anchors

Media Bubble: More Martha! Yay!

Jesse · 01/12/06 02:30PM

• Martha Stewart is planning a new mag, this one for "modern, multitasking" women aged 25 to 45. Most significant: In a shocking bout of narcissism-suppression, it's called "Blueprint," not "Martha Stewart Blueprint." [NYP]
• Sumner Redstone — who may or may not have been in a senile flight of nonsense when he said it — claims to dream of combining CNN and his CBS News. Just like Steve Brill suggested, oh, seven years ago. [B&C]
• Dana Stevens's take on Vargas and Woodruff: Fine, competent, but definitely not PJ. [Slate]
• Jonathan Dahl is the new editor of SmartMoney. [NYT]

Media Bubble: Nobody Likes Barney Anymore

Jesse · 01/03/06 02:40PM

• Oh, bad job, Keller and Sulzberger. Finally public editor Barney Calame grows a pair and decides to write about something interesting and relevant — why you chose to hold the domestic-spying store for a year — and you guys promptly snip them off. Now he'll never work up the nerve again, alas. [NYT]
• The Elizabeth-and-Bob show starts at ABC News tonight, and we're pretty sure the senior citizens who still watch the evening newscasts are aquiver with excitement. That, or Parkinson's. One of the two. [USAT]
• Last week Forbes said WashPostCo would be the Journal. Now Jim Cramer says Murdoch will. [NYM]
• Joel Stein and Maureen Dowd are feuding. God knows who to root for. [LAT]
• 2005 was, essentially, Vanity Fair's very bestest year ever. [WWD]
• Rumor has it the Underneath the Robes dude is set to become the new Wonkette. Hmm. Interesting. [WSJ; NYO]
NYT lurves NY1. [NYT]
• Chung and Povitch have a new show and think they're Hepburn and Tracey. Which is sort of cute, in a deluded way. [NYM]

IWantMedia Wants Anderson Want Media, Needs Anderson to Need Media

Jesse · 01/03/06 01:52PM

Patrick Phillips of IWantMedia today checks in with the man he picked as 2005's Media Person of the Year, our beloved Anderson Cooper. They talk about the future of TV news, about A.C.'s anchoring style, about Details magazine, and about — natch — premature grayness. Allow us, if we may, to highlight just a few favorite Coop quotes from the exchange:

And We Thought His Modeling Career Ended Decades Ago

Jesse · 12/28/05 09:21AM

We don't know how old this vintage poster for sale on eBay is, we don't know what kind of shape it's in, and we don't know if it's worth any real money. Most important, though, we also had no idea that Anderson Cooper has been doing ad campaigns for French cologne.

Media Bubble: With Brownridge Going, Wenner Seeks Someone New to Bully

Jesse · 12/23/05 11:00AM

• Megalomaniacal Jann Wenner is now picking on Us editor Janice Min, which doesn't seem like a smart thing to do. [WWD]
• Now The Washington Post has a staff blogger, too. [Washingtonian]
• Jon Friedman visits an EW focus group and finds that subscribers really, really love the magazine. Freakishly so, to be honest. [MW]
Daily News readers overwhelming think Bob Schieffer should stay on permanently as the CBS Evening News anchor, according to Richard Huff's "highly unscientific" poll. [NYDN]
• If you look really closely, you can find Warren Buffett's hand in Time's Person of the Year issue. No, it's not holding cash. [NYP]

Media Bubble: Whither 'amNew York'?

Jesse · 12/22/05 02:13PM

• The strike's overlooked victims: Those freebie papers you don't really want to read but grab anyway when the dude shoves them at on your way into the subway station. [NYP]
CBS Evening News will — finally — be No. 2 within a few months, and Katie Couric will eventually be its next anchor, outgoing EP Jim Murphy predicts. [Phil. Inquirer]
• Now Al Sharpton says he won't do the proposed Al in the Family sitcom. This sort of breaks our heart, not least because we spend all that time a few weeks ago Photoshopping his head onto Carroll O'Connor's body. [AP via USAT]

Sapping the Life from Our Anderson

Jesse · 12/16/05 09:19AM


Life mag has always been famous for its great photography — back in the old days, by legends like Alfred Eistenstaedt and Margaret Bourke-White and Cornell Capa. So it's nice to see that in its latest incarnation — as a thin, flailing, weekly newspaper insert — Life continues that tradition of groundbreaking images. Like this week, for example, when it splashes on its cover perhaps the only unattractive picture we've ever seen of anchorhunk Anderson Cooper. He looks so sad, so wrinkled, so haggard, so in need of moisturizing. Oh, cheer up, little Andy. You'll be back in dapper Details photo spreads in no time.

