Time Inc. is cutting six percent of its work force, or 600 people. [NYT]

♦ J. Crew is absolutely delighted Michelle Obama mentioned the brand on The Tonight Show last night. It's already the basis of an online ad campaign. [Jezebel, Politico]
♦ The Olsens celebrated the launch of their book at Barneys last night, after which MK celebrated into the night at Bungalow 8 and Lit. Today the duo signed books at Barnes & Noble, where they were greeted by PETA protesters in masks. [style file, OK!]
♦ Rachel Roy is just like you and me: She relishes going to vintage stores in small towns because "they aren't picked over by designers like New York is." As for whose style she most admires? Lauren Santo Domingo's. [FabSugar]
♦ You may have balked at Tom Ford's $9,240 otter fur boots, but you'll feel silly on the beach at St. Barts this winter without his $475 tanning goggles! [style file]

A research company is looking for volunteers willing to fly to Paris to evaluate the impact of jet lag on the human body. You'll get a free round-trip ticket and $2,500 in cash for your trouble. What could be the bad news? Did we mention you'll be confined to a research facility once you arrive, and you'll be pumped with a drug used to treat narcolepsy while you're there? [JetLagStudy.net, NYDN]

♦ Just what you need in these lean times: a handy map of recession specials at restaurants across the city. [Eater]
♦ Iron Chef Masaharu Morimoto went on a ramen tasting tour through the East Village and—surprise—gave David Chang's Momofuku top honors. [GS]
♦ Allen & Delancey chef Neil Ferguson has left his two-star home for "moral and personal reasons" to join Soho House as executive chef. [Eater]

It looks like private equity exec Leigh Abramson is holding up just fine amid the global financial crisis. The former Morgan Stanley Capital Partners honcho and managing director of Metalmark Capital picked up a duplex at 941 Park Avenue for $12.5 million, $2 million less than what the apartment was originally listed for back in April. (Abramson's timing also worked out in his favor: Metalmark was acquired by Citigroup in late 2007, back when the bank was still overpaying for acquisitions.) According to the listing, the five-bedroom apartment was the longtime home of the late pianist Arthur Rubinstein; now Abramson will get to chat about the unraveling economy with fellow resident Stan O'Neal, the disgraced former CEO of Merrill Lynch. Click through for a few photos and a floorplan of the spread.

A mortgage exec (and hardcore Jets fan) named David Findel was the one who paid $400,000 for the rights to the two best seats at the team's new Meadowlands stadium. (The bad news: The team only sold off 620 of the 2,000 licenses in the exclusive "Coaches Section" of the stadium.) The losers: Gary Vaynerchuk, the owner of winelibrary.com, and restaurateur Drew Nieporent. [NYP, Crain's]

Huffington Post reporter Jason Linkins and Ana Marie Cox on the closing of Radar last week: "It should have been Portfolio." Video after the jump.

The stock market rebounded a bit today, but the economic outlook for New York is turning increasingly grim. Gov. David Paterson announced today that he's now expecting the budget gap for next year to be $12.5 billion, almost double what was projected a few months ago. [NYT]

Nello Balan's Nello on Madison Avenue and his Hamptons outpost, Nello Summertimes, were both seized by the IRS for tax evasion this morning, reports Eater. Details are still a bit sketchy at this point and it remains unclear when the restaurants will reopen. (We're guessing anyone with a reservation for tonight is out of luck.) Also unclear: whether Nello's ghost-related travails, which were covered by the Times this past weekend, had anything to do with the bust. [Eater]

Despite few signs the economy is truly improving (not to mention a good deal of bad news today, like consumer confidence at an all-time low), the Dow jumped nearly 900 points today—its second-greatest point gain ever—as investors looked for bargains and eagerly awaited news of an interest rate cut. The S&P gained 10.7 percent and the Nasdaq was up 9.5 percent on the day, which means instead of photos of sad traders, the news media is now showing off much happier (and cuter) ones. Finally! [WSJ, NYT]

James Kurisunkal is the boy wonder behind Park Avenue Peerage, the blog that breathlessly catalogs life in the 10021 social bubble. If you keep up with the Upper East Side hierarchy and you've ever wondered how Kurisunkal (pictured here with the Tinz) interacts with the young ladies he showers with attention, a look at the lengthy email correspondence between James and embattled novelist/socialite Tatiana Boncompagni may enlighten you. The email was forwarded to us as evidence that Tatiana has been passing herself off as the daughter of an Italian princess. More interesting, though, is how Kurisunkal asks Tatiana to change a reference in her novel from "Park Avenue Peerage" to "Fashion Week Daily" (the passage in question is describing a website that gets fed items by publicists), how the PAP founder says he holds his "website to a higher standard [than] Vogue [and] W," and just how much leverage you can get from sending James big boxes of cookies on a regular basis. Also? He's no fan of Anisha Lakhani and Kristian Laliberte, in case you're keeping track at home. The full email below.

