In your troubling Wednesday media column: layoffs at Conde Nast and the Boston Globe, Bill Keller fights back, King's officially dead, North Korea's still mean to journalists, and more:

Dispatches from the land of Twitteronia: Penelope Trunk and Brooke Hammerling wrestled with their relationships, while Jason Pontin and Chris Lehmann wrestled with the facts. These are the fights Twitter always wins:

Earlier we heard a rumor that struggling Conde Nast was planning to lay off its full-time receptionists. And we've received more corroboration that it's (kinda?) true! What sort of bootleg operation is this?

Unthinkable: a tipster tells us that over at Conde Nast—where the good times are over—all the "regular" secretaries have been laid off. What now—freelance secretaries? Irregular, damaged secretaries? Email us with info.

• NBC is chopping 6 shows, including, yes, the Chopping Block. [THR]
• It's rumored Budget Travel has, yes, cut its budget. [Gawker]
• Another stain on Jim Cramer, not that he needs it: In '07, he called Andrew Cuomo a "communist" for proposing mortgage industry regulation. [NYT]
• The Times's Bill Keller sheds some light on yesterday's cuts and layoffs. [E&P]
• Condé Nast's Chuck Townsend sheds light on his staff changes. [AdAge]
• Lionsgate slashed 8 percent of its staff today. [THR]
• Newspaper ad revenue dropped 17.7% in 2008. [E&P]
• Americans spend 8.5 hours a day consuming video content. [NYT]
• Facebook needs a (generous) friend: It's trying to raise $100 million. [PC]
• Cable company Charter Communications is officially bankrupt. [NYT]

• It's been a dark day at the New York Times: Arthur Sulzberger Jr. and Janet Robinson announced a five percent salary reduction for all editors and said 100 employees on the business side would be laid off. [Gawker, NYO, NYT]
• Blender has been shuttered; April will be the mag's last issue. [AdAge]
• The Washington Post is offering buyouts again. And if enough people don't take 'em, the paper says a round of layoffs will follow. [Politico]
• Richard Beckman is out as Condé Nast's marketing chief; he'll be heading up the company's Fairchild Fashion Group instead. [WSJ, Crains]
• It's getting a little stormy over at the Weather Channel! [NYP]
• Rod Blagojevich may have some sort of reality show in the works. [CST]
• ABC News has settled a lawsuit filed against Diane Sawyer. [NYP]
• Barry Diller is the proud new owner of SportsPickle.com. [PaidContent]
• The most newspaper-friendly city in America? Rochester! [E&P]

In your sun-dappled Wednesday media column: Newspapers crumble like so many sandcastles at high tide, Rupert Murdoch's still rich, Choire has a contest, and J-school is changing. Not enough:

Richard Beckman—formerly head of the Conde Nast Media Group, which handles the company's biggest and most exclusive advertisers—is now the President and C.E.O. of Conde's Fairchild Fashion Group. That's a demotion. Backstory:

• Matt Lauer's "deer incident" won't keep him down for long. He's reportedly in "good spirits" after undergoing surgery yesterday to repair a separated shoulder and will be back to work in a few days. [Star]
• How did Bruce Willis meet his new wife, Emma Heming? He picked her out during a casting call, just like any normal person. [P6]
• Lindsay Lohan is sick of "people telling lies" about her since she's "really a good person" who just wants to put in a honest day's work. Got that? Good. [People, Us]
• Barbara Walters is planning to quit ABC in the near future so she can "spend more time with her boyfriend, Dr. Robert Butler." Or at least that's what "industry insiders" are telling the Enquirer. [NE]
• The cutbacks at Condé Nast continue: Editors like David Remnick and Ruth Reichl have been forced to take the subway! [NYP]

• You can rest easier now: Now that he's no longer planning to run for Senate, Chris Matthews has signed a new four-year contract with MSNBC. [NYT]
• Howard Dean has signed on to be a CNBC contributor. [HP]
• Major media companies are now looking for a bailout. From Google. [AdAge]
• Jay Leno's chat with Obama was his fourth most-watched show ever. [LAT]
• Some perks may be curtailed at Condé Nast. Like the one that allowed Portfolio editor Joanne Lipman to fly to Davos first-class, possibly. [NYP]
• Advance Publications is instituting mandatory 10-day furloughs and a pension freeze at nearly all of its daily papers, says Steve Newhouse. [E&P]
• Time publisher Don Fries is headed out the door. [NYP]
• NBC is very good at spinning the Times, in case you haven't noticed. [CJR]
• Knowing starring Nic Cage was No. 1 at the box office this weekend. [NYDN]