Media Bubble: Also, Brian Williams Is Ready for His Closeup

Jesse · 12/08/05 02:58PM

• ABC's Vargas and Woodruff announcement, says Tina Brown, proves that Norma Desmond is still big, it's the networks that got small. [WP]
• Newspapers! Not in as bad shape as you think they are! (Not yet, at least.) [NYT]
• Last week, the Today show hit 10 straight years — 520 weeks — as the top-rated morning show. Which we're sure will somehow be construed as further evidence of Katie Couric's divaness. [NYT]
BusinessWeek to shutter overseas editions. [NYT]

Media Bubble: Has Bravo's 'NYDN' Show Losts Its Stars?

Jesse · 12/07/05 01:20PM

• Will Michael Cooke's NYDN departure cause problems for Bravo reality show about the paper? Even worse: What about Hud Morgan's departure? [NYP]
• Jon Friedman thinks ABC fucked up its anchor decision. [MW]
• Even so, ABC's changes give a glimpse at CBS's future. [NYO]
• How did Us get the Nick-and-Jessica scoop? Through Dan Klores, the publicist the mag and the couple share, according to Access Hollywood. [MIN]
• Maureen may be everywhere these days, but the books she's flogging is "a glib, d j vu compendium of every Newsweek-style pop-science zeitgeist piece of the last 15 years." [VV]
• NYT Co. announces ad hikes, a $40M cost for layoffs. And says it won't give any earnings guidance for 2006, which can't be a good sign. [NYT]
The Source is evicted from its offices. Which can't be a good sign. [NYP]

Media Bubble: Whither Wenner

Jesse · 12/06/05 03:45PM

• Does Jann want to sell off Wenner Media? [WWD]
• And does Time Warner no longer want to sell off part of AOL? [NYT]
• Former Regan Media flack Paul Crichton could be considering suing his old boss Judith over her characterization of his departure. Oh, the fun never stops over there. [Radar]
Washington Post Magazine Reader Peter Carlson discovers the charms of erstwhile New York Presser and onetime Spicoli gondolier Matt Taibbi. [WP]
• ABC went with Vargas and Woodruff only after the network couldn't reach a deal with Charlie Gibson. [NYT]
• And apparently there's this cool blog revolutionizing Hollywood coverage. [LA Mag]

Vargas and Woodruff Are New ABC News Anchors

Jesse · 12/05/05 11:57AM

Eight months after Peter Jennings last anchored World News Tonight, and four months after his untimely death, ABC News has announced that Bob Woodruff and Elizabeth Vargas will become the new permanent co-anchors of the broadcast. There are also a host of changes coming to the show. According the ABC announcement:

Media Bubble: TWX, NYT, NBC, CBS, and CNP. And Canada, Too.

Jesse · 11/30/05 04:29PM

• Investor Carl Icahn signs on Bruce Wasserstein's Lazard to join in his crusade against Time Warner management. New York feature on Icahn's clever business strategy TK soon. [NYT]
NYT Mag bigthinker Michael Ignatieff leaves magazine, Harvard gig, and the country to rescue his native Canada from its political crisis. NYU bigthinker Noah Feldman, recently signed up as Times Mag contributing writer, seems set to replace Ignatieff there. [NYP]
• Steve Capus named president of NBC News. [NYT]
• And Rome Hartman, 60 Minutes vet, named executive producer of the still-anchorless CBS Evening News. [NYT]
• Dear Les Moonves: For the love of God, please don't make Katie Couric the CBS anchor. Please. Love, Jon Friedman. [MW]
• Conde's standard Christmas directions aren't good enough for Anna. [WWD]