Credit Suisse is laying off another 500 people, adding to the 1,565 people who were canned earlier this year. [Bloomberg]

Former hedge fund manager Sam Israel sure has a talent for putting off the inevitable. The former financier faked his own death to avoid jail time back in June, then got a judge to postpone his sentencing twice so he could get treatment for his addiction to methadone in August and September. Now a judge has delayed his sentencing yet again so he can undergo a 90-day medical evaluation in North Carolina. His next court date isn't scheduled until February 2009. [Bloomberg via Dealbreaker]

♦ The battle over Project Runway rages on: Harvey Weinstein is now claiming that Bravo intentionally undermined the success of Season 5 by changing the show's airtime, running "mundane and unappealing" ads, and "revealing spoilers about future episodes." [THR]
♦ Barack Obama will appear on The Daily Show tomorrow night. [AP]
♦ The New York Times is not running out of money, say execs at the paper. [NYO]
♦ MSNBC moved into second place in the primetime cable news race, beating CNN for the month of October. [THR]

As you probably suspected, luxury hotels are feeling the pinch as the economy spirals downward. It's not just the fact that tourists are no longer interested in paying $1,750 a night for a room when their brokerage accounts are imploding at the same time. The corporate travel market is shifting, too, and some companies are shying away from sending employees to fancy hotels for fear that bad press will follow when people find out that these are the same companies laying people off right and left. Imagine that!

A few months back, M.I.A, the Brooklyn-by-way-of-London singer who derives her enthusiastically touted cred from her father's former existence as a Tamil Tiger terrorist, was thinking about abandoning our fair shores. Thank goodness she didn't, because we need brave cultural vanguardists like her to remind us that rich people are ruining the creative heart of New York! In an interview with artist Kehinde Wiley, M.I.A.—who also says she misses "being a real human," like when she lived in Sri Lanka "in the middle of a war and I was getting shot at"—bemoans the fact that "it's just become impossible for young, creative artists to live in New York."

The video above documents a bit of vigilante art outside a Washington Mutual branch in California. We've yet to see any branches in New York get painted over with a mural illustrating the plunging price of WaMu stock during the month of October, but here's hoping! [GoAbove via Urban Prankster]

The deadliest avenues in New York City, according to the Tri-State Transportation Campaign? Third Avenue and Broadway, just in case you were wondering. [City Room]

Sienna Miller and Balthazar Getty making out on the sidewalk in the West Village ... Jessica Alba and Cash Warren walking in Brooklyn with baby Honor ... Michelle Williams taking daughter Matilda to the doctor's office, then getting in a car with Spike Jonze ... Eva Mendes on the set of her new film ... Daniel Radcliffe jogging on the sidewalk ... Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes leaving the American Felt building with Suri ... Dina and Ali Lohan attending a Halloween charity event ... America Ferrera on the set of Ugly Betty in Gramercy Park ... Lauren Conrad posing for photos outside the Letterman show, and later going out with her new boyfriend Kyle Howard ... and Pink leaving the Alexander McQueen store on West 14th.

The feud between Tatiana and Natasha Boncompagni gets messier, and nastier, by the minute. Just in case you've missed the story thus far, Tatiana Boncompagni is the author of the chick lit novel Gilding Lily and has been working on a new book called Hedge Fund Wives. Natasha is her sister and claims she co-authored Hedge Fund Wives—in fact, she says the story is largely based on her own Wall Street career—but was then cut out of the deal by Tatiana, who she says has "a history of lying." Tatiana is insisting it was solely her work and that her sister simply offered "input," and has filed suit against Natasha for claiming partial credit, and for copying the manuscript from her computer and posting part of the manuscript online in an act of retribution. Natasha, for her part, is upset her sister has denied her role in writing the book, and is countering with various—and potentially very damaging—claims. Following so far? Good. After the jump, more from the Boncompagni scandal and a few scandalous emails, too.