World War II Australia? "There were actually a lot of Asian seamstresses in Australia during the pre-WWII era," said Lydia. "And you don't see dresses like this anymore." Possibly a good thing, but you be the judge.

Hollywood PrivacyWatch: Shipping With the Stars Edition! 11/24 —I saw JASON PRIESTLEY and his wife, maybe? (a cute blonde) having someone from the UPS store in Toluca Lake bring a dolly-full of boxes from the store to their car. As the parking lot behind the store was packed, we all had to fight to even get out, and I think I may have cut him off… oops… [Hollywood PrivacyWatch is written by and for Defamer readers; send your sightings to tips@defamer.com.]

[Update: Below, the bride-to-be tells us how he proposed... aww.] Remember Washingtonienne Jessica Cutler? She was the young oversharing blogger who got fired from Capitol Hill because she blogged up a storm about her after-work sexual exploits—much of it with older, well-known politicos, some of it paid. Sample blog excerpts: "W = a sugar daddy who wants nothing but anal. Keep trying to end it with him, but the money is too good." She got famous on Wonkette and outed. She turned the debacle into a respectable-selling novel, The Washingtonienne, posed for Playboy, went broke, and inked an HBO deal. Then there were a bunch of rumors that she was working as an escort—or at the very least, was buddies with a madam who provided girls to Eliot Spitzer. But love is to make an honest woman out of her—she's engaged now, reports Wonkette via Reliable Source, to a dude named Charles Rubio. He's a lawyer! Let's learn more about him.

· Lionsgate will distribute More Than a Game, the documentary about LeBron James's high-school years that will be cross-promoted by Nike, Coca-Cola, State Farm and other brands in a much-needed boost for the otherwise underexposed NBA superstar. [Variety] · Fed up with the "barren" film landscape in the US, Taxi Driver screenwriter Paul Schrader is taking his career-defining transgressions to the world's one remaining bastion of angst, fear, profanity and sex: Bollywood. [THR] After the jump: What legendary newslady will spend today in Chicago scarfing up sloppy Obama seconds?· Barbara Walters will follow 60 Minutes' blockbuster lead for ABC, interviewing Barack and Michelle Obama for a one-hour ABC News special airing Wednesay at 10 p.m. [THR] · His gawky, browbeaten work here is done: Fox News's resident liberal punching bag Alan Colmes is departing Hannity & Colmes at the end of the year. [Variety] · Producer-director Barry Sonnenfeld is attached to develop the book Things a Man Should Never Do Past 30 as a series for CBS. [THR] · Donations are now being accepted for the food drive "Feed the Need," a Jamie Foxx-endorsed tie-in with his movie The Soloist. In keeping with the themes of the film, however, donors are kindly asked to supply meals that will keep for at least six months in storage without spoiling. [Variety]

Pownce cutie-in-chief Leah Culver gets a lot of hate from Valley boys. Guys, don't hate her because she's beautiful. Love her because she suffers, just like you. First at the hands of a cheating man, second at the hands of the Valleywag scumbucket who posts her unpublished 2 A.M. tweet about it:

♦ Graydon Carter says Vanity Fair plans to go ahead with its annual Oscar party, but "the party will be a much more intimate affair than in years past; we're going to scale back the guest list considerably." [DH]
♦ No replacement is planned for Alan Colmes: Fox News plans to have Sean Hannity serve as solo host of the nightly show. [NYT]
♦ Ted Koppel is parting ways with the Discovery Channel. [NYT]
♦ Looks like OK! has been cutting back on copy editors. The cover of the new issue misspells Ashlee Simpson's name. [HuffPo]