The Alessandra Stanley Watch: Perhaps It's All a Cry for Help

Jesse · 11/22/05 10:32AM

We read La Stanley's tribute to Ted Koppel in this morning's paper, and we were doubly pleased. First, because it was a nice, appropriate farewell to an esteemed and accomplished journalist, and second because the error-prone writer seemed to have made her way through a full 900 words without any obvious fuckups. Then we read TVNewser, who reminded us of this sentence in Stanley's piece:

Media Bubble: Scocca Hits Because He Loves

Jesse · 11/16/05 02:10PM

• Come on, Pinch, you're breaking poor Tom Scocca's heart. [NYO]
• Was Bob Woodward the first reporter to learn of Valerie Plame's identity? And why didn't he mention that to anyone till now? [WP]
• Ah, but at least Ben Bradlee says it's OK Woodward didn't tell his nominal bosses. [E&P]
• Turns out Bush-crony public-broadcasting chief Kenneth Tomlinson — you know, the guy determined to get more conservatives on PBS — broke all sorts of laws and regulations. [NYT]
• Who's to blame for Arrested Development's (latest) demise. America, obviously. [NYO]
• Rupert: This internet thing is gonna be huge! [Hollywood Reporter]
• What reference in a headline will conclusively show that boomer media dominance is over? [Slate]
• MSNBC's Chris Matthews name-drops, and Jon Friedman loves him anyway. [MW]

Media Bubble: Right-Wingers Like Judy. Imagine That.

Jesse · 11/14/05 12:01PM

• Is Judy Miller now a right-wing hero? Wait, what was she before the war, then? [NYM]
• Andrew Sullivan to move his blog to Time.com. Sellout! MSM! All those other things we're supposed to say! Yada yada yada. [NYP]
• Bob Schieffer to stay longer as CBS Evening News anchor. [NYT]
Times to launch quarterly sports mag. [NYP]
Esquire likes undulating apartments. [NYT]
• Google considers offering book rentals, sort of. [Reuters via Yahoo]
• Ruth Reichl reads The Bruni Digest. Bruni doesn't. Or so he says. [AP via Yahoo]

Media Bubble: Please Go Away, Maureen

Jesse · 11/09/05 03:04PM

Are Men Necessary? is "a very odd, occasionally entertaining mish-mash of politics and sex, biology and Cosmopolitan-ology, gravity and wit, insight and carelessness." We don't care what it is; we'd just like to stop hearing about it. [NYO]
• And Maureen should go away for a while, too. [MW]
• Republican senators want another investigation of a leak to reporters. You know, because the last one worked out so well for their party. [WP]
• Anna Wintour may or may not be out to kill The Devil Wears Prada film. [Radar]
Teen People lands racist teenie-boppers Prussian Blue, who apprently think — wrongly — they'll be getting editorial control. Isn't it fun to pull one over on Nazis? [NYP]
• Memogate producer Mary Mapes was right and everyone else was wrong, insists Memogate producer Mary Mapes. [WP]
• Less demand than expected for lunch with Rupert Murdoch. Which is fine news indeed. [Guardian]
• HBO documentary chief likes both highbrow and porn, and, likely, she'll soon snag Ted Koppel. [NYP]
• Apparently, Esquire had cool covers in the sixties. [MB]
• Meet Judy Miller without traveling to Sag Harbor — only $375! [HuffPost]
• As a kid, New Yorker essayist Adam Gopnik used to sneak out after bedtime — to read. Which is somehow unsurprising. [S.F. Chronicle]
• 135K paid users have signed up for TimesSelect. As if you can't get more than enough Maureen for free these days. [E&P]
• Anderson Cooper does the self-deprecating shtick well, too. [Philadelphia Inquirer]
• Prediction: New ABC anchors will be Elizabeth Vargas and Bob Woodruff. Peter, however, would have wanted Charlie Gibson. [Newsday]
• Because one is never enough, negotiations continue at the Times continue over another fired reporter. [Media Mob/NYO]
• No one wants to read TV Guide offshoot Inside TV. [WWD]