• Further evidence CNN's Jon Klein should start polishing his resume: The network continues to trail Fox News, MSNBC, and Headline News. [Portfolio]
• Obama's performance on The Tonight Show will keep people talking for awhile (and not in a good way, clearly), but the ratings were huge. [Time, THR]
• The April issue of Portfolio is the slimmest in Condé Nast's history. [NYP]
• Charla Lawhon is stepping down as managing editor of In Style. [WWD]
• Your prayers have been answered: VH1 is reviving Behind the Music. [NYP]
• Bob Pittman says the ad industry should get a bailout, too. [Fortune]
• Fox News's Greta Van Susteren is denying her husband is a paid adviser to Sarah Palin, but she admits that he gives her advice and "helps" her. [HP]
• SpiralFrog, the glitzy music site that launched in 2006, has gone bust. [PC]
• Broadway dimmed the lights last night in honor of Natasha Richardson. [THR]

Tiniest Condé Nast magazine ever: the 106-page April Portfolio.

In your outrageously newsy Wednesday media column: a PR conspiracy theory for Us Weekly, updates on Conde Nast layoffs and Interview cheapskate-ness, Steve Bartelstein vanishes, and trade mags start wheezing:

These are difficult times for Condé Nast. AdAge reported yesterday the publishing giant is planning to slash the ad sales group managed by Richard Beckman; today, Keith Kelly of the Post reports some of the company's flagship titles have seen a 30 to 40 percent decline in revenues, and the company has "taken a dagger to its corporate pension plan" in order to reduce costs. Meanwhile, the Observer's John Koblin reports chairman Si Newhouse and CEO Chuck Townsend have asked editors to trim their discretionary budgets (which includes items like messengers, first-class airfare, and car services), and says a broader round of job cuts is inevitable. Of course, it's hard for any editor to trim his or her own staff—and it can be difficult for top execs to take a step back and see the absurd spending when they're so close to it.

Joanne Lipman, the diva editor of Portfolio, is becoming known for her disastrous cover decisions. The worst, perhaps, involved the president and Annie Leibovitz.

It looks like Condé Nast editors will indeed have to cut their budgets another 10 percent, as previously suspected, including through layoffs in both advertising and editorial. But what will happen to the swankness?

Conde Nast could really use some good news. Instead, today's news is that the company is planning cuts in its media group, which handles its biggest advertisers and marketers. That's even worse than it sounds.

• Jon Stewart's smackdown of Jim Cramer last week generated some of the biggest ratings The Daily Show has ever seen, not surprisingly. [MediaPost]
• Portfolio editor Joanne Lipman has once again defied logic (and some of her Condé colleagues) by putting Sarah Palin on the cover of the new issue. [WWD]
• Condé Nast is expected to trim Richard Beckman's ad sales group. [AdAge]
• Liberal activists have launched a petition drive targeted at CNBC. [AP]
• ICM's Esther Newberg has sold a memoir by Paul Allen to Penguin. [Crains]
• More on Eric Siminoff's split from Lynn Nesbit and Mort Janklow. [NYO]
• Mel Karmazin sounds off on his fight to redeem Sirius and his rep. [Fortune]
• Ratings for Donald Trump's Celebrity Apprentice continue to slide. [AdAge]
• 60 Minutes is the "hottest show on TV." Who knew? [Newsweek]

What is wrong with Joanne Lipman? Does the Portfolio editor detest business journalism? Is she trying to finally get fired? There must be some reason she's putting Sarah Palin on next month's cover.

Michael Wolff is a lousy husband and, as we learned today, a lousy son-in-law, too. If you'd like to take a look at the lawsuit filed against Wolff and his wife by 85-year-old Edith Anthoine—she claims the pair tried to force her out of her apartment—we posted a copy of it below. Earlier we listed one way Condé Nast could save a few bucks as it embarks on another round of budget cuts. Here's one more: terminate Michael Wolff's contract with Vanity Fair. We're no lawyers or anything, but we have a feeling that sleeping with an intern constitutes just cause.